http://www.zimonline.co.za/
by Nokuthula
Sibanda Monday 03 November 2008
HARARE - South
Africa is set to host an extraordinary summit of the
Southern African
Development Community (SADC) to discuss northern neighbour
Zimbabwe's
political impasse, diplomatic sources said.
The regional summit -
whose date is still to be announced - comes
after the 15-member bloc's
security Troika failed last week to pressure
President Robert Mugabe and
opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai to reach
agreement on the composition of
a new power-sharing government.
South African President and current
chairman of SADC Kgalema Motlanthe
will chair the extraordinary summit,
according to the diplomats, who did not
want to be named.
"South Africa as the current chairperson of the regional body is
almost
certain to host the crisis meeting on Zimbabwe," said one of the
diplomats.
"Although Mozambique is the current chairperson of the Troika, it
has been
found necessary that the head of the regional organisation chairs
the
meeting."
The diplomat who is privy to the Zimbabwe power-sharing
negotiations
also said that prospects of the deal being reached before
year-end were
good.
"We do not want this issue to be taken to
the UN (United Nations),
this is an African problem and we do not want it to
go out of the region. We
do not even want the African Union to have anything
to do with it."
Mugabe, Tsvangirai and another opposition leader
Arthur Mutambara
agreed to form an all-inclusive government under a
September 15
power-sharing deal that retains Mugabe as president while
making Tsvangirai
prime minister and Mutambara deputy prime
minister.
Analysts see such a power-sharing government as the first
step to
ending decade-long food shortages and economic crisis in Zimbabwe.
But six
weeks after agreeing to share power political leaders are yet to
form a
unity government because they cannot agree on who should control the
most
powerful ministries.
The United States last week voiced
concern over delays to form a unity
government in Zimbabwe and put the blame
squarely on Mugabe who it said was
refusing to share power genuinely and
equitably as outlined under the
power-sharing accord. - ZimOnline
http://www.zimonline.co.za/
by Nqobizitha
Khumalo Monday 03 November 2008
BULAWAYO - Zimbabwe's
opposition MDC party has written to Southern African
Development Community
(SADC) executive secretary Tomaz Salamao protesting
against what it says is
his misrepresentation of the status of the country's
stalled power-sharing
talks.
Salamao said in communiqué last week that the only issue of
dispute between
the MDC and President Robert Mugabe's ruling ZANU PF party
was over who
should control the ministry of home affairs in a unity
government outlined
under last September's power-sharing deal.
The
SADC official issued the statement after a summit in Harare of the bloc's
Organ on Politics, Defence and Security failed to pressure MDC leader Morgan
Tsvangirai, Mugabe and the head of a breakaway faction of the MDC Arthur
Mutambara to agree on the composition of a unity government.
The MDC
claims the parties are deadlocked over the allocation of at least 10
ministries, sharing of the country's 10 gubernatorial posts, allocation of
diplomatic posts and sharing of permanent secretary positions in the new
government.
Tsvangirai confirmed at the weekend that his party had
written a letter of
complaint to Salamao.
"We have written to him
expressing concerns and protesting the misleading
information that he
included in the communiqué after the stalling of the
talks on Monday (last
week)," said Tsvangirai.
"The issues leading to the deadlock are not
limited to the Ministry of Home
Affairs as Salamao will want to make the
world believe, said Tsvangirai who
was in Bulawayo to attend the launch of a
documentary on atrocities
committed by Zimbabwe's army in Matabeleland and
Midlands provinces in the
early 80s.
The MDC leader could however not
be drawn to reveal the details of the
letter to Salamao, limiting himself to
only saying that the letter makes it
clear that the opposition party was not
happy with the SADC secretary's
"manipulation of the
truth".
Meanwhile, Tsvangirai said that he would attend an extraordinary
summit of
SADC aimed at saving the Zimbabwe power sharing deal, even if he
did not
receive his passport.
"With or without a passport I will be
travelling for the SADC summit when
the dates are announced, even if the
date and venue is announced tomorrow I
will travel with or without the
passport," Tsvangirai said.
The statement by Tsvangirai is a climb down
from earlier statements made by
the MDC chief negotiator, Tendai Biti, who
told reporters on Tuesday that
Tsvangirai would not to the SADC summit
unless he received his passport.
