Police hatch postal ballot plan to aid Mugabe

by Tinotenda Kandi Friday 16 May 2008

PRESIDENT Mugabe . . . leaving no stone unturned in bid to win back power

HARARE – Police officers, their spouses and dependents will be required to vote for President Robert Mugabe through postal ballot in a clandestine scheme to boost figures for the veteran leader in a tricky presidential run-off election, sources told ZimOnline.

Zimbabwe holds a second presidential election on August 2 after the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) said opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai defeated Mugabe in a March 29 ballot but failed to garner more than 50 percent of the vote required to take power.

Under the Electoral Act, only police officers deployed on duty outside their voting constituencies as well as civil servants on duty outside the country are allowed to vote by postal ballot. Spouses and dependants of police officers in the country should vote at polling stations in their constituencies like all citizens.

Our sources, who are senior police officers and cannot be named to protect them, said under the alleged plan spouses and dependents of officers living at police camps are going to be registered as volunteers in the law enforcement agency to enable them to vote by postal ballot.

"Spouses and dependents who qualify to vote will vote by post under the guise of being police special constabularies who will be on duty on voting day,” said one source.

“They will vote two days before the actual election and they will do so under watch from their superiors to ensure they vote for Mugabe.”

The illicit voting plan that our sources said was likely to be extended to include spouses of soldiers was expected to raise at least 30 000 postal votes for Mugabe. There were about 6 000 postal ballot cast in the last election, which were mainly from police officers who were on duty on voting day.

An internal police document detailing the postal vote scheme shown to ZimOnline on Wednesday said that a police elections command centre would be set up at police general headquarters in Harare.

Deputy Police Commissioner General in charge of administration and human resources Barbara Mandizha will head the command centre that will oversee the postal voting.

Chief superintended Prudence Chakanyuka will coordinate the scheme while assistant commissioner Margaret Ndangana will work as administrator of the project.

The document outlines an elaborate structure of supervision that will ensure that all police officers, spouses and dependents will cast their votes under supervision.

The document entitled: Postal Voting Mechanisms, says: "(The) command centre will coordinate postal ballots for officers and dependants and registration of dependants into the force.

"To put mechanisms to ensure adequate supervision of postal voters. Each officer to be supervised by his/her immediate superior. Dispols (district police commanders) to supervise dependants' votes. Dispols themselves to be supervised by Propols (provincial police commanders)."

Provincial commanders are the only officers who will vote without anyone watching over them.

According to our sources, Mandizha explained the new voting arrangement to all senior police officers with rank of chief superintendent and above at a seminar held Tuesday at the Police Club in Harare.

Police spokesman Oliver Mandipaka yesterday denied that the police were planning to rig the presidential run-off election by making spouses and children vote for Mugabe by postal ballot.

Mandipaka said the Tuesday seminar by Mandizha was not to discuss the alleged vote-rigging scheme but to prepare senior officers ahead of the run-off poll. "It was a preparatory meeting to equip senior officers with necessary skills ahead of the presidential run-off,” he said.

There was no immediate comment from the ZEC or the ruling ZANU PF party on the alleged plan by the police to sway the August vote in favour of Mugabe.

But Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party said it had caught wind of the plan and was in the process of gathering evidence before approaching the courts on the issue.

MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa told ZimOnline: "We have been following the development for two weeks now after being informed by our contacts in the security forces. We are still compiling information on it and we will certainly approach the courts to stop ZANU PF from abusing the postal vote.” – ZimOnline.

High Court asked to order army out of rural areas

Zim Online

by Cuthbert Nzou  Friday 16 May 2008

HARARE – Prominent lawyer and opposition politician Eric Matinenga has filed
an urgent High Court application to force Zimbabwe’s top military commander,
General Constantine Chiwenga, to withdraw soldiers from rural areas where
they have allegedly committed violence and human rights abuses.

Advocate Matinenga, who is the opposition Movement for Democratic Change
MDC) party’s Member of Parliament-elect for the rural Buhera West
constituency, wants the court to order Chiwenga to stop the militarisation
of rural areas and that he should instruct his men to stop harassing and
assaulting opposition supporters.

There was no need for Chiwenga, who is Zimbabwe Defence Forces commander, to
deploy army units in rural areas “in this time of peace,” Matinenga said in
an affidavit to court.

“This is an application which is being made on an urgent basis following the
occurrence of certain disturbances,” Matinenga said in his affidavit. “The
Zimbabwe National Army is in full control and is harassing civilians for the
simple reason that they voted for the MDC and not ZANU PF.”

The matter is yet to be sat down for hearing.

Political violence broke out in many parts of Zimbabwe almost immediately it
became clear that the MDC and its leader Morgan Tsvangirai had defeated
President Robert Mugabe and his ZANU PF party in the March 29 polls.

The MDC, Western governments and human rights groups have accused Mugabe of
unleashing ZANU PF militias and the army to beat and torture Zimbabweans
into backing him in a second round presidential ballot on August 2.

Political analysts see violence – that the MDC claims has killed 32 of its
supporters to date – picking up as the country approaches the run-off
election that is being held because Tsvangirai defeated Mugabe in the March
poll but failed to garner 50 percent of the vote required to takeover the
presidency.

