• WOZA call for support and prayers - court appearance Wed 5 November
• JAG Communique dated 31 October 2003
• JAG Open Letters Forum No. 176
• Zimbabwe Govt Appeals Crt Ruling On Independent Paper Ban
• Tough new visa requirements for Zimbabweans
• Court to hear Mugabe victory challenge
• Zimbabwe media body challenges order to licence newspaper
• Turn up the volume on 'quiet diplomacy' in Zimbabwe
• Bishop of Harare in land grab row
• MDC's 2002 election challenge to begin
• Zimbabwe's banks ready for currency controls

      Copyright © 2003, Dow Jones Newswires

      HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP)--In the latest crackdown on free press, a
Zimbabwe government media commission has appealed last month's court order
lifting the ban on the country's only independent daily newspaper.

      The state-controlled Sunday Mail reported Sunday that appeal papers
were filed last week at the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Godfrey
Chidyausiku.

      In August, the commission refused the Daily News and its sister Sunday
newspaper a license to publish. But the Administrative Court, which handles
disputes over government decisions, ruled that the commission had exhibited
bias against the papers and was itself "improperly constituted."

      Filing the appeal effectively puts a freeze on the court's ruling.

      Gugulethu Moyo, lawyer for Daily News owners, Associated Newspapers
Zimbabwe, said the appeal made his client's position even more complicated.
Hours after the Oct. 24 verdict, the Daily News brought out its first
edition for six weeks but was promptly shut down by police.

      "Whatever the legalities, the fact is the only independent daily
newspaper has been shut down by the state and that has huge implications for
the human rights situation in this country," Moyo said.

      "It is quite clear the state is determined to keep the Daily News off
the streets. We are going to have to keep fighting it at enormous expense
and it is a huge tragedy," he said.

      The Administrative Court ordered the seven-member media commission to
reconstitute itself, including independent representatives, by Oct. 30.
State lawyers claimed this meant the Daily News remained banned to Oct. 30,
and had five Associated Newspapers directors detained for publishing the
Oct. 25 edition.

      Meanwhile police spokesman Trust Ndlovu said he could give no
information on a Zimbabwean journalist based in South Africa who was
arrested while covering a nurses' strike in Zimbabwe last week.

      Andrew Zhakata was detained under the 2002 Access to Information and
Protection of Privacy Act, in the southern border town of Beitbridge and was
due to have appeared in court.

      On Monday, lawyers for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change
begin their long delayed court challenge of the March 2002 presidential
elections, in which longtime President Robert Mugabe claimed a further
six-year mandate despite widespread allegations of intimidation and vote
rigging.

      However, there are fears the state will seek further delay tactics to
increase legal costs for the opposition, which is banned by law from
receiving foreign funding.ding.

      (END) Dow Jones Newswires

      November 02, 2003 10:58 ET (15:58 GMT)

        Tough new visa requirements for Zimbabweans

            November 02 2003 at 11:21AM

            By Liz Clarke

      Zimbabweans wanting to visit South Africans have to meet tough new
visa requirements.

      It is believed that the measures are to stem the tide of illegal
immigrants entering the country in the wake of growing economic turmoil and
human rights abuses in Zimbabwe.

      Now, according to an advisory issued by the South African high
commission in Zimbabwe, holiday visas can be obtained only if funds
equivalent to a minimum of R1 000 are endorsed on the passport with the name
of the bank where the currency was issued. However, a shortage of South
African rands in Zimbabwean banks means that most people who legitimately
apply for currency will not be able get it and neither can currency obtained
on the black market be validated by the mainstream banks as required.

      Those seeking medical appointments in South Africa must provide a
letter from Zimbabwean doctors stating the nature of their illness. The new
visa regulations also require the patient to state why they cannot be
treated locally, as well as confirmation of the doctor's appointment in
South Africa.

            Businessmen require a business letter of invitation from South
Africa
      Businessmen require a business letter of invitation from South Africa
and an accompanying business letter from a Zimbabwean company.

      Zimbabweans applying for transit visas for connecting flights in South
Africa must prove that they will be admitted to their destinations and must
be in possession of return tickets.

      Meanwhile, a fire that broke out in the visa-processing room of the
South African embassy in Harare left hundreds of people unable to leave the
country during the past two weeks.