Tsvangirai two weeks ago refused to
attend a summit of SADC's politics and
security Organ in Swaziland, saying
demanding he be issued with a passport
before he could leave
Zimbabwe.
The MDC leader, who is prime minister designate under the
stalled
power-sharing deal, has not been granted a normal passport for
months, and
requires emergency travel documents every time he leaves the
country.
Tsvangirai says the refusal by Mugabe's government to issue him
with a
passport is symbolic of the veteran leader's insincerity and lack of
commitment to genuinely sharing power with the opposition.
Zimbabwe's
historic power-sharing deal that was brokered by former South
African
President Thabo Mbeki on behalf of SADC retains Mugabe as president
while
making Tsvangirai prime minister and Mutambara deputy prime minister.
The
bare bones agreement allots 15 Cabinet posts to Mugabe's ruling ZANU PF
party, 13 to the Tsvangirai-led MDC and three to Mutambara's
faction.
However it is silent about who gets which specific posts and the
rival
parties have since the signing of the agreement wrangled over who
should
control the most powerful ministries such as defence, finance and
home
affairs. - ZimOnline
| ||
STATEMENT: Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR)
continues to closely monitor developments relating to the implementation of the
15 September 2008 agreement signed by the principals of the three political
parties represented in Parliament.
It is deeply regrettable that the ongoing impasse
was not resolved at the meeting held in Harare with the SADC Troika on 27
October 2008.
Such failures are a disconcerting indication that
political players, both national and regional, have failed and continue to fail
to view the interests of the suffering people of Zimbabwe as the central and
most urgent factor necessitating resolution of the outstanding issues and
allowing the new inclusive government to be formed and commence its
duties.
Whilst the political negotiations continue without
an end in sight, Zimbabweans continue to be starved on the basis of their
political affiliation. Political violence is, once again, on the rise.
Deaths due to cholera outbreaks mount, and health,
water and sanitation services have collapsed.
Children are forced to sit for examinations when
they have effectively learned nothing in the past year.
People continue to walk to work, fail to retrieve
their own cash from banks, and look from afar at basic goods in the shops and
market places which they can no longer
afford.
Events which occurred prior to, on the day of, and
subsequent to the meeting on 27 October 2008 – more particularly the
indiscriminate arrests, detentions, assaults and alleged abductions of women and
youth human rights defenders, as well as innocent bystanders, by members of the
Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) and non-state actors allegedly aligned to ZANU PF
– clearly show that the status quo in respect of responsibility for the control
of such law enforcement agents cannot
continue.
Certain sectors of the ZRP continue, with the
knowledge and/or acquiescence of the Minister responsible for their supervision,
to willfully violate the fundamental rights and freedoms of ordinary Zimbabweans
with impunity.
Law enforcement agents remain in urgent need of
reorientation to instill a culture of human rights within the force and ensure
that they apply the laws of the country impartially and not for the purposes of
mere persecution of people who, in their desperation, have taken their public
protest peacefully to the streets.
Non-state actors who willfully commit human rights
violations with the knowledge or acquiescence of the state must also understand
that their actions are unacceptable, criminal, and cannot be maintained in a
truly democratic dispensation.
Such issues have been highlighted and accepted by
all three principals in the signed 15 September 2008 agreement and yet
compliance is completely lacking.
Further, the partisan coverage of events by the
state-controlled print and electronic media is a clear indication of lack of
good faith in abiding by the spirit and letter of the 15 September
agreement.
Such media continues to provide biased coverage and
commentary on the ongoing political discussions, and continues to completely
shut out information which is regularly released by the two MDC formations.
It is clear to those who are fortunate enough to
have access to online publications and alternate information that the
differences between ZANU PF and MDC and the areas of contention remain wide,
despite what continues to be reported in the state-controlled
media.
Ordinary Zimbabweans, who have remained patient and
hopeful that a resolution is in sight which will positively and clearly impact
on their lives, have a right to receive diverse, comprehensive and honest
information about the issues in contention and areas of difference so as to
develop their own opinions and actions based on such information.
The de facto government continues to believe that
starving people of information will allow them to continue to control and/or
silence public scrutiny and dissent.
This is unacceptable conduct in any country, and
under any circumstance.
The solution to this wide-ranging catastrophe is to
convene an Extraordinary SADC Summit "urgently".
When, where and what will be on the agenda are not
clear, but the Zimbabwean people have once again been forced to deal with
further delays in the resolution of the impasse whilst the humanitarian crisis
escalates to unmanageable proportions.
