| ||||
Mail and Guardian
Johannesburg, South Africa
28 March
2006 09:01
Harare city council plans to splash out
Z$1,45-trillion to buy
329 sedans and pick-up trucks for its managers and
field staff, Zimbabwe's
Herald newspaper reported on
Tuesday.
Its website said the purchase would be made with
money the city
intended borrowing from the open market.
About Z$1,1-trillion would be used to buy 183 one-tonne trucks,
at an
average cost of Z$6-billion apiece.
Another Z$42-billion
would go towards the purchase of 90 sedans
going for Z$3,6-billion
each.
Other items in the huge capital lending budget were
several
"executive" desks, each of which costing over
Z$50-million.
The council is also planning to buy office
chairs and
refrigerators that will cost several hundreds of millions of
Zimbabwean
dollars.
Borrowing the money from the open
market at current interest
levels means rates, tariffs and other municipal
charges would have to be
increased.
This would be vital
for the city to be able to service the debt,
implying an increased burden on
ratepayers.
According to the current exchange rate one South
African rand is
worth more than 15 000 Zimbabwean dollars. - Sapa
Business Day
Dumisani
Muleya
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Harare
Correspondent
ZIMBABWEAN President Robert Mugabe is reinforcing the
country's armoury of
repressive laws in a bid to counter rising opposition
as economic and social
conditions deteriorate.
After recently
drafting a law allowing the interception of telephone and
e-mail
communications, the government has gazetted a new bill to deal with
international terrorists and their local collaborators - who often tend to
be opposition members, in the view of authorities.
Zimbabwe has
an arsenal of repressive laws, including the Public Order and
Security Act,
the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act, the
Broadcasting
Act, the Official Secrets Act, the Criminal Law (Codification
and Reform)
Act and the proposed Interception of Communications Bill.
Government
intends to amend the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act to
tighten it. The
proposed bill, the Suppression of Foreign and International
Terrorism, will
worsen the situation, taking the country further down the
path of a police
state.
Zimbabwe is already the most repressive country in southern
Africa, with
more infrastructure for repression than Swaziland and Lesotho,
the last
outposts of monarchical rule in the region.
The
Suppression of Foreign and International Terrorism bill provides for
measures to deal with international terrorism, including mercenary
activity.
It makes it an offence to undergo training for foreign or
international
terrorism, to recruit persons to undergo such training, or to
possess
weaponry for the purposes of terrorism.
The maximum
penalty under the proposed law for such offences would be life
imprisonment.
It also makes it an offence to knowingly harbour or conceal a
foreign or
international terrorist or to fail to report such a terrorist
within 72
hours of becoming aware of his or her presence.
The maximum penalties
for such an offence would be a fine or 10 years in
jail.
The
proposal comes against the background of a recent arms cache discovery
in
which opposition Movement for Democratic Change members were arrested for
allegedly plotting with a foreign terrorist group, the Zimbabwe Freedom
Movement, and former apartheid-sponsored Mozambican rebel movement Renamo to
kill Mugabe.
March 28, 2006.
By Andnetwork .com
FARMERS owe Agribank nearly $1 trillion in
unpaid loans advanced to
them to finance various farming activities last
season. Agribank's chief
executive Mr Sam Malaba yesterday said the bank was
owed a total of $909,5
billion.
"Agribank's loan book
currently stands at $2,3 trillion and of that
amount some $909,5 billion was
already in arrears as at 28 February 2006.
"This is mainly due to droughts
we have had in the past few years," Mr
Malaba said.
In the
2005/06 season, the bank advanced $1,4 trillion and $640
billion was
extended through the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe loan facility.
"Most of the
loans granted last year will only be paid back when farmers
start marketing
the crops which are on the ground and now it is only at the
end of the
marketing season," he said.
"The only crop which we financed last
year that has been marketed is
winter wheat which we extended loans
totalling $284,6 billion and we
realised a 67 percent loan repayment."
Agribank has since set up a debt
recovery unit to make follow-ups on
defaulting farmers.
