IOL
November 21
2005 at 10:20PM
By Peta Thornycroft
Harare - Political
violence in Zimbabwe has fallen to its lowest
levels since the emergence of
the opposition Movement for Democratic Change
six years ago.
Analysts say this is because President Robert Mugabe has successfully
subdued the opposition and civil society.
The Human Rights
Forum (HRF) on Monday released its latest monthly
statistics, which show
that political violence during September was at its
lowest level since the
MDC burst onto the political scene and ended Mugabe's
de facto one-party
rule.
The HRF report shows that in September there were less than a
dozen
arrests of political activists and no incidents of
torture.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Political protests are rare in Zimbabwe these days, and draconian
security
laws - tougher than those used by the Rhodesian regime during the
liberation
war in the 1970s - make it an offence for any demonstrations
without police
permission, which is regularly denied to opposition groups.
The HRF
gathers its information from volunteers who offer information,
and it does
not have the capacity to seek full information in rural areas.
John
Makumbe, a senior political scientist at the University of
Zimbabwe,
explained on Monday: "Zanu-PF, which perpetrated most political
violence
since 1999, now feels safe and secure as it has subdued all
effective
political opposition."
He said violence, repressive legislation and
state security agents had
effectively managed all opposition attempts to
challenge Zanu-PF's 25-year
rule.
More than 400 MDC members
have been killed since it came close to
beating Zanu-PF at the general
election in 2000 - only six months after the
party had been
launched.
Tens of thousands of its members have been tortured,
jailed or had
their property destroyed. Hundreds of thousands of its
supporters fled to
other countries, mostly South Africa and
Britain.
MDC legal secretary David Coltart said on Monday: "Zanu-PF
discovered
that political violence damages the facade of democracy in
Zimbabwe. Hunger
is a much more effective political weapon, and in rural
areas, many MDC
supporters are constantly denied access to
food."
Zimbabwe's Grain Marketing Board is the only legal cereals
trader and
importer of maize for human consumption. Most small towns go
regularly
without any mealie meal, and subsistence farmers ran out of grain
more than
three months ago, according to non-governmental
organisations.
The World Food Programme has not yet begun its new
emergency programme
to feed up to four million of the hungriest
Zimbabweans.
HRF director Eilean Sawyer said: "Information we are
collecting now
for the October report will show that political violence is
intra-party:
within Zanu-PF and within the MDC."
The MDC has
split into two factions: one that favours participation in
Senate elections
that take place on Saturday, and the other which is
against. - Independent
Foreign Service
This article was originally published on page 8
of The Star on
November 22, 2005
IOL
November 21
2005 at 11:32PM
Lagos - More than 50 Nigerian and Zimbabwean human
rights groups wrote
a letter on Monday to the African Union (AU)
chairperson, Nigeria's
President Olusegun Obasanjo, on alleged rights abuse
in the southern African
country.
"We are asking you, as chair
of the AU, to call publicly on the
government of Zimbabwe to implement in
full the recommendations made by the
African Commission on Human and
Peoples' Rights," the groups said in the
letter, published by The Guardian
newspaper here.
The Commission visited Zimbabwe in June 2002 and
the AU adopted its
report last January.
The letter to the AU
chairperson comes ahead of a Commonwealth Summit,
scheduled for November
25-27 in Malta in which the issue of Zimbabwe's
suspension from the mainly
English-speaking fold is expected to be
discussed.
In the
report, the commission concluded that "human rights violations
occurred in
Zimbabwe" and made substantive recommendations for action by the
government
of Zimbabwe, the letter said.
However, the majority of these
recommendations have not been
implemented and human rights concerns raised
by the Commission in 2002
"remain serious problems today", it
said.
"Respect for the rule of law has deteriorated further since
the
Commission's report was published," the groups complained.
"It deteriorated markedly in 2005 when the government ignored national
and
international law to launch 'Operation Murambatsvina' - a programme of
mass
forced evictions and demolitions of homes and livelihoods," it said. -
Sapa-AFP
Mail and Guardian
Harare, Zimbabwe
22 November 2005
07:41
Zimbabwe's plans to process its uranium deposits into
energy
will slash the huge amounts the power-starved country pays to import
electricity, Energy Minister Mike Nyambuya said on
Monday.
"When we exploit it, we would like to use it for
peaceful
purposes and reduce our electricity importation bill," the minister
told
Agence France Presse.
President Robert Mugabe
announced at the weekend that the
cash-strapped country had decided to tap
uranium, discovered in the northern
Zambezi Valley in the early 1980s, to
produce energy.
Mugabe said the uranium would not be used "to
make bombs but to
generate electricity".
Zimbabwe has two
main power stations -- one hydroelectric and
the other thermal -- but it
still imports at least 35% of its needs from
neighbours such as South
Africa, Mozambique, Zambia and the Democratic
Republic of
Congo.
The country has in recent years experienced serious
power
shortages, which the national power company Zesa has blamed on a lack
of
foreign currency to buy spares for generators for its power generation
stations.
The opposition however remained sceptical about
prospects for
processing uranium.
Joel Gabbuza, energy
secretary in the main opposition Movement
for Democratic Change (MDC), said
the statements were "wishful thinking".
"It is very difficult
to build a power plant based on uranium. I
don't think we have the capacity
to do it. That's just wishful thinking,"
Gabbuza said.
He
however expressed fears that Zimbabwe could be used "as
conduit of nuclear
arms" although he did not provide details.
The head of the
geological survey department, Temba Hawadi, said
uranium was discovered in
Zimbabwe in the early 1980s by a German firm, but
that plans to extract the
mineral were shelved because uranium prices were
low.
Hawadi said three Australian firms, in partnership with local
companies, are
interested in uranium mining in the northeastern tip of
Zimbabwe bordering
Zambia and Mozambique.
"The demand for the peaceful use of
uranium has gone up in
recent years and there are applications that are
being processed," said
Hawadi. - Sapa-AFP
Zim Observer
by STAFF EDITORS (11/20/2005)
A rainbow arcs towards
the horizon, just above a sign saying "Welcome to
Zimbabwe." The colourful
spectacle happens when sunlight is refracted
through the mist thrown up by
Victoria Falls, which straddle the country's
border with
Zambia.
Zimbabwe has the best views of the falls, which are about 100
metres high
and known locally as mosi-o-tunya ("the smoke that thunders").
Visitors can
paraglide over the falls, take tea at the colonial-era Victoria
Falls hotel,
or bungee-jump from a 100-year-old bridge spanning the Zambezi
River.
But an increasing number of foreign visitors is choosing
to view the falls
from Livingstone, Zambia. Like Zambia's broader economy,
the town is
profiting from the economic and political crisis afflicting
Zimbabwe.
On a recent weekend, several dozen foreign tourists
crowded into Zambia's
Mosi-o-Tunya National Park to view the falls, which
have been reduced to a
trickle on its eastern cataract by southern Africa's
severe drought.