What is clear is that we cannot afford another
Summit where the outcome is a resolution which offers no meaningful action to
assist in urgently redressing the critical humanitarian situation on the
ground.
The Heads of State and Government must not be
brought together to deal only with one political hurdle, being the allocation of
Ministries.
The Summit must comprehensively and holistically
address all the current outstanding issues, as they have been outlined by the
parties to the agreement if they are not to contribute to further delays and the
collapse of the country. Apart from the political issues, the SADC Summit must,
as a matter of urgency, ensure that immediate short-term measures are put in
place to:
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=6666
November 2, 2008
By Our
Correspondent/SWRadio Africa
HARARE - Two lawyers, Patrick Chinamasa of
Zanu-PF and Welshman Ncube of a
faction of the MDC, allegedly conspired to
doctor the now controversial
September 15 document, it has been
revealed.
SADC secretary general, Tomaz Salomao has admitted that the
controversial
document signed on that day by President Robert Mugabe, Morgan
Tsvangirai
leader of the mainstream MDC and Arthur Mutambara of the
breakaway MDC
faction to formalise the power-sharing agreement had been
fraudulently
altered behind the back of the Tsvangirai MDC.
The
Tsvangirai MDC initially raised serious concerns about the authenticity
of
the document in an interview in early October, complaining that Zanu-PF
had
doctored the agreement and altered certain clauses over the weekend
before
it was signed. Although last Monday's Troika meeting acknowledged
this fraud
had taken place, the communiqué released by Salomao after the
meeting said
nothing about the issue.
The Troika came under pressure to come out and
publicly admit and condemn
the alteration.
The Tsvangirai MDC has
accused the Zanu-PF representative at the ongoing
negotiations, Chinamasa,
who is the former Minister of Justice, secretary
general Ncube, representing
the Mutambara faction and Thabo Mbeki's own
representative, Mujanku Gumbi,
of tampering with the document by making
certain changes to it, without the
knowledge of the representatives of the
mainstream MDC led by
Tsvangirai.
This happened over a weekend and the party leaders, Mugabe,
Tsvangirai and
Mutambara then signed the document on the Monday morning,
with Tsvangirai
presumably oblivious of the alleged fraudulent intervention
of Chinamasa and
Ncube over the weekend and on the assumption, therefore,
that it was the
same document agreed to the previous Friday.
The MDC
claims Chinamasa, Ncube and Gumbi had altered clauses relating to an
increase in the number of non-constituent senators allocated to the
Mutambara faction, a clause stating that a replacement for vice prime
minister cannot be a non-constituent MP and that there would be mutual
consultation among the parties on matters pertaining to the appointment of
key government officials and ambassadors.
In interviews with
journalists Salomao has now publicly admitted that the
power-sharing
document agreed to on Friday, September 11, was fraudulently
doctored before
it was signed on Monday, September 15. Salamao pledged that
the issue would
be resolved, presumably before the next SADC extra-ordinary
summit.
The SABC reported on Friday that the SADC summit would now be
held in
Johannesburg this week.
Salomao's admission follows pressure
from the MDC who wrote a stinging
letter to SADC headquarters highlighting
their concerns.
Meanwhile, Mugabe's Zanu-PF party held a politburo
meeting last week in
which sources say the party resolved not to make any
concessions on the
ministries they usurped through the expedience of a
government gazette
issued by Mugabe.
Such intransigence on the part
of Zanu-PF could throw into total disarray
the prospects of any meaningful
success being achieved at the urgent full
SADC summit to be convened
following last Monday's deadlock in Harare.
Tsvangirai has since
September 15 been widely condemned and exposed to
ridicule for signing a
document that fell far short of his party's and the
long-suffering general
public's expectations. As a result, it has been
impossible to implement the
power-sharing agreement.
Salomao's revelation also serves to confirm
long-standing allegations of an
unsavoury relationship between Zanu-PF and
the MDC faction formed by Ncube
and let by Mutambara.
http://www.nytimes.com
By CELIA W. DUGGER
Published: November
2, 2008
JOHANNESBURG - The government of Zimbabwe, led by President Robert
Mugabe,
spent $7.3 million donated by an international organization to fight
killer
diseases on other things and has failed to honor requests to return
the
money, according to the organization's inspector general.