"As a way of reducing these arrears and also on
improving our loan
repayments, Agribank has established a debt recovery unit
and this unit has
debt recovery managers and debt recovery officers
stationed at provincial
level to follow up all outstanding loans at each
provincial office," he
said.
Farmers who have failed to honour
their debts have been blacklisted,
making them ineligible for additional
financing unless they were paid up.
But, the issue of defaulting farmers has
been a thorn in the flesh for
Agribank. Indications were that the majority
of farmers who accessed funds
under the Agribank's loan facilities were
defaulting on payment and in the
process threatening the revolving nature of
the facility.
The bank said the figure reflected "crop failure
caused by severe
drought of 2004/05 cropping season and wilful default in
some cases." In
recent months, Agribank has also come under fire from
farmers and economic
commentators who blamed the firm for failing to
synchronise its systems to
ensure farmers met their end of the bargain
through timely repayments.
Literally, Agribank has been lending to
farmers and then forgetting
about reimbursements until other farmers came in
to apply for new loans.
Agribank has been lending at concessionary annual
interest rates of between
five percent for winter wheat crops and 50 percent
for other crops without
collateral.
Source : The Herald
| ||||
Zim Daily
Tuesday, March 28 2006 @ 12:05 AM BST
Contributed by:
correspondent
By Dumisani Nkomo
The Zimbabwe
crisis does not need to be described, as it has
become obvious to all. So,
to attempt to redefine it would be a grave insult
to the collective
intelligence of the nation. I will, therefore, attempt to
depict 10 possible
scenarios, which may obtain from the current situation,
which will enable
Zimbabwe to pull herself from this quagmire.
I will attempt
to present a number of scenarios and critically
evaluate their practicality,
worth and effectiveness. The first option, of
course, is Organised Mass
Action. This is the most talked about and least
practiced option. It looks
to me the one in March 2003 called for by the MDC
was the only real success.
Organised stay aways by the ZCTU and the National
Constitutional Assembly
have been massive flops largely due to poor
organisation, ill-conceived
timing, lack of consultation with relevant
stakeholders, a culture of apathy
and fear amongst the general masses of the
population and the existence of
oppressive laws such as the Public Order and
Security Act and repressive
State apparatus such as the quasi-military units
in the form of Zanu PF
militia as well as a ruthless police, intelligence
and military system.The
conditions are ripe for such an action, but the
nation does not seem
sufficiently motivated to resort to this option.
The second
option is Spontaneous Mass Action - an option highly
favoured by the MDC and
many other Zimbabweans. It does not place
responsibility for action squarely
on the shoulders of an individual, party
or institute, but relies on
somebody, somewhere in some fuel or bread queue
saying enough is enough.
Spontaneous mass action has emerged as a favourite
option for the following
reasons: It cannot be easily contained by the
brutal State security
apparatus because it may start anywhere and spread
anywhere. It is difficult
to pinpoint leaders of such an action and to
isolate or incarcerate them. It
is a demonstration of people, which may
appeal even to individuals in the
State security apparatus as evidenced in
Romania and the former Yugoslavia.
The economic climate is ripe for such an
action as evidenced by fuel queues
and food shortages. Food shortages have
always been a trigger for
revolution.
The third option can be labelled the Palace Coup.
This theory
supports the implosion scenario whereby the President, who has
emerged as
the personification of the Zimbabwe crisis, is ousted by his own
colleagues
in the ruling party. This option seemed to be an unfolding
reality when he
was on holiday in Malaysia. This option can only work if the
conspirators
have the support of the military and, therefore, are limited to
those who
have a measure of influence in the military. This option appears
to be quite
appealing for the following reasons: Historically, even the most
powerful of
empire builders such as Julius Caesar and Tshaka the Great were
eliminated
by those closest to them and not by distant enemies. There is
great pressure
on sections of Zanu PF for the displacement of the old
order.
The fourth option is a Military Takeover. But this is
an
unlikely and undesirable option as African history has proved that
military
takeovers have resulted in military dictatorships. The perceived
"saviours
of the people" may soon become ensconced in an eternal transition
to
civilian power, as was the case with Ibrahim Babangida in Nigeria and
Ghana's Jerry Rawlings who later transformed himself into a civilian
president albeit by democratic consent. Zimbabwe has suffered under a
one-man one-party dictatorship and a military takeover may be suicidal and
genocidal to the emergence of democracy in Zimbabwe. This option should not
be encouraged, supported or celebrated by peace-loving
Zimbabweans.