In less than five years several new hotels and
tour operators offering river
cruises or game drives have sprung up in
Livingstone, transforming it from a
provincial backwater into a growing
tourist hub. "Five years ago you could
stand on Mosi-o-Tunya road and see
only one car in half an hour," says
Misozi Tembo, a local spokeswoman for
Sun International, which in 2001
opened two hotels in Livingstone. "Now it's
difficult to cross it."
A shopping mall and two new hotels are
under construction and the town's
tiny airport will be refurbished by the
end of the year to allow 747s and
other big aircraft to land, according to
Ng'andu Magande, Zambia's finance
minister.
"Three quarters
of the falls are in Zambia," says Mr Magande. He says
French, South African
and US hotel groups have also expressed interest in
building hotels in
Livingstone, named after David Livingstone, the Scottish
missionary and
explorer who sighted the falls 150 years ago.
Zimbabwean farmers,
driven abroad by President Robert Mugabe's seizure of
commercial farms, have
also flocked to Zambia, alongside other neighbouring
countries. The migrants
have brought capital and intensive methods rare in
Zambian agriculture and
caused the country's tobacco production to more than
double in two years to
45m kilograms.
"The impact they have made on tobacco farming in
less than two years has
been tremendous," says Dipak Patel, Zambia's
minister of commerce, trade and
industry.
Precise figures are
not available on how many Zimbabwean farmers, many of
whom leased rather
than bought land, are now in Zambia. Peter MacSporren, a
Zimbabwean farming
expert now living in Zambia, puts the number at about
200, about half of
whom he says produce tobacco.
Graham Rae, a white commercial
farmer, moved to Zambia in November 2001
after his farm in Shamva, Zimbabwe
was seized. He cultivates seed maize,
tobacco, soya beans, wheat and
commercial maize on a 9.7 hectare
(24,000-acre) property near Lusaka. Mr Rae
says that he and Mr MacSporren,
his business partner, looked at Mozambique,
Malawi and South Africa before
settling on Zambia, which had the most
potential.
Many Zimbabwean farmers have struggled to make money
in Zambia where
long-term finance and skilled workers are in shorter supply
than in their
homeland. Like local smallholders, many have been hurt by the
drought, which
the government says has left 1.7m Zambians facing food
shortages.
The white migrants, after their eviction from
Zimbabwe, have also made it
clear that they are in Zambia only to farm.
Zambian officials appear to be
largely pleased with their presence. "We're
creating jobs and generating
foreign exchange, so we're happy with it," says
Mr Patel.
Zambia, called Northern Rhodesia under British rule,
was joined in a
federation with Zimbabwe until its independence in 1964. In
the 1970s and
1980s it weathered a long period of economic stagnation during
which
Zambians took shopping trips to their richer southern
neighbour.
The tables are now turned, with Zimbabwe's economy
contracting and demand
for copper, Zambia's main export, fuelling gross
domestic product growth of
4 to 6 per cent. Zimbabweans come to Zambia to
sell small goods for kwachas,
a harder currency than deflated Zimbabwean
dollars. Moses, a Zimbabwean
trader, crossed the bridge on a trip to
Victoria Falls from Livingstone,
where he delivered an order of souvenir
T-shirts. While he had started his
business in Zimbabwe, he now does most of
his business in Zambia or
Botswana.
Source: FT
· Five million more people infected last year, says
UN
· Asia singled out as being particularly at risk
Sarah Boseley and
Randeep Ramesh in New Delhi
Tuesday November 22, 2005
The
Guardian
The HIV/Aids pandemic is continuing its deadly spread across
the globe,
infecting five million more people last year and bringing the
total living
with the virus to over 40 million, the UN said
yesterday.
UNAids, in its latest update on the figures, tried to lighten the
gloom by
pointing to Kenya, Zimbabwe and some of the Caribbean countries,
where there
is some limited evidence that infection rates may be dropping
slightly. But
in the worst-hit regions, notably sub-Saharan Africa, the
trend is steadily
upwards and in India there are suggestions that the scale
of infection could
be worse than the official figures
imply.
Article
continues
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter
Piot, executive director of UNAids, said it was encouraging that
prevention
efforts had led to gains in some countries. "But the reality is
that the
Aids epidemic continues to outstrip global and national efforts to
contain
it."
At a press conference in Delhi, he said Asia, which contains half of
humanity, was particularly at risk. China and Burma, which he said had the
worst epidemics in Asia, were slow to acknowledge the scale of the problem.
"In the world's most populous nation, China, the overwhelming majority of
the population does not know how the virus is transmitted."
India,
which has officially 5.1 million people living with HIV - a number
not far
behind South Africa's - announced earlier this year that new
infections had
fallen dramatically to 28,000 in 2004 from 520,000 in 2003,
sparking
disbelief among voluntary groups.
Dr Piot said he had two concerns with
India's data. One was that most of the
sampling was done in rural areas when
most of the affected population was in
cities. The second was that in some
states the surveillance of the disease
was of "poor quality". "It does not
make sense that migrants from a poor
state like Bihar who live in Mumbai do
not then infect their wives when they
come home. Something is
missing."
The UNAids report called for new efforts to prevent people from
becoming
infected, provoking protests from some activists who fear a
slackening in
the world's efforts to get drugs to all those who need them.
Only one
million are so far on the drugs, while six million will soon die
without
them. Three million people died of Aids last year.
The World
Health Organisation, which set a target of three million on
treatment by the
end of this year, stressed that treatment is now essential
to prevention
work, because people will not be tested for HIV and therefore
will not
change their behaviour unless drugs are available. "We can now see
the clear
benefit of scaling up HIV treatment and prevention together and
not as
isolated interventions," said the WHO director general, Lee
Jong-wook.
However, Dr Piot said the emphasis on prevention after a
few years of
vociferous campaigning for drugs was deliberate because the
balance had
tipped too far the other way. "We're very concerned that
prevention has
slipped off the agenda," he said. "From the developed to the
developing
countries, whether you look at funding or intensity of
programmes, most
attention is going to treatment. In the long run, that is
really bad." He
called for "a rapid increase in the scale and scope of HIV
prevention
programmes".
But the report shows that while projects with
commercial sex workers in
Thailand and India and drug users in Spain and
Brazil have borne some fruit,
the most intractable problems are in
sub-Saharan Africa, where 77% of those
infected are women. Their social
status is very low, they have few rights
and they are unable to negotiate
with men for safe sex.
Some programmes to try to improve the standing of
women have been started in
Africa, said Purnima Mane, director of policy,
evidence and partnerships at
UNAIDS. "It saddens me to say that the results
are very, very small scale. I
often worry whether they will remain sustained
because the prevalent norms
are so much against gender equality."
In
Kenya, Zimbabwe and Uganda, HIV prevalence rates, measured among pregnant
women at antenatal clinics, have dropped, which is being attributed partly
to changes in sexual behaviour, with the greater use of condoms, but also to
increases in death rates.
Zim Daily
Tuesday, November 22 2005 @ 12:05 AM CST
Contributed by:
correspondent
POLICE Commissioner Augustine Chihuri has embarked
on a campaign
tour for Zanu PF and is ordering his subordinates to vote for
the ruling
party in the forthcoming senate election, zimdaily heard this
week.