Matinenga described the level of army violence and intimidation in his
Buhera West constituency as “shocking”, citing as an example one incident
when a senior army officer told terrified villagers that he stood to be
promoted to the rank of brigadier if he murdered 150 MDC supporters.

“I was shocked at the extent to which members of the MDC were being
harassed, humiliated and beaten by members of the army,” said Matinenga, one
of Zimbabwe’s leading legal minds.

Chiwenga was not immediately available for comment on the matter.

However Matinenga’s application comes barely a week after an army
spokesperson, Major Alphios Makotore rejected media and opposition reports
that soldiers were spearheading violence against MDC supporters. –
ZimOnline.

COSATU to hold anti-Mugabe protests

Zim Online

by Norest Muzvaba Friday 16 May 2008

JOHANNESBURG – South Africa’s powerful labour movement will on Saturday lead
protests against President Robert Mugabe’s controversial rule, in a move
certain to pile up pressure on President Thabo Mbeki to act more decisively
to end Zimbabwe’s crisis.

Mbeki is the Southern African Development Community (SADC)’s mediator on
Zimbabwe but has been accused of failing to apply pressure on Mugabe to end
political violence that the opposition says has killed 33 of its supporters
and displaced thousands others since March.

The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) will be joined in the
marches – that will take place in South Africa’s capital, Pretoria and in
all other major cities across the country – by the South African Communist
Party, the Zimbabwe Solidarity Forum in South Africa, the Swaziland
Solidarity Network, and the Young Communist League.

The South African NGO Coalition, Disabled People of South Africa, the
Treatment Action Campaign and the Anti-Privatisation Forum will also join in
the marches that are being held also to protest against rising food prices
in South Africa and xenophobic violence that broke out in some Johannesburg
townships over the past week.

COSATU organising secretary for campaigns Theo Steele told journalists in
Johannesburg: “We will be mobilising all progressive people in solidarity
with the struggle for a free and democratic Zimbabwe.

“This is the march for freedom and democracy in Zimbabwe. Our demand is for
President Mugabe to step down and for more decisive action from South
Africa, African Union and SADC.”

Zimbabwe, which is also grappling with its worst ever economic crisis and
good shortages, was plunged deeper into political crisis after an
inconclusive March poll in which opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai
defeated Mugabe but failed to garner more than 50 percent of the vote
required to takeover the presidency.

A second round presidential run-off poll is due on August 2 to settle the
contest between Mugabe and Tsvangirai. But political violence that broke out
immediately after it became clear Mugabe had lost had stoked up tensions to
leave the southern African country on the edge of political turmoil.

The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), Western governments and
human rights groups have accused Mugabe of unleashing ZANU PF militias and
the army to beat and torture Zimbabweans into backing him in the second
presidential ballot.

Steele criticised the delay to hold the presidential run-off saying it gave
Mugabe more time to brutalise voters in a bid to intimidate them to grant
him another five-year term in office – a point the MDC has also raised.

“We are against this date because it is a delay to continue with violence,
intimidation and terror to force people not to participate in the
presidential run-off election,” said Steele.

MDC secretary general Tendai Biti, speaking to journalists separately in
Johannesburg, called the extension illegal and an assault on the people’s
will.

COSATU and its allies said they would use Saturday’s marches to call on
South Africans to refrain from xenophobia that left at least two people dead
and scores of mostly Zimbabwean immigrants injured and homeless after gangs
of South African men attacked them in the Alexandra township of
Johannesburg. – ZimOnline.

Commentary: South Africa's unseemly alliance with Mugabe

InsideBayArea.com

By James Kirchick commentary
Article Created: 05/15/2008 01:18:17 PM PDT

By James Kirchick

commentary By James Kirchick

The tendency to compare contemporary political events to the Third Reich is
called "reducto ad Hitlerum," so facile are the alleged similarities and so
often is this tactic employed. With that caveat, when I saw a photograph
Friday of smiling, garland-laden South African President Thabo Mbeki holding
the hand of Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe, I couldn't resist drawing a
mental parallel: British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain in 1938 waving
his copy of the Munich treaty before a crowd of thousands, boasting that he
had achieved "peace for our time."

That Mbeki, who last month insisted there was "no crisis" in Zimbabwe,
continues to glad-hand Mugabe represents a complete abandonment of moral
responsibility. As he provides diplomatic cover, Mugabe's armed thugs roam
Zimbabwe's countryside threatening, torturing and killing people believed to
have voted for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change. The MDC claims
25 of its supporters have been murdered and 40,000 people have been
displaced since the March 29 parliamentary and presidential election.

The regime has detained journalists and trade union leaders as well as
members of the country's electoral commission, the body that verifies
election results.

The regime claims that MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, while besting Mugabe,
did not poll more than the 50 percent required for an outright win and has
mandated a runoff.

Given that the alternative would be an automatic Mugabe victory, Tsvangirai
has decided to take part. Yet conditions for a free and fair election
clearly do not exist in Zimbabwe. In an interview with the New York Times
last week, a member of Mugabe's Politburo implicitly promised war: "We're
giving the people of Zimbabwe another opportunity to mend their ways, to
vote properly. This is their last chance."