The fifth option is a rerun of the presidential
election through
the courts. As long as conditions for an election rerun
remain the same, the
ruling party will continue to use the uneven playing
field to continuously
win elections by dubious means. But that option should
not be abandoned, as
it will give the MDC the moral high ground to challenge
the legitimacy of
the Zanu PF government.
The sixth
option is to allow things to disintegrate. There are
many who argue that the
current situation is not sustainable and the
government will inevitably
collapse. Whilst this is quite possible, probable
and desirable, it may not
be practical because it appears like the ruling
party is willing to hang on
to power even if it means ruling over skeletons.
It may also be difficult to
rebuild once the economic framework of the
country collapses. The verdict
is, whilst the current situation is not
sustainable, the rulers of the land
do not give a hoot and will hang on to
power by hook, crook or
book.
The seventh option is to wait for the next elections.
The
presidential election is only two years away. If the MDC chooses to
quietly
rebuild its effectiveness, credibility and image, it may succeed in
winning
the presidential election. Indicators, however, are that: Zanu PF
will not
sit idly and watch the MDC grow. More MDC leaders will be arrested,
detained
and tortured on trumped-up charges. Some could even be killed. The
MDC and
other alternative voices will be systematically silenced by current
and
prospective draconian laws which will further erode the democratic
process.
But the most reasonable and practical route which is
also the
eighth option seems to be that of a negotiated settlement. In this
regard
previously stated strategies, such as mass action, could well be an
effective means to gaining leverage to negotiate a workable settlement for
Zimbabwe. A transitional authority would involve the setting up-of a
transitional government of national unity composed of both Zanu PF and the
MDC.
A constitutional conference of all stakeholders
would then be
convened to formulate a new democratic constitution, which
would be the
framework of democratic elections in which the parliamentary
election would
be held concurrently with the presidential election.
Dissolution of all
quasi-military units and institutions such as the
militia, the national
youth service and war vets and depoliticisation of
food aid would also be
imperative.
Ninth - A government
of national unity is unlikely. Such a
government would involve President
Mugabe inviting the MDC to be a part of a
government of national unity which
Mugabe has vowed he would never do. The
last option is to do nothing and
still expect something to happen. This is
the option, which most Zimbabweans
are practicing at the moment and nothing
will happen as long as nothing is
done.
Nkomo is a political commentator
Zim Daily
Tuesday, March 28 2006 @ 12:03 AM BST
Contributed by: correspondent
I find pleasure and courage to
write you this letter. I feel
that in your honeymoon at the University of
Zimbabwe and in expelling
students you have somehow forgotten a lot. Since
the day you expelled us i
still cant believe that professionals or rather
professors sat down and
discussed an illegality and decided to be angry on
behalf of Robert Mugabe
and expelled Mfundo Mlilo, Collen Chibango and
Wellington Mahohoma three
distinguished leaders of the union. I find it
difficult to understand how
you finally found us guilty when all odds were
fighting against you , i find
it difficult to discern what paragons you used
to expel us, i need to remind
you that history and infact posterity will
judge you harshly, unfortunately
in your absence.
You
have expelled and suspended more students from the
University of Zimbabwe
than the colonial governments combined because you
want to be used by Robert
Mugabe or you have chosen to be angry on his
behalf. It is easy to think
that i am begging you to come back, on the
contrary, i am a distinguished
student leader towering above the entire
student movement who has served the
students not only of this university
alone but counrtywide. I am a beacon of
hope to students and zimbabweans in
general who are silent because people
like you have forgotten that the
fullness of time shall
come.