      A spokesperson for the department of foreign affairs in Pretoria said
they were awaiting a forensic report detailing the source of the fire, which
closed the visa office for more than a week.

      A spokesperson for foreign affairs said reports from Zimbabwean
authorities had stated that "a large stack of papers" had been placed too
close to the airconditioning plant, which was left on "by mistake" overnight
and caused overheating, resulting in the fire.

      "We understand that, although fire tenders tried to douse the flames,
they were unable to enter the high-security building swiftly enough to save
the documentation," the foreign affairs spokesperson explained.

      He said that the situation was now "back to normal".

Up until President Bush's Africa trip in July, the administration was
surprisingly focused on Zimbabwe, where the government's unruly seizures of
white-owned commercial farms and three-year-old assault on dissents are at
the heart of a political, economic and humanitarian crisis. State-sponsored
violence has killed scores of Zimbabweans, thousands have been tortured, and
millions face starvation.

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell bluntly wrote that Zimbabwe's President
Robert G. Mugabe's "time had come and gone," challenging African leaders to
robustly pressure the ruling party into allowing a transitional government
to lead the country to fresh elections.

Since the Africa trip, the administration has sharply toned down the
rhetoric in a nod to South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki's and other
African leaders' behind-the-scenes efforts to reform the obstinate Mugabe.

Critics call "quiet diplomacy" a euphemism for inaction.

The repressive regime shows few signs of letting up, recently shutting down
the only independent daily newspaper, the Daily News.

Nor do economic and humanitarian crises show signs of abating in the face of
drought, AIDS, a political impasse and drastically reduced output on the
confiscated farms, which were the backbone of what was once one of Africa's
best performing economies. GDP is expected to fall by 11 percent this year,
after contracting by 27 percent between 2000 and 2002.

The inflation rate climbed to more than 450 percent in September. The
unemployment rate is at least 70 percent.

Donors are handing out food to millions of Zimbabweans amid charges that the
regime denies its opponents food aid. Donor pressure on the regime has
proved futile. Observers worry that Zimbabwe has fallen off the
administration's agenda.

But the United States can still work behind the scenes to forge consensus on
how to influence the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front
(ZANU-PF). The lead player will have to be Zimbabwe's main trading partner,
South Africa, supported by regional organizations, including the Southern
African Development Community (SADC) and the African Union.

Mbeki says ZANU-PF has agreed to negotiate with the opposition, and Mugabe
reportedly agreed to step down by the middle of next year.

South Africa's leverage is limited. Drastic action, such as cutting off
Zimbabwe's electricity - much of which is supplied by South Africa and
Mozambique - could result in Mugabe unleashing unprecedented waves of
refugees; a reported 2 million Zimbabweans have fled across the border to
South Africa in the past few years.

African leaders' approach is also rooted in colonial memory.

On a continent where societies greatly respect age, Mugabe at 79 is an elder
statesman. He is also a liberation-era hero, who spent more than a decade in
prison and led armed resistance against the white minority regime of
Rhodesia, as the country was called. After becoming the leader of the new
nation Zimbabwe in 1980, he was a lead supporter of South Africa's
liberation struggle.

Mugabe's manipulation of the land issue plays well in countries such as
South Africa and Namibia, where land redistribution remains contentious.
Land has been at the heart of conflict in Zimbabwe since white settlers
claimed the territory in 1890. A system akin to apartheid that gave settlers
the best land continued after Rhodesia declared itself independent from
Britain in 1965.

Brokered during peace negotiations, Zimbabwe's constitution contained
provisions to prevent the government from seizing land or forcing farmers to
sell land for a 10-year period.

In the first decade of independence, 50,000 families were resettled on more
than 7 million acres.

Land redistribution slowed drastically in the 1990s as international donor
support for buying land dried up amid accusations that the increasingly
corrupt government parceled acquired land out to ministers and party
officials.

By 1997, the glaring land ownership imbalance still existed; a million
blacks farmed the worst land, while 4,500 commercial farmers, the vast
majority of them white, owned 70 percent of the best land. Demand for land
rose as the economy soured and a donor-imposed economic program hit
disproportionately at the poor.