And yet, as the world looks to South Africa for political leadership (as it
is the region's economic powerhouse), Mbeki stands idly by. In fact, his
methods of dealing with the tyrant to his north — supplying cut-rate
electric power, issuing nary a word of criticism, siding with Russia and
China to prevent the dispatch of a U.N. envoy to report on post-election
violence — has exacerbated the political and humanitarian crisis.

Why has Mbeki acted this way?

National liberation movements rule the roost in much of southern Africa:
Angola, Mozambique, Namibia, Zimbabwe and South Africa are all governed by
political parties that emerged from armed revolutionary movements, and their
leaders tend to close ranks when one is threatened.

The leaders of South Africa's ruling African National Congress fear a domino
effect, in which the fall of a sister liberation movement could portend a
similar fate for its own political fortunes. "If Zimbabwe 'falls,' South
Africa will be the next target," South African historian R.W. Johnson wrote
recently in the London Review of Books.

Zimbabwean writer Blessing-Miles Tendi, writing in the Guardian, offered
another explanation for South Africa's inertia: Mbeki owes Mugabe a
political debt. Mugabe could have seized Zimbabwe's white-owned farms in the
1990s but resisted, in part because of pressure from the ANC, then trying to
convince South Africa's whites that they would not lose their land in a
post-apartheid dispensation.

On a plane ride from Johannesburg to Harare in 2006, I sat across the aisle
from a South African military officer on a mission to train Zimbabwean
troops. Appalling as it may seem, post-apartheid South Africa maintains a
firm military relationship with the Mugabe regime.

They formed a joint commission on military strategy and intelligence in
2005, for instance. Both are also members of the African Union and the
Southern African Development Community, regional alliances that discourage
unwanted meddling and encourage mutual sustainment. The AU even amended its
constitution in 2003 to permit forceful intervention in any AU country to
rectify "serious threat(s) to legitimate order."

This was widely seen — correctly — as a form of regime preservation.

The March 29 election gave a reticent Mbeki every opportunity he needed to
gently urge a peaceful transition of power in Zimbabwe. But his aversion to
the opposition Movement for Democratic Change — which the ANC's top brass
views as a "neocolonialist" threat partly because of the support it has from
the West — led him to quietly support the breakaway candidacy of Mugabe's
former finance minister, Simba Makoni, as a "third way" option to keep the
MDC boxed out.

Another complicating factor is that Mbeki faces internal opposition from
South African labor, which opposes his free-market economic reforms and is
allied with its anti-Mugabe Zimbabwean trade union brethren. Victory for the
opposition in Zimbabwe would embolden Mbeki's domestic antagonists.

Mugabe has easily manipulated Mbeki, a strange set of affairs considering
that the former figure is a discredited dictator running a morally bankrupt
kleptocracy, and the latter presides over a country brimming with
international goodwill and a strong economy. It is not in South Africa's
national interest, nor — despite what he may think — in Mbeki's personal
political interest that Mugabe's disastrous rule continue. No political
leader wants a failed state on his border, and Zimbabwe's collapse is deeply
felt in South Africa, where more than 3 million Zimbabweans have fled in
recent years, crowding into a country with 40 percent unemployment.

As discredited as his role as mediator may be, Mbeki can still act for good.
At the very least, he could demand an end to the regime's unceasing violence
against its own people. He could threaten to cut off fuel and electric
supplies. He could publicly demand Mugabe step aside. If that's too
antagonistic, he could pressure Mugabe to allow journalists and election
observers from free countries (that is, not just teams from China, Iran and
Venezuela, nations that Mugabe welcomed in March) to monitor the runoff.

But by refusing to perform even the easiest of these tasks, Mbeki has
exposed himself as an utterly feckless leader. The tragedy of Zimbabwe falls
considerably on his head.

Kirchick is an assistant editor of the New Republic.

US govt sends protest letter to Zimbabwe

SABC

May 15, 2008, 22:15

The US government has sent a formal protest letter to the Zimbabwean
government regarding this week's scuffles between Zimbabwean police and the
US ambassador to that country and other diplomats. The State Department says
Zimbabwean police's behaviour was inappropriate.

The US State Department's spokesperson, Tom Casey, says they wanted the
government of Zimbabwe to know about their concerns in regard this matter.
Initial reports were that the US ambassador and others from Europe and
Tanzania were briefly arrested after visiting a hospital on Tuesday. Casey
also reiterated that a presidential run-off will be impossible under the
present circumstances, but insisted that the Zimbabwean Electoral Commission
must put an exact date as to when this run-off will be held.

Human rights group, Amnesty International, said violence had reached crisis
levels in Zimbabwe. "We are particularly worried about people living in more
remote rural areas, where violence is taking place away from the spotlight,"
Amnesty said.

Meawhile, Zimbabwe police arrested the secretary-general of the
anti-government teachers' union outside the High Court, civic activists
said. Raymond Majongwe of the Progressive Teachers' Union of Zimbabwe was
held as he attended a bail hearing of labour leaders arrested earlier this
month, activists said.

Official results showed that opposition party learder Morgan Tsvangirai beat
Robert Mugabe in the election, but not by enough votes to avoid a run-off.