According to police sources, Chihuri's whirlwind tour has taken him to
the
country's provinces. Although police spokesman, Assistant Commissioner
Wayne
Bvudzijena, said Chihuri's tour was not for campaign purposes, but for
appraising officers on the political situation in the country, those who
attended the meetings insist the commissioner was campaigning for Zanu
PF.
They said Chihuri's trump card in his current campaign is
the
promise of a recent 155% pay hike for officers in January, and the
on-going
land redistribution exercise which has seen members of the
uniformed forces
receiving preferential treatment in the allocation of
plots.
Chihuri, who violated the Police Act in 2000 when he
publicly
declared his loyalty to Zanu PF, has already toured Manicaland,
Mashonaland
West and Mashonaland Central. Last week, he addressed police
officers at
Morris Depot and Harare Central. He is to cover the remaining
provinces
before the senate poll scheduled for November 26. Said one police
officer
from Manicaland: "Chihuri reminded us promised us pay increases and
said we
should thank the government for addressing our
plight.
He then castigated the MDC, saying it was sponsored
by whites
and we should never vote for it." According to another source, the
commissioner, "who spoke like a true politician", chronicled the events of
the liberation struggle giving reasons why he thought government was right
to grab land from the whites. He also allegedly threatened to deal with
those officers aligned to the MDC.
"Basically, the
message was mari tichakupai ende nyika haisi
kuzotorwa (we will give you
money and the ruling party will retain power),"
said the officer. Dismissing
the allegations, Bvudzijena said : "That is a
gross misrepresentation. We
are trying to realign police officers to the
objectives of the organisation.
We want police officers to understand the
political climate in the country
and how they should deal with political
violence which is an area of concern
to us and we need our officers to
emphatically deal with
it.
"We were not only looking at crime but administrative
issues as
well, including finances. But some people have misconstrued our
actions as
campaigning," said Bvudzijena. Said one officer in response to
Bvudzijena's
denials: "They could never buy us with money, nor with
Chihuri's cheap
politics. Like everyone else, we are suffering because of
the current
corrupt government and we definitely won't be bought by Mugabe's
30 pieces
of silver." A constable within the force described as "peanuts"
the 155%
salary increment promised.
"It is worthless.
Just look at today's cost of living," he said.
Chihuri's campaign trail
follows a statement released by the commander of
the Zimbabwe Defence
Forces, General Constantine Chiwenga on behalf of the
Joint Operations
Command, that uniformed forces would not respect any
election results if
Zanu PF lost. Members of the Joint Operations Command
include Chihuri
himself, Air Marshal Perrence Shiri, Gen Chiwenga and the
heads of the
intelligence and prison services. Just before the March
parliamentary
elections, Chiwenga undertook a similar tour, ordering
soldiers to vote for
the Zanu PF candidates in the the general election
which was won by Zanu
PF.
New Zimbabwe
By Lebo
Nkatazo
Last updated: 11/22/2005 13:18:19
ZIMBABWEAN police are failing to
enforce an arrest warrant against 31
supporters of the ruling Zanu PF party
following a telephone threat by
President Robert Mugabe's nephew and MP,
Patrick Zhuwawo.
Zhuwawo is blocking the arrest of the 31 youths who were
part of his
campaign team following a warrant of arrest issued against them
last
Wednesday.
Police officers at Norton police station alleged that
Zhuwawo, who is the
area's Member of Parliament called the police station
last Friday and
ordered that the youths should not be
"touched".
"Zhuwawo said the youths must not be arrested until further
instruction. I
think they (Zanu PF youths) know that this is the state of
affairs as they
are roaming the suburb without any fear of arrest," said a
police officer at
the station.
Zhuwawo, who is said to be more close
to his uncle, Mugabe, than his brother
Leo, is the Deputy Minister of
Science and Technology.
A Harare magistrate issued the warrant of arrest
against the youths when
they failed to appear in court.
The 31, who
have been on free bail since February, face violence charges.
The youths
were nabbed a day after they allegedly overran a police post in
Norton in a
bid to rescue a colleague who had been arrested on charges of
engaging in
and inciting political violence.
Prosecutors say the youths went on a
hunt for MDC in the Norton area. When
their hunt yielded nothing, they
indiscriminately attacked anyone perceived
to be an MDC
supporter.
President Robert Mugabe nephew defeated the MDC's Hilda
Mafudze in polls
that the opposition party said were characterized by
violence.
No comment could be obtained from Zhuwawo last night.
New Zimbabwe
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In
1987, the Bhundu Boys played at Wembley. Today, the band's members are
either dead, in jail or broke. The legendary guitarist Rise Kagona (works in
a Scottish charity shop) and the wife of late frontman Biggie Tembo (toilet
cleaner) reveal how it all went so horribly
wrong
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By
Robert Chalmers
Last updated: 11/22/2005 13:16:22
I HAVE to wait 10
minutes before my interviewee appears: not an uncommon
experience when
you're dealing with people connected to show business,
though in this case
it's because my subject has to finish cleaning the
ladies'
toilets.
Ratidzai Tembo finally joins me at a table in the Octopus, the dim,
cavernous beer-hall where she works near Mbare, one of the more intimidating
townships close to Harare. I'd first driven to her home, a broken-down shack
she shares with two of her children, and her mother. The poverty in Mbare is
shocking even by the standards of Zimbabwe, the country that recently
finished bottom of the Economist magazine's world index for quality of
life.
Ratidzai and her family live in two cramped rooms without
electricity, in a
property that even the most creative estate agent could
not avoid describing
as a hovel. Her family explained that she was already
at work, and gave me
directions to the Octopus, which is what Zimbabweans
euphemistically call a
"nightclub". Her boss, understandably alarmed by the
arrival of a British
journalist, given the climate of paranoia and menace
generated by Robert
Mugabe's Zanu PF government, finally agrees to let us
speak alone.
"Were you at those Wembley Stadium shows? Did you meet
Madonna?" I ask
Ratidzai.
She shakes her head.
"No. I went to
many shows in England, but not those."
She pauses.
"When you
mention Madonna... all that seems like another life. There have
been times
since then when I have had to sell my clothes so that the
children could
have food."
Ratidzai is the widow of Biggie Tembo, singer and guitarist
with the Bhundu
Boys, the band John Peel (former BBC Radio DJ) famously
described as
producing the most naturally flowing music he'd ever heard in
his life. Andy
Kershaw was best man at her marriage. Tembo won a Sony Award
for a superb
Radio 1 documentary that he co-presented with Kershaw, hosted a
special for
Channel 4, and appeared on Blue Peter. The Bhundu Boys were
lauded by Eric
Clapton and Mark Knopfler as well as Madonna, who personally
requested that
the band support her for the three nights she played, to a
total of 240,000
people, at Wembley in 1987. Elvis Costello, another
admirer, briefly acted
as their producer. At the height of his success in
the late 1980s, Biggie
Tembo, one of the most convivial and engaging men I
have ever met, lived
with Ratidzai in a bungalow with a swimming pool, in an
affluent suburb of
Harare.