A new opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), and its
civil society and trade union allies successfully campaigned for a "no" vote
on a February 2000 referendum on a new constitution, which would have
greatly strengthened executive power and permitted land confiscation. Coming
only months before parliamentary elections, the defeat triggered ZANU-PF's
violent crackdown on dissent and "fast track" land reform.

By redistributing farms owned by whites - many of whom supported the MDC -
the government struck at opponents, and played to a land-hungry rural
support base as well as general resentment of white privilege.

Mugabe has seized almost all of the white commercial farms.

International news reports often focused on the plight of white farmers (a
handful of whom were killed). By charging that racism frames the West's
response, Mugabe deflects criticism from the disastrous effect his policies
have on the average Zimbabwean.

Hundreds of thousands of poor black farmers - whose work on commercial farms
supported as many as 2 million dependants - lost their jobs during the land
grab.

Redistribution has benefited few. Fewer than 123,000 of the 300,000
officially resettled small-scale farming families have moved onto the land,
according to a recently leaked government report. Less than a tenth of the
50,000 newly apportioned commercial farms were in use.

State-sponsored militias made up of independence war veterans and
conscripted youths have carried out much of the violence. Newspaper offices
have been bombed and human rights advocates beaten. Draconian laws support
the violence. The MDC's leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, is being tried for
treason on flimsy charges. Court rulings are often ignored.

Nonetheless, the opposition maintains support in cities and the southeast,
where security forces killed thousands in the early 1980s.

Despite winning 57 of 120 elected seats in the 2000 parliamentary elections,
the opposition has little institutional power.

Mugabe won an additional six-year term in the March presidential election,
which SADC, the European Union and the United States condemned as
fundamentally flawed (many African observers endorsed the result). The MDC's
court challenge is unresolved.

The opposition proves its popularity through crippling strikes. But ZANU-PF
maintains its grip on power, and prospects for meaningful negotiations are
poor.

The best chance for a breakthrough lies within the ruling party's ranks.

Many members of the elite have been insulated from the crisis - or benefited
from it. But party leaders and business associates are increasingly
concerned by the country's slide.

If carried out with African states, expanding and strictly enforcing
targeted sanctions that the European Union and the United States applied
between 2001 and this year - which banned travel and froze assets of top
officials - would raise the cost of keeping the status quo for the
privileged elite.

Whether new measures are necessary will be clear by next month when ZANU-PF
holds its party conference.

The most important donor role is to provide incentives - including
development and reconstruction funds - as progress is made. Resolution of
the land issue will be crucial.

The American administration has made great progress in helping Africans to
broker an end to the seemingly intractable war in Sudan.

Similarly, South Africa and the continent's other heavyweight, Nigeria, have
made strides in ending wars across the continent.

It would be a costly shame if donors and African leaders wait for Zimbabwe
to implode before finding a solution.

Russell Geekie is a freelance writer who specializes in Africa. He was an
editor at Africa Report magazine from 1990 to 1995.

Mugabe ally 'given farm as reward for supporting Zanu-PF policies'
Sunday Times Foreign Desk

Controversial Zimbabwean Anglican Bishop Nolbert Kunonga has been accused of
illegally displacing a white commercial farmer from his property and seizing
it for himself and his family.

Kunonga, the Bishop of Harare and a close associate of President Robert
Mugabe, this week allegedly ordered farmer Simon Hale to pack his bags and
leave St Marnock farm, about 15km from the capital.

According to the London Sunday Times, Kunonga evicted more than 50 black
workers and their families to make way for his own staff.

The property was reportedly parcelled out to the bishop by the Zimbabwe
government two weeks ago.

Land seizures that began three years ago are continuing unabated in
Zimbabwe, albeit on a low-intensity scale.

Two businessmen with Zanu-PF links, who had resettled themselves and
relatives on the same farm, have also reportedly been booted out by Kunonga.

According to the London Sunday Times, the bishop took it from the
businessmen who had already seized two farms.

The paper reported it was believed that the bishop had received the farm as
a reward for his outspoken support for Mugabe and his controversial policy
of land seizure.

On Friday, Hale was removing his equipment and other belongings from the
farm.

Kunonga - one of Mugabe's associates who has been banned from travelling to
the US and Europe - will move into the spacious, seven-bedroomed farmhouse.

Hale's son, Marcus, said his family had been given a Friday deadline by
Kunonga to vacate the farm - despite the fact that they had not been served
with Section 5 and Section 8 notices, which are preliminary and final
eviction orders respectively.