Zimbabwe's Tsvangirai due in Belfast

5/05/2008  20:17

Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai is due in Belfast tomorrow.

He and Senegalese President Abdoulaye are set to address the 55th Congress
of Liberal International (LI) tomorrow morning.

Mr Tsvangirai, who claims his Movement for Democratic Change won the recent
presidential elections, will address worldwide liberal party members.

Mr Tsvangirai beat President Robert Mugabe in the first round on March
29th - but with not enough votes to avoid a run-off. Zimbabwe's electoral
commission said on Wednesday the presidential run-off could be delayed until
the end of July.

Official results showed that opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai beat
President Robert Mugabe in the election but not by enough votes to avoid a
run-off.

Conference organiser Lord Alderdice said: “We are honoured that Mr
Tsvangirai and President Wade have chosen to attend our Congress in Belfast.
It is a city often seen as an example that conflict can be overcome when
people choose peace and democracy over violence and tyranny."

LI is the world federation of liberal and progressive democratic political
parties. It was founded in 1947 to strengthen liberal protection from
totalitarianism, fascism and communism.

© 2008 ireland.com

Tsvangirai lines up MPs for confrontation

Financial Times

By Alec Russell in Johannesburg

Published: May 16 2008 01:09 | Last updated: May 16 2008 01:09

Morgan Tsvangirai, Zimbabwe’s opposition leader, will try to seize the
political initiative when he returns home this weekend by convening his
party’s MPs and setting out a legislative programme in a direct challenge to
President Robert Mugabe.

The leader of the Movement for Democratic Change has spent the last five
weeks in effective exile, touring the region to drum up support from leaders
of the Southern African Development Community over the crisis that followed
the elections in late March.

In his absence, MDC activists have endured a vicious campaign of
intimidation by Mr Mugabe’s supporters ahead of a run-off presidential
election. Mr Tsvangirai has recently faced criticism within opposition
circles over his strategy, with some querying what he has gained from his
peregrinations.
But speaking to the Financial Times in Johannesburg, he dismissed scepticism
about the rewards of his courtship of the SADC.

In the past, the regional grouping has been reluctant to confront Mr Mugabe
over his abuses of power. Jose Eduardo dos Santos, the president of Angola
and an old ally of Mr Mugabe, had assured him at the weekend, however, that
“should there be a run-off, SADC should ensure there are conditions for the
elections to take place,” he said.

There would be a SADC summit soon, the MDC leader predicted, to confirm a
date for the election, conditions for a run-off, and the “mechanism” for a
transition.

On his return, scheduled for Saturday, Mr Tsvangirai is planning to convene
a caucus of his MPS. Then, given that the MDC won the March parliamentary
elections, they will throw down the gauntlet to Mr Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party by
setting out a legislative agenda.

He will then go on a “victory tour” around the country starting at rally in
Bulawayo scheduled for Sunday, and will visit the victims of the violence.
The MDC says 33 of its supporters have been killed and hundreds beaten up by
followers of Mr Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party, which lost control of parliament for
the first time since independence in 1980.

Mr Tsvangirai’s aides concede this is a high-risk strategy, given that
rallies have been banned. It is unclear how the authorities who delayed the
release of the first-round election results for a month will respond.

In a move seen by diplomats as a bid to buy more time, the state-appointed
Zimbabwe Electoral Commission has announced a 90-day extension to the
deadline for a run-off. According to the ZEC’s results, the MDC leader fell
short of the clear majority needed to avoid a second round, although the MDC
says the results are flawed and that Mr Tsvangirai won outright.

In his interview Mr Tsvangirai said he had been using “a number of avenues”
to seek to reassure the senior generals loyal to Mr Mugabe about the
implications of a change of government.

“We are doing everything to ensure they feel part of the solution,” he said.
Dismissing speculation in Harare that senior generals might stage a coup if
Mr Mugabe considered handing over power, he hinted that even the hardliners
who control the police and armed forces could stay in their posts in a new
era.

Analysts suspect that for all their bravado, neither the MDC nor Zanu-PF is
keen on a run-off. “Zanu-PF aren’t confident they would win it,” said one
senior diplomat in the region. “And the MDC are concerned about the
potential bloodshed.”

The MDC is banking on a SADC-led initiative to resolve the impasse, while Mr
Mugabe’s advisers are hoping to negotiate a government of national unity,
the diplomat added.

The MDC on Thursday called for a new SADC summit. One party insider said
they had support for such a move but that member states had yet to ask the
president of Zambia, the head of SADC, to convene a summit.

Stand Up For Zimbabwe

http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/postglobal/

By Njoroge Wachai

Put aside for a moment today’s situation in Zimbabwe, where political
turmoil reigns after President Mugabe’s attempts to rob the opposition
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, of his
legitimate election victory.

Instead, imagine that it’s November, 2008 in the U.S.. Democratic
presidential candidate Barack Obama has just pummeled the GOP’s John McCain
in both the popular vote and the Electoral Colleges to claim the U.S.
presidency.

But McCain, courtesy of the power of incumbency (Republicans control the
White House), adamantly refuses to concede. He and President Bush hoard the
official election results in a bid to block Obama from being officially
declared the president.