The
actions by Zimbabwe have deprived the organization, the Global Fund to
Fight
AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, of resources it needs and damaged
efforts to
expand life-saving treatment, said the inspector general, John
Parsons.
Zimbabwe's actions also jeopardize a more ambitious $188 million
Global Fund
grant to Zimbabwe, due for consideration by the fund's board on
Friday, Mr.
Parsons said.
The Global Fund has continued to demand that Zimbabwe return
the money, and
Global Fund officials say Zimbabwean financial officials have
promised to do
so by Thursday. But Mr. Parsons said Zimbabwean officials
also said they had
not repaid the money because they did not have enough
foreign currency.
The breakdown of trust between the Global Fund and
Zimbabwe's government
comes at a time of widening humanitarian crisis and
casts further doubt on
the willingness of Western donors to invest heavily
in rebuilding the
economically broken nation as long as Mr. Mugabe is in
charge, even if a
deadlock over a power-sharing government is
resolved.
Mr. Parsons said in an interview on Sunday that last year the
Global Fund
deposited $12.3 million in foreign currency into Zimbabwe's
Reserve Bank. He
declined to speculate on how the $7.3 million it was
seeking to be returned
had been spent, except to say it was not on the
intended purpose. Civic
groups and opposition officials maintain that the
Reserve Bank helps finance
Mr. Mugabe's patronage machine.
Mr.
Parsons did offer an example of the human consequences of the Reserve
Bank's
failure to hand over the money for disease fighting. The Global Fund
has
brought in large quantities of medicines that can cure malaria but has
been
able to finance the training of only 495 people to distribute them
safely
instead of the planned 27,000. There were 2.7 million cases of
malaria among
Zimbabwe's 12 million people in the World Health Organization's
most recent
estimates.
"The drugs expire by the middle of next year, and it would be
criminal if we
can't use them because of these problems," Mr. Parsons said.
"They've got
quite a short shelf life."
Zimbabwe's information
minister, Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, said Sunday in an
interview that he was not
aware of the particulars of the disagreement, but
he defended what he
described as the Reserve Bank's good intentions and
accused the Global Fund
of politicizing aid.
"They always want to put certain standards and
concoct certain things to
make us look bad and horrendous in international
eyes," he said.
Gideon Gono, governor of the Reserve Bank, the custodian
of the Global Fund's
money, has been spending large sums this year on a
variety of things,
according to reports in Zimbabwe's state-owned
media.
Mr. Gono gave the country's judges new vehicles, satellite dishes
and
televisions and allocated 79 vehicles for the Information Ministry. He
announced the provision of 3,000 tractors, 105 combine harvesters and
100,000 plows for the country's farm mechanization program. Mr. Ndlovu, the
information minister, said the Reserve Bank had been getting foreign
currency for imports of food and medicine.
Mr. Ndlovu said the Global
Fund had sided with Western nations that had
restricted aid to Zimbabwe and
imposed sanctions on it - sanctions that Mr.
Mugabe and his party blame for
the country's economic ruin.
"The money from the Global Fund is nowhere
near what the Reserve Bank has
spent on health care for the country," the
information minister said.
Civic groups and opposition officials contend
that Mr. Gono and the Reserve
Bank have helped finance the governing party's
patronage operation,
essential to Mr. Mugabe's hold on power for the past 28
years. Eddie Cross,
a senior official in the opposition Movement for
Democratic Change, accused
the Reserve Bank of looting the Global Fund's
donation.
International aid groups and United Nations agencies say the
country's
annual inflation rate of more than 230 million percent and rules
imposed by
the Reserve Bank have severely complicated the logistics of
helping the most
impoverished people.
The Reserve Bank suspended
electronic banking a month ago, making it
impossible for international
organizations to pay for goods and services
with bank transfers. The Reserve
Bank has also severely limited cash
withdrawals from commercial banks. And
the inflation rate has rendered check
payments nearly worthless by the time
they clear days later.
More than 20 aid groups, donor countries and
United Nations agencies wrote
Mr. Gono last week asking that electronic
banking be restored for
humanitarian aid purposes and that they be allowed
to pay service providers
in foreign currency. If agencies are increasingly
unable to pay for their
field operations, they wrote, that inability will
"greatly increase the
already substantial suffering of those Zimbabweans who
are most in need of
humanitarian response."