Almost 10 years ago, Biggie, distraught at
having left the Bhundu Boys in
acrimonious circumstances, was found hanged
in Harare's psychiatric
hospital. He was 37.
"He died on July 29,
1995," Ratidzai tells me. "You can see the hospital
from here." She points
to a forbidding concrete building across the yard of
the beer hall, where a
few clients are passing around a blue plastic bucket
filled with chibuku - a
challenging but affordable beverage whose
unforgettable bouquet is produced
by ingredients including yeast, gruel and,
in some cases, battery
acid.
I tell her how I had lunch with Tembo, Kershaw and John Peel in
London, nine
months before the Zimbabwean died. Biggie's once irrepressible
manner had
become subdued. There was a disconcerting intensity about him. He
talked
about giving up music and becoming a comedian or a
preacher.
"All of that started after he was separated from the group,"
Ratidzai says.
"He suffered terrible stress. He began to drink whisky - lots
of it,
straight from the bottle. He said it would help him sleep, but it
didn't. He
couldn't sleep. He was up for days. He started to behave
strangely. One day
we were watching TV - this was towards the end, when we
still had a place in
England, a flat in Bristol. He kept saying he could
smell burning; that
something was on fire in the house. He was pacing
around, looking for smoke,
even though nothing was alight."
They
returned to Zimbabwe permanently at the end of 1994. Barclays Bank
repossessed the bungalow. "Then he was kept in the mental hospital here for
several months."
"How did he kill himself?"
"They told me that
he broke free from his straitjacket and hanged himself in
his
room."
For the past year, Ratidzai has worked here at the Octopus, as a
waitress
and cleaner. She earns $50,000 Zimbabwean dollars - around £4.60 -
a week.
A handsomely packaged special edition of the Bhundu Boys' first
two albums
was released in July 2001, under the title The Shed Sessions, to
considerable acclaim. The website run by Stern's, the London-based World
Music specialists, shows that the double CD, priced at £12.95, remained in
its Top 25 for 13 months, and at one stage reached Number Two. The Shed
Sessions is available from Amazon's sites in the UK, the US and Japan.
Tembo's widow says she has received none of the royalties due to her
husband.
"Do you ever hear the Bhundu Boys on the radio?" I
ask.
"Sometimes. That is painful. I turn it off. It upsets me. Where I am
living
now, the only heating is firewood or paraffin, and we cannot always
afford
them. My life," she adds, "has become a nightmare."
At the
height of their fame in the mid-1980s, the group were signed to
Warners
(WEA). They toured North America, Australia and Hong Kong,
chauffeured to
venues from luxury hotels. They owned a large house in
London. Their manager
says the advances the five band members received - not
including fees from
their heavy tour schedule - totalled around £120,000.
To call the Bhundu
Boys one of the greatest African bands of all time is to
demean their
achievement; their unique talent never required a geographical
prefix.
"I first heard them when they put out an EP in the autumn of
1985," Andy
Kershaw recalls. "Peel and I were in the office at Radio 1. We
sat staring
at each other, thinking this recording was absolutely wonderful.
It was the
dazzling quality of the music, the harmonies, the sparkling
guitar playing.
The Bhundu Boys were simply one of the greatest pop groups I
have ever
heard."
The following spring, Kershaw adds, he and Peel
went to see the group in
Chelsea.
"I realised after a few minutes
that I had this enormous grin on my face. I
was surrounded by kids of
college age. They were all grinning too. I turned
to look at John, and -
Peel being Peel - he was weeping. The tears were just
running down his face.
It really was a revelatory moment. We introduced
ourselves to the band. I
immediately hit it off with Biggie, who was an
ideal frontman; a superb
communicator with a wonderful sense of humour and
full of enthusiasm for
everything. The band played like they were having the
time of their lives.
They played like that because they were."
No single story is so
chillingly symbolic of Zimbabwe's decline as the
tragic history of the
Bhundu Boys. Their formation, in April 1980, coincided
with the country's
declaration of independence. "Bhundu Boys" were
anti-colonialist bush
commandos, and the band embodied the exuberant
optimism engendered by
liberation from British rule.
The group were fêted by Robert Mugabe in
the days when he was acclaimed by
many - including senior British
politicians - as a positive influence. But
the band angered Zanu PF when
they played benefits to raise awareness of
Aids, a disease which, until
recently, Mugabe refused to acknowledge as a
problem in Zimbabwe, where an
estimated 40 per cent of the population (and
up to 80 per cent of the
military) are HIV positive.
Former Bhundu Boys Shakie Kangwena, David
Mankaba and Sheperd Munyama are
"late", as Zimbabweans put it, all from
Aids. Another, Washington Kavhai, is
in jail in the UK, in Preston, serving
seven years for violent assault.
Kenny Chitsvatsva, the drummer, was last
heard of driving a minicab in
London.
As I leave the beer hall in
Mbare, Ratidzai Tembo's last words to me are:
"Please help
me."
Biggie Tembo was born Rodwell Marasha in Chinhoyi, 70 miles
northwest of
Harare. The town is famous for having seen the first skirmish
between the
Zimbabwean Liberation Army and Ian Smith's Rhodesian Security
Forces - a
clash which launched the conflict that eventually led to
independence. As a
boy, Tembo was involved in the armed struggle as a
messenger and lookout,
and he liked to address friends, Peel and Kershaw
included, as "Comrade".
He came to Harare in the late 1970s and was
recruited to the Bhundu Boys by
their founder, the inspirational guitarist
Rise Kagona. The group were
playing in township beer-halls when they were
spotted by Steve Roskilly, a
former Mayfair property developer, who began
recording them at his studio in
the capital. With Roskilly, they had four
Number One singles in three years
in Zimbabwe.
The odd circumstances
which brought the band international fame began in the
mid-1980s at a squat
in a disused hospital at Earl's Court, London, where
Owen Elias, a student
at Chelsea College of Art, met Doug Veitch, a maverick
Scottish guitarist
whose supplementary sources of income included driving
tube trains and
cleaning windows. Using the £2,000 then gifted to new
businesses under the
Enterprise Allowance Scheme, they formed a label,
Discafrique, and left for
Harare to look for artists. There, Roskilly played
them the songs they
issued on the EP that would captivate Peel and Kershaw.
It was when Elias
and Veitch decided to bring the band to the UK in 1986
that things became
increasingly surreal. Unable to fund a tour, they turned
to Gordon Muir, a
designer of knitwear brochures who grew up with Veitch in
the border town of
Hawick. Muir provided the cash and was soon sole manager
of the band. (Elias
now makes wine in Kent; Veitch is in Lanarkshire,
completing a PhD in
woodland management.)
Muir got the band bookings on the lucrative student
circuit, from which
base, with the support of DJs such as Peel, Kershaw and
Charlie Gillett,
they built a national following.
When I return to
London from Zimbabwe, I find a number for Muir, who now
lives in Kirkliston,
a village outside Edinburgh.