Democrats threaten violent street protests unless their candidate is
declared the winner. Canada, Mexico and the European Union (EU) rally behind
them, threatening the U.S. with unspecified actions, including travel
restrictions for McCain and members of his inner circle.

Democrats, frustrated by Republican obstinacy, rush to court to seek an
order to compel the government to release the election results immediately.
The Court rejects their plea, just as the Zimbabwean High Court recently
did. McCain and Bush threaten “to bash the heads” of Obama supporters who
dare “disturb peace and tranquility that this county is enjoying (Read
Mugabe’s threat to bash the MDC.)

Meanwhile, the heads of the CIA, FBI, Secret Service, and the Joint Chiefs
of Staff call a press conference at the Pentagon to denounce Obama,
declaring that they will not salute a person who didn’t fight in the Vietnam
War, the Second World War, the First Gulf War or the ongoing conflicts in
Iraq and Afghanistan. They call Obama a stooge, and demand immediate
swearing in of John McCain.

Soon after the conference they, along with the Illinois State Troopers and
the local Sheriff’s office raid the Obama Campaign headquarters in Chicago,
bloodying staff, confiscating computers and making mass arrests. A
heavily-armed SWAT team with military reinforcement invades the Democratic
National Committee (DNC) headquarters; they beat up Howard Dean, Democratic
senators and representatives, and labor organizations that support Obama.

Obama, having gotten wind of the operation, flees to Mexico, where he
appeals to regional leaders to intervene. “We’re still verifying the
ballots,” McCain declares.

While Obama is away, Republicans - in cahoots with security agents (war
veterans, sheriff deputies, soldiers, and SWAT officers) – fan out across
the country hunting down his supporters, beating, arresting and killing
them. Many flee to Canada, Venezuela, Mexico, Haiti, Cuba and other
neighboring countries.

There’s a noisy media outcry. The government’s response: taking off all
radio and TV stations off the air except the Voice of American and FOX News.

Welcome to Zimbabwe. We’re not talking about Barack Obama and John McCain.
This is about a dictator and a demagogue called Robert Mugabe and Mr. Morgan
Tsvangirai, the man many believe won the March 29 General Election, but who
has not been allowed to assume power. Instead, Mugabe and his goons have
forced Tsvangirai into exile.

As I noted two weeks ago, Mugabe wants to subvert the democratic process in
Zimbabwe. Many observers led by the respected Zimbabwe Election Support
Network have proclaimed that Mr. Tsvangirai won the March 29 presidential
election. Rather than acquiesce to the fact that he has lost, Mugabe and his
supporters are brutalizing opposition supporters in the hope of discouraging
them from participating in a runoff, which the government has just postponed
by a whopping 90 days.

Clearly, apathy has fast descended on the international community. There’s
hardly a strong voice to be heard coming from the African Union (AU) or the
South African Development Community (SADCC), the two organizations that
should be drawing a democratic roadmap for Zimbabwe.

South African president Thabo Mbeki, who might have been instrumental in
turning things around, is already in bed with Mugabe, which prompted the
Washington Post two weeks ago to label him a rogue democrat.

Now, should the world remain silent in the face of Mugabe and his cronies’
wanton abuse of human rights? Mugabe is undoubtedly a tin-pot dictator.
Diplomatic denunciations, wherever their source, are unlikely to move him.
Time and again, he has demonstrated his contempt for any member of the
international community who has dared to challenge his ineptitude.

Just today Mugabe’s police detained, for one hour, several Western diplomats
who had gone to visit victims of political violence that the ruling party
ZANU-PF militias have been waging against opposition supporters. Mugabe is
more than determined to terrorize anybody deemed to oppose him.

The Washington Post recently reported how 11 opposition supporters were
killed in a single day. In April the New York-based Human Rights Watch
detailed how ZANU-PF goons, with the help of security agents, have been
setting up informal detention centers across the county to torture
opposition supporters.

It’s time for the international community to make a resolute demand that the
democratic rights of all Zimbabweans be respected. Coercive measures,
including punitive sanctions for companies and countries propping up the
Mugabe regime, might force this man to sober up.

Njoroge Wachai is a former Kenyan journalist currently based in the United
States.

Posted by Njoroge Wachai on May 15, 2008 5:00 PM

Comments (3)
Mohamed MALLECK,Swift Current, Canada:
Mr. Wachai,

Truthfully, I don't like to see Mugabe staying in power any longer. I think
he should have gone in 1997 already, but at least in 2002. That year, partly
under my initiative, the African Development Bank went out on a limb that
year trying to adapt the common 'rules of engagement' binding it with the
IMF and the World Bank to help Zimbabwe implement an Economic
Reform/Structural Adjustment Programme-cum-orderly land reform that would
have released hundreds of millions of US dollars and averted the
then-oncoming economic meltdown. But, Mugabe's regime was stubborn, and the
country and its people experienced the years of misery they have endured for
so long.