A third of Zimbabweans
are now hungry and in need of food aid, the United
Nations estimates. A
million children have lost one or both parents. About
140,000 people died of
AIDS there last year.
Mr. Mugabe's government banned the work of
international aid groups for
almost three months during the election season
earlier this year, accusing
them of backing the political opposition. The
ban was lifted on Aug. 29, two
months after Mr. Mugabe was declared the
victor in a discredited
presidential runoff election. His main rival, the
opposition leader Morgan
Tsvangirai, dropped out of the race, citing
state-sponsored violence against
his supporters.
It has taken time
for the aid groups to resume work. One major humanitarian
group, which
declined to be identified by name for fear of retaliation
against its staff
by government officials, said it would be able to get food
to only half as
many people as originally planned this month because of the
difficulties of
paying for its logistical operations.
The Zimbabwe office of the United
Nations Children's Fund, which coordinates
one of the world's largest
programs for orphans, decided Friday that it
could no longer pay the local
groups it supported there by check, seriously
hampering its ability to help
the most vulnerable children and their
mothers, said Roeland Monasch,
Unicef's acting representative in Zimbabwe.
Mr. Monasch said the United
Nations' daily posting of the country's exchange
rate showed that the number
of Zimbabwe dollars required to buy a single
American dollar rose from 3
million on Oct. 23 to 1 billion the next day,
and then to 40 billion on
Wednesday and 1.1 trillion on Saturday. For Unicef
to continue operating, he
said, it must start using American dollars.
Mr. Parsons, the Global Fund
inspector general, who presented the
preliminary findings of a Global Fund
audit on Tuesday in Harare, Zimbabwe's
capital, to donor nations and United
Nations agencies, said in the interview
that he had met with Reserve Bank
officials to tell them, "We need our money
back."
But Reserve Bank
officials have told the Global Fund they do not have the
foreign currency
required, Mr. Parsons said, so, "One has to assume they
spent it on other
things."
In Mr. Parsons' presentation to donors, a slide on program
management
featured a Cameroonian saying: "Trust in Allah but tie your
donkey." The
Global Fund's management, known as the secretariat, has not
released any new
money to Zimbabwe since last December and will not disburse
more until the
problems in protecting the Global Fund's donations are
resolved, he said.
"We cannot safely leave foreign exchange in Zimbabwe,"
Mr. Parsons said.
"The secretariat has to find some other means to safeguard
our funds - to
keep it offshore and drip-feed it into Zimbabwe. It can't be
under the
Reserve Bank or anyone influenced by the Reserve Bank."
http://www.zimbabwemetro.com
Opinion
November 1, 2008 | By
Nelson Chamisa
The MDC is deeply disturbed by the utterances made this
week by a senior
Zanu PF official that non-governmental organisations were
hoarding food aid
in order to misrepresent the food situation in the
country.
The MDC notes with concern that the statement made by Rugare
Gumbo,
purporting to be the Minister of Agriculture on Wednesday show that
Zanu PF
is still in denial that the food situation in the country has
reached very
critical levels.
Firstly, Gumbo cannot purport to be a
minister. There is no government in
Zimbabwe and Gumbo cannot use a
fictitious position to mislead the nation
that the hunger in Zimbabwe is
being exaggerated. For the record this is a
clear Zanu PF position with
regards to the issue of hunger in the country.
The self-styled minister
denies that Zimbabweans are eating wild fruits,
adding that the people have
been doing this since "time immemorial." Gumbo
should tell the nation when
he last had his supper of wild fruits and where
Zanu PF members are enjoying
their wild fruit meals.
This is a reckless statement, which confirms that
the elite in Zanu PF have
taken permanent resident status in cloud cuckoo
land. Throughout the
country, Zimbabweans are competing with wild animals to
eat wild fruits as
unprecedented starvation stalks the
countryside.
It is just unheard of that a person who purports to be in
charge of food
distribution thinks that it is acceptable to eat wild fruits
just because
the practise has been in existence since time
immemorial.
This is reducing the people to the primitive days of over 300
years ago.
Because of Zanu PF, Zimbabwe has gone back 10 generations back to
primitive
communities of hunters and gatherers.
In recent months, we
have had unbelievable reports even from the State media
of people in the
rural areas dying after consuming wild fruits and going for
days without any
food.