Could I talk to him?
"I'll have to
think about that," he replies.
"What happened to Rise Kagona," I ask. "Is
he alive?"
"Rise lives here," he says, "in Kirkliston."
A couple
of days later, on the train to Scotland, I find myself pondering a
number of
questions. How can a guitarist of Kagona's ability be living in
such obscure
circumstances? What made Tembo kill himself? Why is his widow
receiving no
royalties?
I sit down with Kagona and Muir in the living room of the
Scot's isolated
cottage. The guitarist lodges with a philanthropic neighbour
on an adjoining
farm. To keep himself occupied, Kagona - this is a musician
who, apart from
Clapton et al, was revered by the late Joe Strummer - does
ironing at the
local charity shop. His clothes and his manner attest to this
proud but
gentle man's minimal sources of income. Whenever possible, he
travels into
Edinburgh to play with local bands.
"But the last bus
for our township - I mean village - leaves Edinburgh about
11pm, so if I
miss it, I have to sit in the railway station to keep warm,"
Kagona
explains. "The first bus is at 7am. But I am a musician. I have to
play."
A few years ago, he invested his savings into a farm outside
Harare.
"When I arrived there with some relatives, a gang of youths -
those who call
themselves 'comrades' - were waiting. They said: 'Show us
your Zanu PF
Cards.' We didn't have any. We showed them the deeds. They
said: 'Show us
Zanu PF cards or you have five minutes to get out before we
kill you.' I
decided land was not worth dying for."
Kagona has been
working on a new album with Muir, which the Scotsman hopes
to finish by May
and issue under the name of the Bhundu Boys. The tracks
they have recorded
are, in Muir's words, "basically grooves". Sung in
English, not Shona, they
are some way removed from the sound that
established the band's
reputation.
Muir, a slim, intensely-focussed, grey-haired man of 44,
recalls how he and
Doug Veitch took a battered van to meet the band when
they landed in London
in May 1986.
"Doug had no soles on his shoes,"
says Kagona. "We thought they must be
henchmen for the people with money."
He was mistaken.
The group arrived with no instruments.
"They were
determined to acquire their own gear," Muir says. "With the
monies per gig,
this was not realisable. I got into a hire purchase
agreement."
For a
year, the Bhundu Boys lived with the Scotsman and his partner Anne in
Hawick. After overseeing the band's success with Shabini and Tsvimbodzemoto,
their first two albums on Discafrique, Muir brokered the deal with
WEA.
"That is one thing I will blow my own trumpet on," he says. "The
deals we
got have been unsurpassed by any world music act. WEA must deeply
regret
that they ever came into contact with us."
"How much did you
get?"
"From Blue Mountain [the publishing company] about £50,000 to
£60,000 in
advances. From Warners, about the same."
Income, Muir
says, was split equally between himself and each of the band
members. "There
were a lot of expenses," he says. "We sank large amounts
into purchasing a
PA and studio equipment. We were all taking a reasonable
salary; about £300
a week."
As is often the case in the music business, it was when the
major label
became involved that things went badly wrong. Muir's boldness
and initiative
as a manager have never been in question. At the time of
Nelson Mandela's
70th birthday concert at Wembley in 1988 - a bill with a
disappointing ratio
of black artists - the Bhundu Boys organised a rival
event in Brixton, where
Mark Knopfler sportingly appeared as "The Token
Honky".
But once at WEA - instead of Roskilly, who had captured their
elegant
simplicity on their early records - the band hired Robin Millar, the
producer of singer Sade. True Jit, the first of two albums for WEA,
introduced an anodyne, westernised sound that horrified some of their core
admirers.
"We came from a poor background," says Kagona. "We toured
the US. We met Ray
Charles. We played Central Park with Eddie Murphy.
Limousines took us
everywhere. We rode along with our heads sticking out of
the roof. One time
in New York the limousine arrived and Biggie wouldn't
join us."
"Why not?"
"He felt such behaviour was not correct. I
told him that the record company
had arranged the car, and if we went by bus
we wouldn't get the money back.
Biggie used to say that we were enjoying too
rich a life, while our brothers
and sisters were suffering back home in
Zimbabwe. I understand what he
meant. But I told him look, enjoy it while
you can. Because these things go
away, and once they have gone you will
never get them back again."
Kagona's instinct was
prophetic.
Together, the band, which was registered as a limited company,
bought a
large house in Kensal Green, north-west London, where they lived
for 18
months or so.
As the Bhundu Boys' reputation grew, Tembo's
behaviour, according to Muir,
became unpredictable. He says Tembo got to
thinking he was bigger than the
band. He gives me details of the singers'
affairs with a number of women. He
says that when Biggie left the band, in
1989, his last words were: "I quit.
Fuck the lot of you." Kagona agrees that
Tembo walked out. Not long
afterwards, Muir adds, Biggie attacked
him.
"He beat the shit out of me. I have pictures."
Tembo, for his
part, told Kershaw and others the group had become envious of
his individual
popularity, and sacked him. Nobody disputes that Tembo could
be extremely
difficult, or that, subsequent to his departure, he pleaded to
rejoin the
Bhundu Boys, but was rejected.
"Now I don't know who my enemies are,"
Tembo had sung, in an improvised
lyric on the second WEA album, Pamberi. "It
was better when I knew."
"Tembo was fired from the Bhundu Boys and he
found that rejection very
difficult to deal with," one friend told me. "At
almost the same time, he
discovered that the man who brought him up as his
son, in Chinhoyi, was not
his natural father. The two things knocked him
sideways. I went to see him
in the mental hospital in Chinhoyi. He said: 'I
cannot deal with this. These
things have been such a shock.' In career
terms, he had been promised the
earth. To have begun to achieve, then to
have everything snatched away from
him, was just too much."
With
Tembo out of the band, the Bhundu Boys' fortunes waned rapidly. The
group's
prize asset had always been a more complex man than his ever-smiling
stage
persona suggested and his departure exacerbated a pattern of aberrant
behaviour. Kershaw says that Tembo would come round to his house and begin
weeping for no apparent reason, then start talking about how much he missed
the band, and about his confusion over the identity of his
father.
"It was very important for him to know where his father's
ancestors were,"
says Kagona. "In Africa, your father is the central figure
in your life.
Biggie became obsessed with contacting his ancestors. He would
lock himself
in his room and make these strange noises." Kagona demonstrates
the sound, a
sustained rattle similar to a Spanish "r".
"He would do
these rituals, praying to spirits, taking snuff, and making
that rrrrrr
noise. He believed he had drawn evil spirits to him. He had no
idea where
his real father was. Those rituals took him somewhere else. They
took him to
a bad place. He ended up mad."
Tembo divided his time between the UK and
Zimbabwe, where he joined a
fundamentalist church generally regarded as a
cult, and took to preaching
and speaking in tongues on public transport.
Once, he went on Zimbabwean
television and confessed that demons possessed
him.