That much said, though, about the frustrations I have experienced with
Mugabe's blind post-1992 self-destructuveness while trying to help (which
contrasts with your easy criticisms, combined with unconscionable defence of
grave excesses by Mwai Kibaki in your own country, Kenya), I have the right
counter your continuing cheap demonisation of Mugabe. You write : " ... the
U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has just pummeled the
GOP’s John McCain ..." as if you were equating that putative outcome with
the actual outcome of the Mugane/Tsvangirai presidential contest. By his own
reckoning, Tsivangirai won 50.3% of the vote. 'Pummeling', Mr. Wachai? Do
you understand what you write?

When it is held in a few weeks' time, Tsivangirai will likely win the
run-off presidential election in Zimbabwe. But he will win it by a lower
margin than he would have won it had he not, in the first place, arrogantly
brushed aside the idea of a run-off, only to eating his own words in several
replays of Mugabe's finetuning to his advantage the conditions under which
the runoff will be conducted. Maybe Mugabe will be doing so unfairly. But
Tsivangirai has now learnt that he has lost credibility by having been
overly dismissive of a run-off in the first place, while Mugabe's devious
ways is sadly getting greater grudging acceptance because, everybody is now
agreed, "power corrupts" and wil, soon enough, corrupt Tsivangarai as well.

Sad, very, very sad. That is why my profession, especially the specialty
known as Development Economics, is known as 'the dismal science'.

May 15, 2008 6:24 PM |

Posted on May 15, 2008 18:24

Christopher Lucas:
If "Good" equates with human freedom of action, property rights, economic
and social opportunity and the safety of law and order, the state of affairs
under Colonial rule was Good. Those who cried the loudest for "liberation"
failed to appreciate the depths of human capacity for rapine and evil, when
unrestrained by law and order, which, at least, Colonial powers maintained,
in some measure. Now, those same people pray for the same Colonial powers to
"pressure" RM. Theirs is, in essence, a prayer for the very thing that their
fathers rejected as Colonial "oppression" in the days when the rule of law
existed there. In fact, his symbolic opposition to the myth of Colonial
"evil" keeps RM in power today.

May 15, 2008 5:43 PM |

Posted on May 15, 2008 17:43

Dan-O:
Nothing demonstrates pure hatred more than apathy for suffering people.
Sadly, the only acceptable solution will be the death of a million or more,
and that may not even change the outcome.

Hate the "western world" all you want. Supporting Mugabe only serves Mugabe
and a few fortunate cronies. It doesn't serve Zimbabwe's people, who have
vote for change.

The western world has been rendered diplomatically impotent because of now
out-of-date anti-colonial sentiment.

Sadly, all Zimbabwe has to offer is large amounts of farmland. No oil, no
luck.

Fortunately, Mugabe is old and is not long for this world. He has much to
answer for in the next one.

Unfortunately, be prepared for another Rwanda, Uganda, Darfur, Liberia,
Angola....

May 15, 2008 5:36 PM |

Zimbabwe Ruling Party Proposes Cooperation On Violence, But It Continues

VOA

By Jonga Kandemiiri
Washington
15 May 2008

Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa, a spokesman for the ZANU-PF party of
President Robert Mugabe, has proposed that the ruling party and opposition
set up a joint panel to look into claims of political violence and see those
responsible are prosecuted.

Chinamasa told the state-controlled Herald newspaper that his party is
“interested in the truth, whether it hurts us or not,” adding that the
Zimbabwean judiciary must deal seriously with such political violence. A
number of domestic and foreign observers have accused the government of
orchestrating the political violence that has mainly targeted opposition
members in rural areas since the March 29 elections.

Spokesman Nelson Chamisa of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change
formation led by Morgan Tsvangirai said the ruling party has yet to approach
the MDC about such cooperation, but he said the MDC was ready to try
anything to end the violence which the party says has taken the lives of at
least 33 of its members.

Sources in Masvingo Province said police on Wednesday arrested about 50
ZANU-PF militia members in connection with violence, murder and rape in
rural areas.

In Mashonaland East, a hotspot since the elections, violence erupted late
Wednesday in Rukariro, Uzumba constituency, where the homes of three
opposition supporters were said to have been torched. A source in Marondera
said ZANU-PF activists from the Svosve communal lands destroyed four homes
in Cherima Wednesday night.

Welfare Secretary Kerry Kay of the Tsvangirai MDC formation told Jonga
Kandemiiri of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that her department has been
swamped by the needs of victims, but help and encouragement has been
forthcoming from all directions.

Small scale farmers seen as backbone of food security

Photo: Obinna Anyadike/IRIN

Food for thought

HARARE, 15 May 2008 (IRIN) - A crop forecast by the Zimbabwean government that this year's maize production will fall short of the national requirement by about one million metric tonnes is leading to a reassessment of the role of communal farmers in guaranteeing the country's food security.

For the past five years, Zimbabwe has become increasingly reliant on food aid, a situation largely attributed to the fast-track land reform programme, which redistributed more than 4,000 white-owned commercial farms to landless blacks.

Although the often chaotic and violent land redistribution in 2000, led by veterans of Zimbabwe's liberation war, is seen as the catalyst for the recession that has now lasted eight years and has taken annual inflation rates to above 160,000 percent - the highest in the world - white farmers were not the main producers of the country's staple foods.