In some cases they have to fight with animals to get the scarce
wild fruits
yet Zanu PF says this is not true and instead blames the NGOs
for putting
the lives of the people at risk. The regime is responsible for
this massive
starvation. Even the State media has published reports of
senior Zanu PF and
government officials stealing grain from the Grain
Marketing Board. In fact
it these corrupt sharks and tigers in the GMB that
are diverting grain that
is meant for the people to the lucrative black
market where it fetches high
prices, which most of the rural and urban
people cannot afford.
It is wishful thinking that these donor
organisations can bring in food into
the country then lock it up just to
please the international media.
Gumbo's statements show how Zanu PF is
out of touch with reality. Zanu PF is
burying its head in the sand rather
than declaring the situation a national
disaster and forming an inclusive
government
During President Morgan Tsvangirai's report back rallies
people have been
complaining about hunger and the partisan and corrupt way
the GMB is
distributing grain.
The MDC reiterates that hunger knows
no politics therefore food distribution
should not be politicised.
In
a new Zimbabwe, food will be the government's first priority. No one will
ever spend a single day hungry let alone an hour.
Editor's
note:Nelson Chamisa is the MDC Secretary for Information and
Publicity and
Member of Parliament for Kuwadzana Central,he is also the
party's former
National Youth Chairman.
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=6684
November 2, 2008
By Masiiwa
Ragies Gunda
I HAVE been reading the SADC communiqué following the
failure of the Troika
to resolve the political impasse in
Zimbabwe.
It is not surprising that the meeting failed dismally if one
goes through
the communiqué. Not all readers have gone through this
communiqué; hence
this analysis may help fellow Zimbabweans to understand
some of the issues I
have observed from the communiqué.
The
communiqué betrays the assumptions brought by these supposedly African
statesmen. The first problem is that the Troika assumes that Mugabe is the
undisputed President of the Republic of Zimbabwe. Article 4 of the
communiqué designates Mugabe as President of the Republic of Zimbabwe while
Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara are correctly identified as Prime
Minister designate and Deputy Prime Minister designate
respectively.
It is clear from this communiqué that the Troika did not
accord the two MDC
factions the same status as Zanu-PF because they are
negotiating with the
sitting President. This stupid interpretation of the
reality in Zimbabwe by
the Troika flies in the face of the SADC tribunal
which observed that Mugabe
has no claim to the presidency any more. It is
therefore not surprising that
the Troika failed to break the impasse because
it is basing its discussions
on the wrong premises.
To think that the
presidents and ministers who attended this meeting failed
to note the simple
fact that Mugabe is not the undisputed President of
Zimbabwe just shows the
calibre of Africa's politicians. The second
observation pertains to the
capacities granted Mugabe, Tsvangirai and
Mutambara by the
Troika.
Article 5 wrongly observes that the Global Political Agreement
signed on 15
September 2008 was signed between the "Government and the two
MDC
formations". Nothing could be further from the truth! The troika
leaders
should have their heads examined seriously because even my
grandmother in
the rural areas knows that there was a "deal" signed between
Zanu-PF and the
two MDC factions, not between government and the two MDC
factions.
Patrick Chinamasa and Nicholas Goche represented Zanu-PF, not
the government
of Zimbabwe.
These may seem mere oversights, yet this
is how Mbeki and now the Troika are
trying to cheat the people of Zimbabwe
by sustaining a regime that was
rejected by the majority of the people. By
assuming that the deal was signed
between the government and opposition,
essentially the Troika therefore is
subscribing to the Mbeki foolishness
that Mugabe was right in allocating all
the ministries that he has used to
destroy democracy to his party because
the Troika does not seem to
understand the difference between the government
and Zanu-PF.
Article
10 and 11 are as vague as they come. Is the Troika suggesting that
all other
ministries have been agreed upon? What then does the Troika mean
by saying
that the parties must agree on Home Affairs to allow for the full
implementation of the agreement? Is the Ministry of Home Affairs blocking
discussion on other ministries or is it the last?
This appears to be
different from the information the MDC has been giving
out. It sounds more
as if the Troika was reading a speech written by
Chinamasa. It appears that
we are not any wiser after the Troika meeting
than we were before the
meeting. Further, what is the situation now with
regard to the appointment
of Governors? Is the Troika also of the opinion
that since they were already
appointed there is nothing more to say about
them?
The Troika sounds
to me more like a sub-committee of the Zanu-PF politburo.