My greatest advantage is that i am young and will see a
future
that all of you will never see and so never expect me to sit and
watch you
destroy that future. In the fullness of time Nyagura how will you
quantify
the indignity of sleeping in a cell with human waste and urine all
over and
being tortured and detained because i told you the students were
hungry,
remember that day when you sent a truck load of riot police to
arrest me
because i refused to sign your suspension letters, remember that
day when i
was removed from residence and slept in the open because i asked
you to
solve the situation in the dining halls, remember that sad day when i
was
arrested and detained at Avondale police station, Harare central and St
Marys police station because i told the students it was government's
responsibility to fund tertiary education.
Remember the
many suspensions you have written to me and the
countless times your
security has beaten and stopped me from learning
because if we complained
Mugabe would fire you. How are you going to
quantify all this indignity. I
remember the days i would snick into campus
and lived like a prisoner in an
independent Zimbabwe because you had
outlawed my movements on campus. It was
so painful to live like that, but it
only served to harden me, to teach me
that the struggle is so painful and a
thorny one.
Nelson
Mandela in 1964 at the revonia trial said "all my life i
have fought against
black domination and fought against white domination, i
have cherished the
ideals of a free and democratic society in which all
people live in harmony
and with equal opportunities, it is an ideal which i
have worked for and
which i hope to achieve, but if needs be it is an ideal
which i am ready to
die today" Nyagura today as you expel me and cut short
my life i say to
you--all my life i have fought against Robert Mugabe and
all those who get
angry on his behalf like you, i have fought for and on
behalf of the quest
for academic liberation and emancipation, these ideals
must be achieved and
will be in the face of your
expulsions.
I am
not deterred i am more than ready to engage=did you listen
to the
resolutions of the civic society that we are engaging the state
through
demonstrations, i shall be part of that movement. I am happy because
it is
not long before the end of time when all of you shall go, will be dead
or
arrested, then we shall learn in better environments, even if we leave
the
country we shall be back to enjoy our motherland the struggle is our
birthright the conviction to fight for students, our courage and resilience
is beyond hope itself. I will fight for the students and dedicate my entire
life to the struggle of zimbabweans. I cannot be tempted to say i am tired
when i have only fought for a year, Nelson Mandela fought for 27 seven
years. The fullness of time is coming, remember Nyerere went away, Idi Amin
went away, Banda was chased away, Hitler the fullness of time caught up with
him---we shall catch up with you and your masters. We are the antithesis of
violence and mayhem which you purport to have expelled us
for.
TILL WE CONQUER
MFUNDO
MLILO
Zim Daily
Tuesday, March 28 2006 @ 12:02 AM BST
Contributed by: Zimdaily
I have always said to myself that I am
proud of being Zimbabwean
and African, and I never had to question or answer
myself why I had to be
proud. It seemed natural and just, some mental
emancipation and appreciation
of who I was and could be. I cherished the
strength of several generations
of Zimbabweans and Africans who underwent a
lot and came out of it stronger,
positive and doing the best they could
under the circumstances, wishing to
reach their ultimate potential as
individuals and nations. Until now, now as
I see the African quest for
self-destruction, irrationality and savagery in
thought and deed, as I am
thrust in circumstances so queer I need external
persuasion to say
convincingly to myself that I am proud to be Zimbabwean
and
African.
There are two backgrounds that I consider, to
acquire this
confusion about whether or not to be proud. The first
background is common
knowledge: as African and Zimbabwean people we were a
people minding their
own business, creating and sustaining one generation to
another, knowing how
to satisfy our basic needs and creating social
organisations and
organisational structures relevant to our needs and
purposes. There was no
darkness on our continent; we could see and had our
own indigenous knowledge
which was manifest in technology and medicine,
which could create and
maintain life to the best of our abilities within
given epochs and
geographical settings. From another continent came people
who thought we
were primitive, captured some of us and made us slaves in
foreign lands.
Thereafter their kin came again and colonised us for
centuries, treating us
in an inhumane manner that only we, Africans could go
through and
rehabilitate ourselves mentally to continue through life. We
fought
colonialism, got independence but were again followed up with a cold
war and
post-colonial imperialism, AIDS, starvation, civil wars and other
ravages
that denied us essence and existence. Despite this we forged on. For
this, I
cannot but be proud of being an African, and a
Zimbabwean.