After independence from Britain in 1980 price controls on maize increased the trend by white farmers to resort to cash crops like tobacco, paprika, cut flowers and cotton, while growing yellow maize for stock feed, leaving cereal production largely the preserve of communal farmers.

About 50 percent of Zimbabwe's land mass consists of communal farming areas, where 70 percent of the population reside and small-scale farmers work average plot sizes of about two hectares. Former white-owned farms make up about 25 percent of the land, while the remainder is state-owned, old resettlement and small scale commercial land.

Zimbabwe's annual maize requirement for human consumption is about 1.4 million mt, a drop of about 400,000mt in recent years, as it is thought that more than three million people, from a population of about 13 million, have migrated to neighbouring countries such as South Africa and Botswana, or further afield to England and Australia, in search of work. Unemployment in Zimbabwe is estimated at more than 80 percent.

Michael Jenrich, of the emergency unit of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in Zimbabwe, told IRIN that "On average, communal areas have produced about two-thirds of Zimbabwe's maize production for the last 20 years," and small farmers were the backbone of the country's maize production.

"People think that communal lands are all dry and not good for agriculture. Two-thirds is fairly dry and suitable for livestock, but one-third of communal land is productive and could produce one million or probably even two million tonnes [of maize], if utilised and supported properly."

Disintegration of the system

Before the land redistribution programme a symbiotic relationship existed between many of the commercial farmers and communal farmers, but the agricultural landscape changed radically in 2000: commercial farmers had sustained large-scale agricultural industries, that meant communal farmers were indirect recipients of "a very sophisticated [agricultural] input system," Jenrich noted.

Because a large part of the fertiliser industry was used by commercial farmers, production was both big and reliable, and fertiliser was cheap, so even many communal farmers could buy and access it for a very reasonable price

"Communal farmers were benefiting from cheap and reliable seed supplies, fertiliser and transport systems that were all geared for a certain sector [large-scale farmers]. Because a large part of the fertiliser industry was used by commercial farmers, production was both big and reliable, and fertiliser was cheap, so even many communal farmers could buy and access it for a very reasonable price," he told IRIN.

The economic decline brought about the collapse of the fertiliser industry, disrupted the transport industry and saw a sharp decline in foreign currency earnings from the demise of export crops. This also had "a lot of indirect consequences for communal farmers that has impacted on their productivity," Jenrich said.

"If you see the yields of communal farmers - it is now a third of what it used to be 10 years ago. Communal yields were never very high - the average yields were about 1mt up to 1.5mt per hectare - but now they are below 0.5mt," he said.

A recent crop assessment of both communal and redistributed former white-owned farmland for the 2007/08 season by Zimbabwe's agricultural ministry estimated maize production at 470,669mt, or 0.27mt a hectare, and small grains production at 93,200mt, or 0.2mt a hectare.

The Zimbabwe Farmers Union (ZFU), which looks after the interests of communal land farmers, told IRIN that this season's poor harvest was a consequence of "the late delivery of whatever is available [seeds and fertiliser]" by government, the lack of access to credit for farmers, the increased number of farmers as a result of land reform, and climate change.

E.V. Mandishona, the ZFU's training and information officer, said government agricultural extension services for communal farmers were under severe pressure, as "the number of farmers has increased, but the numbers of agricultural training officers have not."

She said training officers were also unable reach communal farmers because of the shortages of vehicles and spare parts, and the unavailability of petrol.

Homegrown food security

"The point is that the farmers are there; the farmers know how to do it, and with some focussed interventions in terms of inputs, extensions [training] and marketing, the potential of communal farmers in terms of cereal production could easily be revitalised to what it was before, which was about one 1.5 million tonnes, and with a little bit of extra support it could easily exceed that. It is very possible that within a year or two the communal farmers can keep this country food secure," Jenrich said.

It is very possible that within a year or two the communal farmers can keep this country food secure

Jenrich estimated that with an annual budget of about US$50 million in the next three years to cover inputs and train farmers, yields could reach 1.5mt to 2mt per hectare on communal farmland conducive to cereal production.

"Compared to what Zimbabwe has been spending in terms of food imports, it's rather a small fee," he said. At current price levels, communal farmers could produce a tonne of maize for US$80 - still US$20 cheaper than South African maize imports three years ago.

Imports of 200,000mt from Malawi, at US$200 per mt, cost US$40 million last year. Zimbabwe's food shortages have coincided with surplus maize production from Malawi, Zambia and South Africa, but rising cereal costs, with no guarantees of bumper harvests in the region yet, could place severe strains on the availability of maize in southern Africa.

In 2007/08 international donor agencies provided food aid to more than a third of Zimbabwe's population, or 4.1 million people.

Although the past season has been difficult, with heavy rains followed by prolonged dry spells, "for those farmers that planted on time, it [the maize crop] is looking quite good," Jenrich conceded.

FAO envisages stimulating the growth of communal farmlands as very feasible, should funding become available. A network of NGOs supporting communal farmers has developed in the past five years, but it would be "quite involving" and take quite a while to organise access to fertilisers and institute training programmes for about 500,000 of the roughly one million households on communal lands, Jenrich said.