In Britain, he embarked on a series of unsuccessful solo ventures,
collaborating with a Bristol band called the Startled Insects, occasionally
performing stand-up to a bewildered public.
"The audience was
polite," says Kershaw, who saw one 1993 comedy show at
Ronnie Scott's, "but
frankly it was painful to watch."
"What happened to the money from the
London house?" I ask Muir.
"We bought that as a company. The house was
mortgaged."
"So the profits were divided among the band, once it was
sold?"
"What happened was," Muir says, "I bought the house off the band
four or
five years after we first purchased it. I was owed money I hadn't
taken out
of the company." He sold the property "a couple of years later,"
he
explains, "for virtually the same price. We paid £93,000 in 1987 and sold
it
in 1993 for £98,000".
I'd anticipated being able to verify these
and other figures relating to the
band's assets, but records at Companies'
House show that Bhundu Boys Ltd,
first registered under that name in May
1987, never submitted any annual
accounts. An order for the company's
compulsory liquidation was made in 1990
and it was then officially disolved
in 1995. (When asked why the figures
aren't at Companies' House, Muir says
he "hasn't a clue".)
The recent reissue, The Shed Sessions, was put out
on Sadza, Muir's label.
Is Ratidzai Tembo receiving
royalties?
"Through the producer Steve Roskilly, yeah," says Muir. "This
is something
you seem keen to talk about."
"That's because Ratidzai
is not getting anything."
"I account directly to Roskilly."
One of
the most bizarre aspects of Kagona's current situation is that he is
currently recording not only with Muir, but with Doug Veitch. Veitch, now
45, is a gifted songwriter who enjoyed a brief but inspired solo career in
the 1980s as Champion Doug Veitch, the world's greatest exponent of
Caledonian-Cajun-Dub crossover, before vigorous socialising brought him to
the point of physical collapse.
In the course of writing this
article, I get a message from Veitch asking me
to return to Edinburgh, where
I find him with Kagona in a recording studio.
Veitch plays me the demos that
he has made with Kagona. They are inventive
and unfussy, sung in Shona, and
echo the vibrant, melodic spirit of the
original Bhundu Boys
recordings.
Muir had told me that, though he's had differences with Doug
Veitch, the
forestry expert is "basically still my best friend". Veitch, who
could not
be accused of being reticent on any subject, describes Muir in
terms which
are unrepeatable in a family newspaper.
At this, our
second meeting, Kagona, a naturally introverted man, is in
reflective mood.
The deaths of so many colleagues, he tells me, combined
with the implosion
of his career, have been almost impossible to bear.
"I find myself
asking, why me?" Kagona says. "Why am I still alive? I feel
as if I have
never existed," he adds. "I feel as though my life never
happened."
When so many contemporaries began to be diagnosed with
Aids, he explains,
"It got so that, as a musician from Zimbabwe, if you even
had a headache,
you didn't tell anybody."
Kagona was born in Malawi
but has a former wife and three children in
Zimbabwe. When I was in Harare,
I tell him, I had a meeting with Mugabe's
Minister of Information, Nathan
Shamuyarira, who told me he did not regard
the Bhundu Boys as a political
issue. (Shamuyarira, one of the closest
confidants of the President, is
preparing a biography of Robert Mugabe,
which is not expected to be
over-critical in tone.) But the musician remains
uneasy about returning to
Harare, especially if - or rather when - Mugabe
wins re-election on the 31st
of this month.
When I ask him if he has any regrets, Kagona mentions the
purchase of the
London house, a transaction that has left him dissatisfied
and confused.
"I never wanted a house in England," he explains. "None of
us had a house
back home. I would have preferred to buy somewhere in
Zimbabwe. When we
signed to WEA, Gordon got this idea about buying a house."
Kagona
acknowledges that he eventually bowed to a democratic vote in the
band.
"What I got from that house, when it was sold, was for the sale of
my bed
and my linen. They were sold separately, to a second-hand shop. I got
£5 for
them. I am not lying."
The band's debts to him, Muir
adds,"were worked out to the last £10."
Where business dealings are
concerned, Kagona says, "all these years I have
stood in darkness. It has
been like a fog. Deals were signed in offices but
we have been left with
nothing."
As regards Tembo's incrementally expanding ego, Kagona says,
"Gordon
encouraged Biggie in that belief. He built expectations in his
brain."
Muir denies any suggestion of impropriety where the distribution
of income
is concerned. "Were we naïve? Yes. But I don't want to stray into
territory
that suggests we are exploiting Biggie's widow. All the money was
distributed among the band or sunk into equipment. The monies that would be
going to Biggie's widow would be generated by sales of The Shed Sessions. I
pay the money directly to Steve Roskilly, who passes that on to her, as far
as I am aware."
While I was in Harare, I'd driven out to Roskilly's
house in Borrowdale, a
rich suburb where the residual white population exist
on estates protected
by dogs and razor wire. A caretaker appeared at
Roskilly's electric gate and
gave me a number for him. "He is in
Cheltenham," he said, "and he's not
coming back."
A journey that had
began in Mbare ends at Cheltenham Racecourse. Roskilly,
who now runs a
stage-equipment company, meets me at the venue's conference
arena, where he
is supervising a lighting rig. On stage, Olympic Bronze
Medallist horsewoman
Pippa Funnell is rehearsing a speech she will make that
evening.
Roskilly, 57, has brought a file of balance sheets relating
to the Bhundu
Boys. He comes across as a well-meaning man doing his best to
peer into what
Kagona perceives as the fog surrounding the band's affairs.
He says he
recalls a conversation with Muir in which it was agreed that the
Scot, not
Roskilly, should pass on the money to Ratidzai. After looking
through his
papers, though, he concedes that the responsibility appears to
be his, and
that the money has not been paid to Tembo's widow, though he is
not yet
clear as to whether he has received all of what is due to her from
Muir.
We're not talking about huge sums, Roskilly points out - a few hundred
pounds, at most.
"That's a lot of money in Mbare."
Roskilly
agrees.
"I am taken aback by this," he says, looking sincerely mortified.
"I need to
call Muir and sort this out."
The story of Tembo, Roskilly
says, "was a disaster from start to finish. He
didn't resign. He was fired.
And he couldn't take that. Tembo was the one
who came up with the special
songs. Tembo had the personality. The others
couldn't deal with the
attention he was getting. It's true that he was a
volatile man. But the band
made a terrible mistake when they fired him.
Neither Tembo, or they, ever
recovered."
The sad thing, Kagona, had told me, "is that, for all the
cities we visited,
and all the friends, and all the music that we made, the
Bhundu Boys are
mostly remembered for dying of Aids."
In May this
year, Kagona embarked on a six-date tour of the UK with Doug
Veitch, and the
Bhundu Boys guitarist is getting back in contact with people
in the
mainstream of the broadcasting world, including Radio 3's Andy
Kershaw.
"Observing the music business," Kershaw tells me, "there are
certain things
that you learn - if not to accept - then at least to
understand. But there
are two things I will never understand. One is how
Rise Kagona can be
working in a charity shop on the outskirts of Edinburgh.