The second background may be uncommon. We were
small tribes
mainly concerned about meeting our basic needs and no more, who
were found
by outsiders to have no better purpose in life than to wait for
our deaths
in a wild and hostile environment. Being idle, outsiders thought
our lives
could be put to better use as slaves doing productive work in
their
countries, with no remuneration which we did not need. Thoughtless as
we
were, we made our best efforts to ensure slave traders got their
merchandise
conveniently brought to them by some of us, those too glad to be
of use in
hunting down their own cousins. Slave traders did not bring mighty
armies
from the west; they depended on one African tribe to capture slaves
from
another. Our tribal leaders and chiefs did not react to this threat as
one,
or as rationally as they could have.
Tribes never
joined hands, never fought the common enemy. Slave
trade rightly provoked
the moral conscience of the African, but the absence
of collective
resistance showed how despite our communal way of life we
lacked a
rationalised collective outlook, approach and interests. As the
tragedy
unfolded victim families suffered alone and spared families
cherished their
relative advantages. The outsiders realised that we did not
really have an
agenda in life, and came back with what they thought was good
for us -
colonialism. Because we had little regards for ourselves, they
assumed and
we bestowed upon them moral, physical, intellectual and other
superiorities.
The outsiders themselves realised the inhumanity of slavery
and outlawed it.
Again their own realised the unfairness of colonialism and
minority rule and
provided the intellectual, material, political and moral
support to end
colonialism and minority rule. We got independence,
celebrated in style and
started destroying all the good we had inherited
from the outsiders. We were
free to kill our own.
We formed unions of Africans, and
collapsed with laughter at the
plight of our African brothers and sisters in
states that self-destructed,
grew xenophobic about and abused them when they
sought refuge in our
countries. With African solutions to African problems
our problems
escalated. Our economies went down, chaos reigned and we blamed
the
outsiders, but asked for their money which we would squander with glee
before returning for more. We realised there were some politically incorrect
among us, murdered them, exiled those we could not send to Ngong hills
(murder). Where our ancestors had gone as slaves, thither we followed with
scars and traumas to be welcomed with rights, safety and a livelihood we
could only dream of at home.
The outsiders we had sent
packing saying Africa was for
Africans, knowing how savage our lot can be,
accepted and kindly took us
into their care. At home they castigated us but
appreciated the forex we
could remit. We dared not go back in fear of
poverty, torture or both.
Outsiders made long term programmes to airlift our
fellow sufferers back
home to give them homes away from the savagery on our
own continent. Some or
other argument was used by African leaders, and the
status quo in Africa was
justified by Africans.
The
second background may be little known. But when you meet in
the diaspora
many Africans who claim to be from African countries that are
not theirs,
you realise the shame beneath the veneer of pride. Those who had
pride, and
who saw the basis of their pride being mauled by their own,
wonder how and
why we can still remain proud. We have had to tell strangers
how our own
have violated and taken away our dignity, threatened our lives
and drowned
us in our own excretions. We have nightmares of home and dread
the prospect
of being forcibly returned home.
Those of us who found
ourselves in the diaspora talk about home,
homes we cannot be certain are
still our homes, or ones we could still
return to. We talk of relatives,
relatives who are now just images and
voices. We meet, those from all over
Africa, and agree that no matter what
pretext we had to be here - greener
pastures, further education, and
asylum - we ran away from home and most are
reluctant to return. Our pride
only reveals itself when one African is
better than another African, when
one Zimbabwean is from Avondale and the
other from Glen View. When one has
papers and the other does not. We create
hierarchies that would be debated
with no agreements. Without these relative
advantages we are all pathetic.
We watch TV and say they are showing the
worst about Africa, giving negative
coverage, but inside we know it can be
much worse. Pride in being
Zimbabwean, and African, becomes a thorny
issue.
If we are to be proud, what would we be proud of?
Proud to be so
highly trained that our countries of origin cannot employ us?
Proud to have
a thirst for education that our countries of origin cannot
satisfy? Proud to
admit that our own countrymen are savages who tortured,
raped and threatened
to murder us for thinking and acting differently in our
quest for dignity?