After going
through the communiqué, my first question was, who paid for the
hosting of
these apparently clueless politicians who would be more at home
in a Zanu-PF
central committee meeting than masquerading as statesmen when
they cannot
make common sense judgments on the real problems in Zimbabwe.
It appears
therefore to me that these African politicians will continue to
squander the
little dollars being paid by Zimbabwean taxpayers while they
continue to
pamper Mugabe behind our backs. Is there any hope even from the
full SADC
assembly? I do not see any.
The time has come for the MDC to begin to
seriously consider a plan B or C.
These talks are only being used to achieve
one thing and they are
succeeding, pacify people and keep them hoping that
something will
materialize.
Tsvangirai must not continue to be used
by these heartless SADC politicians
to pacify the same people that gave him
the mandate he carries around. Time
has come for him to ask the people again
for guidance. What should we do now
that it is clear that no one will come
to help us out of our problems?
The Troika did not even mention that it
is disgraceful for Mugabe to deny
Tsvangirai a passport. Maybe soon, he will
not need it anyway!
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=6687
November 2, 2008
By Kennedy
Gezi
THIS suggestion has been made before but I will say it again because
it
seems as of now the MDC has not got the message.
Regardless of how
the ministries are allocated to the parties, eventually,
the MDC will remain
a toothless bulldog (some in Zanu-PF may argue, a
British Bulldog) for as
long as they remain without the support and loyalty
of the security forces
of Zimbabwe.
In my argument security forces encompasses the army, the
police, the Central
Intelligence Organisation, as well as the war veterans
(the real war
veterans). Without the support of these forces, the chances
of the MDC
advancing further in any significant way against Zanu-PF in the
current
negotiations are slim.
It seems the MDC has not been able to
convince members of the police force
that it is not to their benefit in the
long run to be beating up their
defenseless mothers and sisters, who are
simply expressing their desire to
see a better Zimbabwe. The MDC has not
seized any opportunity to persuade
the war veterans (the real war veterans)
to stand up and defend the legacy
of freedom against the likes of Jabulani
Sibanda and Joseph Chinotimba.
The MDC had not seized the opportunity to
educate those in the lower ranks
of the military about how they are being
used to uphold the illegitimate
government of Mugabe. The MDC must
formulate and execute an effective
campaign to court the loyalty of the
security forces of Zimbabwe, if not to
help put the MDC into office, then at
least to save the people of Zimbabwe
from the brutality they continue to
suffer without defense.
Without the forces threatening the people of
Zimbabwe, perhaps the masses
will be more willing to stand up in a mass
uprising against Robert Mugabe,
and the Joint Operations Command. Perhaps
knowing that the police and the
army stand with the people, Mugabe will see
better reason to negotiate in
good faith. Perhaps without the backing of
the police force, the real war
veterans and the army, Mugabe and his cronies
could be sent fleeing from
their offices of power, with tails between their
legs.
It has been said numerous times before and during the elections
that it
never seemed as if the MDC had a complete winning strategy that
would carry
them through from the campaign season, through the elections,
and into
power. The events that have transpired since the March elections
have only
gone to demonstrate this.
The MDC did not have a plan for
"What if Mugabe does not concede defeat in
March". The MDC did not have a
plan for "What if the presidential elections
had to go to a runoff". The
MDC certainly did not have an answer for "What
if Mugabe decides to hold on
to power in spite of even a loss".
Now, the MDC seems to be playing a
waiting game, hoping that some
intervention brings them the victory they
already won, while the people
continue to die. There does not appear to be
any effective MDC plan at
play. It is obvious now that Zanu-PF would care
less if the country were to
deteriorate to the levels of Somalia and other
such places we looked at 10
years ago while wondering in silence; "How did
they get there?"
The recruitment of those who hold the reins of power in
Zimbabwe (not
conceived power, but the real power) does not seem to be an
avenue that the
MDC has either explored or pursued in earnest or with any
measure of
effectiveness.
"Strategy, Comrades", as was once suggested
here on The Zimbabwe Times, is
what the MDC appear to lack. The MDC need not
announce tomorrow that they
took advice and went and spoke to police
officers at such and such a police
station, to try and win them
over.
They should be clandestine in their operations; they should be
discrete.
But, for goodness sake, they should strategise and be effective.
They
should look ahead, and have a complete action plan that considers the
"What
ifs".