The other is how
the widow of my best friend has ended up cleaning toilets
at a beer hall in
Harare."
'The Shed Sessions' CD is available from
www.sternsmusic.com. This article
was originally published in the Independent (UK) newspaper
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Paidamoyo
Chipunza
issue date :2005-Nov-22
ABOUT three million Zimbabweans (or
about 36 percent of the rural populace),
will not be able to meet their food
requirements during the 2005-6 marketing
period owing to prolonged dry
spells and the general socio-economic
challenges the country is
facing.
According to a report prepared by the Zimbabwe Vulnerability
Assessment
Committee (ZimVAC) in collaboration with government ministries,
United
Nations arms and non-governmental organisations, at least 225 455
metric
tonnes of maize would be required to meet household deficits for the
affected areas.
The document, dubbed Zimbabwe Rural Food Security and
Vulnerability
Assessments - June 2005 Report, was officially launched in
Harare last week
by the Minister of Labour, Public Service and Social
Welfare, Nicholas
Goche.
The report predicted that about 549 877 people
in Masvingo province and
approximately 529 983 citizens in Manicaland
province would face food
insecurity during the period under
spotlight.
Read part of the fifth report of food insecurity in Zimbabwe:
"Households
with diverse income sources were found to be more food secure
than those
with few livelihood options."
It stated that families faced
with food insecurity had already engaged in
negative coping mechanisms, such
as reducing the number of daily meals by 62
percent, expenditure on
education (41 percent) and health (36 percent)
because of the astronomical
costs of medical treatment and agricultural
inputs (35 percent).
"The
major challenges identified by communities in order of severity were:
drought, price increases, shortage of draught power, sanitation, lack of
safe water and livestock diseases," read the report.
The report cited
households with orphans, single parent female-headed
families, a house led
by a person with very little education or a widow,
elderly, as being among
food-insecure households.
It recommended that the government should ensure
efficient distribution of
food so that the number of food-insecure people
would not increase from the
projected 2,9 million people.
"Special
intervention programmes such as public works programmes (PWP),
targeted cash
transfers, child supplementary feeding and school feeding
programmes need to
be continued and expanded to cover the needs of the
vulnerable," says the
report. "Food assistance targeted at the elderly,
chronically ill as well as
home-based care programmes should also be
continued."
To address school
dropouts due to food shortages as a result of reduced
spending on education,
the government was urged to ensure that the Basic
Education Assistance
Module (BEAM) programme be conducted at the beginning
of every term instead
of at the beginning of the year, to cater for children
who dropout
mid-year.
"Of all those children not in school, 29 percent were aged 6-12
years, 71
percent were aged 13-17 years. The highest number of those not in
school
were orphans," reads the report.
"Twenty-five percent of the
children aged 0-17 years were orphans. Of these,
14 percent were paternal
orphans, 4 percent maternal orphans and 7 percent
had lost both
parents."
Apart from food shortages, the report also addressed a broad range
of
issues, among them agriculture, health and child welfare.
The
vulnerability assessments, which are done annually by all countries in
the
Sadc region, were
born out of a declaration by the Sadc Ministers of
Agriculture in August
2001 and they have become an important tool for
provision of information for
planning and decision-making.
The broad
objective of the Zimbabwe assessment was to appraise the rural
food security
situation throughout the country and to identify areas and
populations
likely to be food-insecure in the 2005-6 period.
The assessment is also
intended to explore rural livelihoods in order to
determine short and
medium-term needs and opportunities for sustainable
interventions.
ZimVAC
is made up of the Food and Nutrition Council (FNC), SIRDC Institutes
and
Ministries of Agriculture, Water Resources and Infrastructural
Development,
Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, Health and Child
Welfare, Local
Government, Public Works and Urban Planning.
Other organisations include
United Nations agencies and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs).
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
The Daily Mirror Reporter
issue date
:2005-Nov-22
CONTROVERSIAL war veteran Joseph Chinotimba has denied
claims by a Harare
businessman-cum-war veteran, Shepherd Gambura that they
jointly own a
security firm.
Chinotimba said Gambura, who is seeking the
dissolution of an alleged
partnership in the firm, Edlan Security (Pvt) Ltd,
and re-appointment as
sole owner, had since resigned from the security
company.
In court papers filed on November 16, in which Gambura is the
plaintiff and
Chinotimba and the security firm are first and second
defendants, the
bearded war veterans commander said: "This is denied in its
entirety. First
defendant became a director of the company upon resignation
by the plaintiff
from the company.
"The CR14 as amended reflected the new
directorship. First defendant and his
son became the
directors."
Chinotimba also denied that the security firm's firearms are
registered in
Gambura's name saying as a legal requirement, Edlan's assets
were all
registered in its name.
He said Gambura only came back to the
security firm to do consultancy work
until the defendants dispensed with his
services.
On Gambura's allegations that he was running the company without
consulting
him, Chinotimba said there was no need,
as the former had no
interest in the company.
"This is denied. There was no partnership between
the plaintiff and First
defendant, secondly, Second defendant is a limited
liability company with
its own assets," he added.
Apart from seeking to
be declared sole company owner, Gambura also wants the
court to order the
auditing of the
firm's books by reputable chartered accountants.
He is
further demanding payment of half the firm's profits to him within
seven
days.
Gambura, in the court papers, also claimed that Chinotimba had formed
another company into which he had transferred some of Edlan's contracts.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Muchena Zigomo
issue date :2005-Nov-22
LOCAL business
players have called for government and the central bank to
step up efforts
towards securing the pledged financial loan from South
Africa, amid
revelations that some measures proposed by that country for the
disbursal of
the funds have begun taking effect in Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe National Chamber of
Commerce (ZNCC) president Luxon Zembe pressed
the government
and central
bank for a swift conclusion to negotiations over the proposed
loan last
week, saying the funds were key to an economic revival.
Zembe said the
business fraternity was "eagerly waiting" the funds, as it is
believed they
could trigger a reversal of dull economic fortunes for
Zimbabwe, which has
been caught in a seemingly unending downward economic
spiral.
"We are
really urging the government to hasten negotiations for the South
African
loan as it would do a lot to stabilize our economic situation at the
moment,
particularly the foreign currency situation which has now reached
alarming
levels and would benefit a lot from an injection of that
magnitude," he
said.
Unconfirmed media reports have indicated that the financial aid package
could be within the realms of between US$500 million to
US$1 billion, an
amount that
could significantly boost Zimbabwe's depleted foreign
currency
situation.
Foreign currency shortages have been at the heart of
Zimbabwe's slow
economic meltdown, and have seen the country struggling to
pay off its
arrears to international creditors and pay for adequate supplies
of
critically needed imports such as fuel and electricity.
Business has
urged government to restore ties with external partners that
would grant
much-needed financial support to break out of its economic
crisis.
However, despite the "principle" commitment by the South African
government
to disburse the funds, little else has surfaced from the
negotiating parties
regarding progress on deliberations that have seen
finance and central bank
officials shuttling between the two countries
almost on a weekly basis.