S Africa's Mbeki In Mozambique For Talks On Zimbabwe

nasdaq

MAPUTO, Mozambique (AFP)--South African President Thabo Mbeki arrived in
Mozambique Thursday for talks with his counterpart Armando Guebuza which are
set to focus on the post-election crisis in their common neighbor Zimbabwe.

A source in Mbeki's delegation told AFP the pair would discuss what he
called "the delicate situation" in Zimbabwe where there has been mounting
violence following disputed elections held in March.

Mbeki, the region's chief mediator on Zimbabwe, has been widely criticized
for his softly-softly approach towards the country's veteran leader Robert
Mugabe, who lost a first-round election in March to opposition leader Morgan
Tsvangirai.

Although a run-off should in theory take place later this month, it is now
set to be held at the end of July at the instigation of the Mugabe-appointed
electoral commission.

Mbeki was also due to hold talks with the Donald Kaberuka, president of the
African Development Bank, which is currently holding its annual meeting in
Maputo.

  (END) Dow Jones Newswires
  05-15-080952ET

'Make them pay'

IOL

    May 15 2008 at 05:03PM

By Hazel Memani

The South African police have had their hands tied with the recent
spate of xenophobia in northern Johannesburg, prompting reports that the
army might step in.

IOL asked readers: "Should South African protection services act more
strongly against those involved in xenophobic attacks?"

Of the 311 readers who responded, 68 percent (213 votes) said 'Yes',
18 percent (55 votes) said 'No and 33 percent (14 votes) said 'Who cares?'.

Here are some of the comments submitted by our readers:

Anne wrote:
Mr Tokyo Sexwale said in a speach just after the end of apartheid that
ALL OUR AFRICAN BROTHERS & SISTERS are welcome to come to SA. (or words to
that effect) where was he when all his African Brothers & Sisters were being
beaten up by a pack of wild criminals. Safely tucked up behind his big walls
to protect himself from his African Brothers & Sisters.

Doug wrote:
Absolutely! These idiots deserve to be put in jail and, if they kill
anyone, should be taken out and hung themselves. South Africans are so
hypocritical. Imagine if foreigners had treated our political exiles during
Apartheid the same way. I agree with the Bishop... it's the new Apartheid (a
part hate).

FED UP wrote:
not so long ago it was requested that the army be bought in to be used
against criminals, some anc moron turned around and said the army cant be
used against its own citizens, that was probally said because the request
came from the DA or some tax paying victims of crime, well guess what
suckers the chickens have come home to roost, once again the army cannot and
will not be used against its own citizens, if it is used then thats a very
clear indication of how racist this anc truly is!!!!

Rayner wrote:
From 1994, any person with the slightest IQ could have told you that
in time, this was going to happen. If anyone is now not convinced that we
have a bunch of idiots running our country then ?the Lord be with you?. But,
then again I am sure the black people on this site will protect and praise
the government for their good work and then find a way of blaming this on
the white people. [ Edited by IOL ]

knersius wrote:
Actually it's 14 years too late to cry wolf ! It ia all good and well
to let brothers and sisters from northern countries to enter South Africa,
but then, in a controlled manner. The problem now is that most of the
illegal people have already dissapeared within the local population. They
work for a meager meal and R20 per day. I am of the oppinion NOT to act
agaist thse people, because the damage id already done. I suggest stricter
border control if possible, keeping further entering

mamalex wrote:
In SW-Europe imigration is organized. Imigrants are first placed in a
camp for 1-2 years. They are investigated, researched their life and
history. Criminals and those without papers are expelled on the spot! They
are given the time to assimilate, integrate, find an own place to stay, find
a job (given ONLY if no one else is available and only if they are
qualified). Everything is payed by tax payers. Of course population is not
very happy, but still, they dont attack or kill. Nothing of the sort is
organized in SA and police is too sluggish in all the ways. What are we
expecting? SAD!!!

Duncan wrote:
Does anyone else get a sense of '80's deja vu? Violence-wracked
townships; a government that cares only about power for the sake of power;
absolute lack of delivery of services to the most needy and a future clouded
with uncertainty? Does the ANC have the guts to cross it's own Rubicon and
get rid of the scum currently running the country from top to bottom and
actually GOVERN as opposed to rule?

Anonymous wrote:
I still say; every African president should be held accountable for
this nonsense. If it wasn't for their greed and corrupt deeds; these people
would not be compelled to cross borders hunting food. In the same breath; it
is too soon to involve the army. Give the police a chance to bring order.
Xenophobia is a monster that needs to be cut by it's roots. Maybe T.M will
now realise there's a crisis in Zim and act. [ Edited by IOL ]

Graham F wrote:
This is mainly a spin-off from Mugabe's actions in Zimbabwe as far as
the Zim ex pats are concerned and other African leaders (or lack of) in DRC,
etc. If the police are ineffective they must use army patrols. (What does
the Army do by the way? They do not secure the borders ).

Thabo Thebe wrote: What a shame to read what my brothers and sisters
are up to....This are the same people who helped us to be were we are
today....Remember nothing last forever,tomorrow the tables will turn, where
will we all go...? Zim,Moza, Zambia etc...we will need this countries one
day....l hope this country will not let these thugs go unpunished....blood
dogs.

Post-election violence 2008 - Index of articles & images