That our leaders, as Putin acknowledged or alleged, eat
their enemies? Proud
of countries that are so self-destroying that the only
opportunity of
remaining alive and living a life with dignity only comes
through an escape
to the west? Proud of knowing that if a natural disaster
does not destroy
us, our leaders would?
I was proud of
being Zimbabwean and African at some point. I
made sense of Pan-Africanism,
black consciousness, ethnic assertiveness and
empowerment, national
sovereignty and territorial integrity, some points
raised by Claude Mararike
about National Ethos. I rejoiced in the success of
Zimbabwean and African
luminaries within and abroad, and said loudly that
home is home though
inside I don't know if I will ever go back home. My
pride is suspended as I
float in European space - an alien who does not
belong yet who cannot call
his home, the home that was, home.
Thomas Chirasha
The Star
March 28,
2006
By Chris Jenkins
Eight horses facing almost
certain death in Zimbabwe have arrived
safely on a farm outside Empangeni
after an epic 1 900km journey by road to
Zululand.
A special
equine rescue operation was mounted earlier this month to
bring a total of
10 horses and three donkeys to South Africa from Mutare.
The
journey began early last week when a Johannesburg-based equine
transport
specialist was hired to collect eight mares and geldings belonging
to
remedial-school teacher and riding instructor Sally Dilton-Hill (63),
whose
farm has been expropriated by the Zimbabwean government.
The horses
arrived by truck at Dayspring Farm in Empangeni, KwaZulu
Natal, around
midnight on Sunday after an exhausting trip which involved a
23-hour delay
at the border at Musina.
Dayspring is owned by former Zimbabwean
farmers and neighbours of
Dilton-Hill, Dave and Les Ervine.
The
rescued horses will be used for community-based projects,
including
equi-therapy for children from Empangeni's Thuthukani Special
School, and by
members of the Zululand Pony Club.
The second leg of the rescue
operation involves collecting two more
horses and a donkey destined for
Hermanus and two donkeys belonging to
Dilton-Hill which have been specially
trained to count and do other tricks.
These two donkeys will also become
permanent residents of Dayspring's animal
farmyard.
The Ervines
moved to Zululand five years ago after their farm next to
Dilton-Hill's was
taken over by the government.
Anyone who can help further towards
the costs of the two trips can
contact the Ervines on 035-792-0045.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Shame
Makoshori
issue date :2006-Mar-28
THE banking industry is battling to
contain massive instability triggered by
workers' threats to embark on a
potentially explosive industrial action to
push for cost of living
adjustments ranging between 90 percent and 150
percent, sources said last
week.
Financial institutions, the sources added, are trapped in a vicious
circle
as they are also racing against time to beat the deadline for new
capital
requirements set for September this year.
At the same time, they
are facing an increasingly agitated workforce living
on empty stomachs when
their managers are showered with multiple perks.
The bone of contention
between bankers and employees has been that most
players have been reporting
above market financial results for the previous
year when the bulk of
workers are trapped in the doldrums of the poverty
datum line
(PDL).
Information from the industry last week revealed that the lowest paid
workers earn between $7 million and $8 million per month.
Bank tellers
are taking home about $20 million.The PDL stood at $28 million
last month
and is projected to shoot to about $33 million due to the
continuous
increase in prices.
Seven banks out of the country's 13 commercial banks have
been slapped with
final notices of intention to halt services although two
of them swiftly
reacted to resolve the disputes.
Barclays Bank, Kingdom
Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, Zimbabwe Allied
Banking Group (ZABG), FBC
Bank, NMB Bank and Stanbic Bank were all staring a
restive
workforce.
However, FBC and Kingdom banks resolved their problems.
The
Zimbabwe Banks and Allied Workers' Union (ZIBAWU), confirmed the
information
yesterday.
Secretary general, Colleen Gwiyo said some cases were referred
to the
government while others are under arbitration.
"Employers were
refusing to negotiate at National Employment Council (NEC)
level, saying
they wanted to wait for the July collective bargaining period.
We asked
workers to negotiate at company level. That could be the reason why
there
have been more disputes.
"Some of the cases were referred for arbitration. In
the past, arbitration
has proved to be effective. That is what might save
employers from strikes,
but we want money because workers are suffering,
Gwiyo said.