"We have been told to move out by today and we were in the process of doing
so when police impounded our truck and the irrigation equipment we were
carrying," he said.

"Right now, I'm going to the police to try and sort out the issue. But we
will not be able to move out all our belongings . . . We intend contesting
the eviction in court."

Marcus said his uncle had also lost a farm to war veteran leaders Patrick
Nyaruwata and Endy Mhlanga. St Marnock - which was first seized last year -
is now lying derelict, with fields unplanted.

Kerry Jay, of the farmers' pressure group Justice for Agriculture, said
Kunonga's actions were "disgraceful".

"It's clear theft and absolutely appalling," she said. "Kunonga is supposed
to be a role model and a righteous person. But what he has done is shameful
and throws the church's image into disrepute."

Repeated attempts to get comment from Kunonga were unsuccessful.

In addition to the prime land seized by Mugabe's ministers and members of
the ruling Zanu-PF party, it is estimated that agricultural equipment worth
Z75-billion has been stolen or vandalised.

Kunonga's support for the land grabs and his mockery of Mugabe's black
opponents as "puppets of the West" have divided the Anglican community in
Zimbabwe.

His pro-Mugabe actions have included the banning of dissent in the church
and the transfer of clergymen opposed to Zanu-PF policies.

In August, he was held hostage by parishioners at the St Philip's Anglican
church in Harare after a row erupted over misappropriation of church funds.

Zimbabwe will be thrust into the international spotlight tomorrow as
opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai
opens his court battle against Mugabe's disputed re-election last year.

Tsvangirai's legal team, led by South African advocate Jeremy Gauntlett,
filed its arguments against Mugabe on October 13. The team will raise a wide
range of controversial electoral issues during the initial five days of the
hearing.

MDC attorneys will argue that the Electoral Supervisory Commission was not
validly constituted and that electoral laws were manipulated.

The lawyers will also argue that violence and intimidation tilted the poll
scales in Mugabe's favour.

AFP

      Zimbabwe's banks and businesses are resigned to the imposition of new
foreign currency controls following a pledge by President Robert Mugabe to
"restructure" the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe.

      Speaking behind closed doors at a meeting on Friday of the ruling
Zanu-PF party's central committee, Mr Mugabe said the process of
restructuring the central bank would start this week. Other institutions,
including the cabinet, would follow. He promised to make the bank "much more
of a development institution that protects the national interest".

      The president's announcement followed the appointment of a taskforce
of nine cabinet ministers to resolve the country's foreign currency crisis.
The taskforce called for "whistleblowers" to report those who were "starving
the country of foreign currency".

      Bankers and businessmen believe that the taskforce and the promised
restructuring of the central bank will lead to new controls on the foreign
currency market and on the banks.

      Economists say the Ministry of Finance's attempts to review the
overvalued exchange rate have been rebuffed by the president.

      Mr Mugabe is adamant that devaluation is no solution and that the
foreign currency crisis will be overcome by tightening controls. The
official rate of the Zimbabwe dollar is Z$824 to the US dollar, but in the
parallel market the currency is traded at around Z$6,000.

      Last month, the Chamber of Mines warned that its members needed an
exchange rate of Z$3,970 to maintain viability, and tobacco growers are
demanding either devaluation or a special subsidy.

      The president also wants to force banks to cut their prime lending
rates. Last week, some banks raised their lending rates to 160 per cent,
which means they have doubled in the last six months. But with inflation
running at 455 per cent and forecast to exceed 600 per cent by Christmas,
lending rates remain massively negative in real terms.

      A senior banker, who asked not to be named, said restructuring the
central bank was unlikely to mean much more than "replacing seasoned
professionals with party functionaries.

      "The president is right to say the current policies are not working,
but imposing artificially low interest rates and maintaining overvalued
exchange rates is no solution either," he said.

      Official balance of payments forecasts predict a current account
deficit in 2003 of US$1.1bn and an overall deficit of almost US$1.5bn -
approximately 25 per cent of gross domestic product.

      Foreign currency is extremely short just as farmers are planting their
2004 crops, resulting in serious shortages of seed, fuel, fertiliser and
chemicals. Foreign currency payments arrears are currently estimated at
US$3bn or about half of GDP.