The talks were stalled for almost two weeks in
August after Zimbabwe had
made a US$120 million payment of its debt to the
International Monetary Fund
(IMF), which has now been reduced to US$175
million.
Since the return to the negotiating table, a major sticking point
has
reportedly been the stringent conditions set by South African president
Thabo Mbeki, which are believed to include both political and economic
reforms to the situation in Zimbabwe.
Sources told Business Mirror that
the political conditions stipulated by the
southern neighbour included the
resumption of dialogue between the
government and the opposition MDC, with a
vision towards the formation of a
government of national unity.
On the
other hand, the economic reforms "suggested the shift to a free
market
economy that was less regulated and determined by market forces" and
an
adjustment of the exchange rate.
The conditions are aimed at ensuring that
South Africa gets its money back.
"We have already seen some of these things
happening - more recently we
witnessed the introduction of the interbank
foreign currency trading system
and a simultaneous adjustment of the
exchange rate - these things have not
all been happening in a vacuum," a
source said.
Government's position has thus far been in favour of a more
regulated
economic structure, which has seen the imposition of controls on
pricing and
foreign currency exchange rates.
Apart from South Africa, the
IMF has also pushed for similar economic
reforms in Zimbabwe.
In its
annual review and economic survey issued last week, the Fund said its
board
had "called on the authorities to act decisively in a number of areas,
including: deregulation; public enterprise reform, fiscal reform,and
particularly civil service reform and agricultural reform".
In another
report issued recently, the IMF also said Zimbabwe
would need external
support if it were to break out of its economic crisis,
with participation
from external partners being a major requirement for
turnaround progress
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
The Daily Mirror Reporter
issue date :2005-Nov-22
OWING
to the acute shortage of fuel, the municipalities of Bindura and
Shamva have
resorted to collecting refuse using ox-drawn carts they hire
from nearby
resettled farmers.
The scarcity of the precious liquid has seen the two town
councils forced to
ground their utility fleet.
Shamva borad chairperson,
Sydney Chiwara said they paid at least $80 000 per
load for the removal of
garbage to keep the city clean.
He said vehicles reserved for critical
services such as health have also
been grounded seriously affecting the
operations of the municipality.
"We have been trying to ration fuel so that
we could attend to cases that
require immediate attention like in the health
sector," Chiwara said. "Now
we have completely run out of fuel and it means
there is no fuel for
emergency cases and refuse collection.
"We found it
better to hire ox-drawn carts to remove refuse that had piled
over the
weeks. Since we started the programme two weeks ago, everything is
going
well.
"We have four groups who are doing that work all with ox-drawn carts
from
the surrounding farms"
The programme, Chiwara said, will continue
until the fuel situation improves
in the country.
Said Chiwara: "We
intend to continue to rid the city of refuse using this
method until the
fuel situation in the country improves. It is better to
resort to carts
because we cannot just wait and see refuse piling yet we
have other means of
removing it. I urge other towns and cities, which have
grounded their
vehicles due to fuel problems to follow suit rather than
waiting while waste
is piling."
Aneas Zhakata, Bindura town secretary said since the inception of
the
concept, the face of the city had drastically changed.
"We took at
least two weeks to clean up massive piles of uncollected refuse
and we are
going to continue with the idea ," said Zhakata.
The country is facing its
worst fuel shortage ever largely as a result of an
acute shortage of foreign
currency-a situation the Reserve Bank is battling
to address.
The
scenario has also been exacerbated by increase in the
price of petroleum on
the world market.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
The Daily Mirror Reporter
issue date
:2005-Nov-22
CHITUNGWIZA residents should brace themselves for massive
hikes in rates and
service charges after the dormitory town proposed to
increase some tariffs
by over 500 percent in its 2006 financial
year.
According to acting town clerk, Amos Matanhike the rates would be
subject to
further adjustments in line with macro-economic conditions
obtaining in the
country next year.
The town increased by 300 percent
(from $3 million to $9 million) the
penalty for anyone found tampering with
water meters.
Water connection fees for residential areas were also increased
from $1,1
million to $3,5 million, while it would cost $333 718 to replace
the meter
up from $111 224.
Water connection fees for non-residential
areas would from January 2006 be
between $4 million and $109 million
depending on the capacity of the water
meter.
The municipality increased
sewer connection fees for residential areas from
$613 600 to $1,84 million
and from $2 million to over $7 million for
industrial areas.
Clearing of
toilet blockages for residential areas would now cost $126 000
up from $42
000 while for industrial areas it would cost $2 million from the
current
$700 000.
Burial fees per adult for residents of Chitungwiza would be $450
000 from
$150 000 while for non-residents it would be $600 000 from $200
000.
For children, the burial fees would increase to $300 000 from $100 000
for
those residing in the town, while for non-residents it would be $450 000
up
from $150 000.
Rentals for public markets in various suburbs of the
town would range from
over $200 000 a month to over $2,2 million from the
current minimum charge
of $18 000 and maximum of $340 000.
Rental fees
for crèches would also increase to a minimum of over $10 million
per month
and a maximum of $158 million.
Expectant mothers would have to fork out $1,2
million up from $300 000 if
they had made prior bookings while those without
would part $1,35 million
per bed per night up from $450 000.
Clinic fees
per adult also rose to $231 050 from $76 667 for seven days an
adult, while
for children it would be $105 050 for a similar period of time
and
afterwards it would cost adults $227 400 for every visit
while for children
it would be $106 200.
Matanhike invited residents to raise their objections
to the budget within
30 days.
Chitungwiza is currently grappling with a
myriad of problems, among them
water cuts, sewer blockages and uncollected
refuse.
Residents in the town this month demonstrated twice against the
municipality
run by executive mayor Misheck Shoko.
At the weekend
President Robert Mugabe threatened to dismiss the Shoko
council if it fails
to solve the problems.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
From
Our Correspondent in Mutare
issue date :2005-Nov-22
COMMUNAL farmers
in Manicaland have reportedly lost millions of dollars to
unscrupulous
street vendors selling fake agricultural inputs including maize
seed, they
coloured green, in the eastern border town of Mutare.
The vendors, who sell
their products at give away prices, are said to have
"seized an opportunity"
presented by farmers' panic buying when responding
to the recent
rains.
Although official comment could not be obtained from the Zimbabwe
Farmers
Union regional manager, Tendai Munjoma, other senior officials of
the union
who preferred to remain anonymous for fear of breaking protocol,
confirmed
receiving such reports.
A farmer, James Sigauke of Dora Dombo
claimed: "The vendors sell the maize
seed packs at much lower prices than
those charged in shops."
He said the racket was uncovered after some vigilant
farmers noticed that
most of the seed was coated with an unknown green
substance that easily
blown off by the wind.
Contacted for comment one
ZFU official said: "Farmers are complaining of
being cheated into
buying
fake maize seed being sold on the streets.
"We urge the farmers to
desist from buying agricultural inputs from the
streets as they are readily
available in shops." He said the daring vendors
coated the maize seed green
for it to pass as the genuine input.