He however alleged victimisation at Kingdom Bank where he claimed
a member
of the workers committee was recently suspended.
He also alleged
that a managing director with one of the banks is always
shouting once
workers request for meetings to open up negotiations, adding
that that was
stifling negotiations.
To date, no financial institution has reported poor
results for the year
ending December 31 2005.
Standard Chartered Bank
last week reported a $1.2 trillion post tax profit.
Stanbic Bank posted a
$1.4 trillion profit after tax and FBC Bank also
reported $860 billion
profit after tax.
Yesterday, the ZABG reported a $149 billion post tax
profit. Two weeks ago,
Kingdom Bank also reported a profit of $198 billion
while Genesis Merchant
Bank posted $94 billion profit after tax.
However,
in most cases shareholders walked away empty handed while workers
have
perennially complained of raw deals from their "rich" employers.
The
financial institutions have argued that they are racing to beat a
rapidly
fluctuating new capital requirement set by the Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe
(RBZ) whose deadline is September 30 2006, hence the need to plough
back
revenue.
Commercial banks are required to increase their capital base to
US$10
million.
This translates to about Z$ 1 trillion.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Business
Reporter
issue date :2006-Mar-28
THE tobacco sector is heading for a
total collapse unless authorities
address the current problems that the
farmers continue to face, a senior
tobacco official has said.
The Tobacco
Industry and Marketing Board (TIMB) general manager, Stanley
Mutepfa, last
week warned of the looming crisis, which he said, threatened
the very
existence of the industry.
"The tobacco industry is going through a difficult
period and urgently needs
support from all stakeholders in the country or it
might collapse," Mutepfa
warned.
Speaking during an agricultural
stakeholders meeting to chart a way forward
for wheat and tobacco
preparations, Mutepfa said there was need for the
provision of inputs on
time so that the crop is grown at the set time in
order not to compromise
quality.
A plethora of problems face the sector and these include farmers'
failure to
secure inputs on time as financial institutions have developed a
tendency of
disbursing funds late.
For example, funds for the 2006/7
season, that were supposed to have been
disbursed in April last year, were
only released last month when the crop
had reached the harvesting
stage.
In addition the crop support price from the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe
(RBZ)
was no longer tenable and some farmers who see the crop as no longer
viable
are contemplating quitting growing the crop.
To produce quality
tobacco there are various processes or stages in growing
the crop that must
be followed.
Seedbed preparations should begin in April with a deadline of
the end of
June.
Transplanting of an irrigated crop should begin early
August, while
transplanting of a dry land crop should be through by the end
of September.
The crop is also supposed to go through a period of moisture
stress for a
stipulated period between spring and the beginning of summer to
allow it to
develop a certain required flavour.
"However, in the last
three years farmers have experienced a situation that
has forced them to
abandon going through the required processes.
In some cases farmers found
themselves transplanting tobacco as late as
January when that was supposed
to have been done much earlier.
"As a result, quality was compromised and in
the end prices dismally fall.
Such a situation is scaring away new farmers
who had shown an interest in
producing tobacco, the country's main foreign
currency earner," Mutepfa
said.
ZFU first-vice president, Edward Raradza,
who chaired the meeting, said
farmers were willing to support the country's
economic turnaround programme
but financial
institutions and suppliers of
various inputs were letting them down.
"ZFU called for this stakeholders'
meeting with
the hope of enlightening
other stakeholders on where they
were failing farmers," Raradza said.
Tobacco output has been on the decline
since 2000.
During 2000 the country produced 230 million kilogrammes
nose-diving to 180
million kilogrammes the following year.
Last season
the country produced 74 million kilogrammes and the farmers are
this year
expecting to produce 45 million kilogrammes.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Patience Nyangove in Marondera
issue date
:2006-Mar-28
CUBAN medical doctors in the country are dissatisfied with
the monthly $11
million allowances they receive from the government, which
they described as
highly unreasonable in Zimbabwe's current
hyper-inflationary environment.
The medical doctors are in Zimbabwe on a
government-to-government agreement
and are only paid allowances by the host
country. They get their salaries
from Cuba.
Some of the medical doctors
who spoke to The Daily Mirror on condition of
anonymity said they were
finding life unbearable in Zimbabwe because of the
high cost of living given
their "paltry" allowances.
"I like it here in Zimbabwe and it's a nice
country to work in, but right
now the allowances we are getting from your
government are really making the
going not so easy for us," one of the
doctors said.
"Imagine if you decide to go for shopping you need at least
have something
like $10 million in your pocket to buy at least a few items,
but we do not
have that kind of money."
Another doctor complained that at
times they were not paid their allowances
on time.
He added that although
they were getting a salary from the Cuban government,
the money was not
enough as they had families to support back home.
"We are calling for the
relevant ministry to review our allowances and peg
them where we can at
least afford to purchase our basic requirements. Yes,
we get salaries from
our government back home, but the money is also needed
back there to sustain
our families we left there," added the doctor.
Yesterday, the Minister of
Health and Child Welfare, David Parirenyatwa,
said the government was aware
of the doctors' plight and was looking into
it.
"With the Cuban doctors
we do not give them a salary, but an allowance. We
also offer them gadgets
to use and accommodation. We will continue to look
into their welfare and
ensure how best we can to improve them," Parirenyatwa
said.
The Cuban
medical doctors first came to Zimbabwe six years ago to help
improve the
health care delivery in rural and district hospitals across the
country.
Zimbabwe has been facing a critical shortage of medical doctors
although it
produces about 1 000 every year. The local medical doctors were
leaving the
country en-masse to other countries in search of greener
pastures.
Last year, the government came up with a Health Services Board
that, among
other things, is supposed to work on how to improve remuneration
and
conditions of service for health workers throughout the country.
The
move was taken to arrest the brain drain in the health service delivery
sector.
Former Harare City Council director of health services, Lovemore
Mbengeranwa, heads the Health Services Board.
Cuba has been sending teams
of doctors throughout the third world since 1963
in the hope of spreading
good health.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Our Correspondent in Bulawayo
issue date
:2006-Mar-28
ELEVEN people corruptly benefited from Operation
Garikai/Hlalani Kuhle
houses in Gwanda, Matabeleland South, town mayor,
Thandeko Zinti Mnkandla
said yesterday.
Mnkandla told this newspaper that
the 11 people, apart from being allocated
houses under the reconstruction
programme, had earlier benefited from other
council schemes.
"So far, we
have 11 people whom we have found out to have benefited from the
council
programmes and Operation Garikai/ Hlalani Kuhle," Mnkandla said.
"This is
the number of cases we have dealt with, but I would like to
indicate that
investigations are progressing and more will be netted."
He added that some
of the beneficiaries were staying in government houses
and had been
earmarked to benefit from Operation Garikai.
"When this housing delivery
programme was launched by the government, there
were some political gurus
that were involved. Some of them used their
political muscle to push out
those that were responsible for allocating the
houses to clandestinely
allocate some of the houses to their relatives and
close
associates.
"Some of these cases are tricky as the gurus are remotely
connected to the
beneficiaries, but we have established that they are indeed
connected,"
Mnkandla pointed out.
Asked to reveal the identity of the
politicians, the mayor said he would
only do so after investigations were
completed.
He said: "I am not fearful of unmasking these corrupt senior
government
officials.
I am, however, careful that doing so at this stage
would jeopardise the
investigations we are carrying out with regards to the
corrupt allocation of
these houses. When we have finished investigations, we
will name and shame
those involved."
About 246 people in Gwanda are
expected to be allocated housing units under
Operation Garikai, while scores
more on the council waiting list would get
stands.
The government
recently ordered a probe into allegations that houses under
the
reconstruction exercise were not benefiting people affected by last
year's
clean up operation.
Gagged Zimbabweans, who are finding it increasingly
dangerous to openly discuss their opinions on the politics of the country in
public due to mounting repression by the Zanu PF regime, are resorting to
venting their anger on the walls of many buildings in Harare. A snap survey by
Zimdaily in Harare last week showed that many walls in the country's capital had
become platforms of airing heaving political discontent.