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Zimbabwe's feisty freedom
fighter
BBC
|
|
Beatrice has used the law to secure
justice | The BBC News website's Justin Pearce profiles Zimbabwean human
rights lawyer Beatrice Mtetwa, recipient of one of the 2005 Press Freedom Awards
by the New York-based campaign group the Committee to Protect Journalists.
"I didn't do anything other than my job," says
Beatrice Mtetwa, reacting to the news that the CPJ has honoured her with one of
its annual Press Freedom Awards.
The Zimbabwean lawyer has defended the rights both of
Zimbabwean journalists and of foreign correspondents working in the country, and
the CPJ award reflects the fact that internationally, Ms Mtetwa is best known
for her work in defence of the media.
But she says she also takes a lot of cases involving
constitutional law, mostly in the area of human rights.
"My most important work never gets near the media," she told
the BBC News website, adding jokingly: "You guys just like to report on
yourselves."
In one of Ms Mtetwa's better-known cases, she rushed
to Harare airport having obtained a court order to prevent the deportation of
Guardian correspondent and US citizen Andrew Meldrum in 2003.
In action
Mr Meldrum had been abducted by the police after an
earlier court ruling had granted him leave to remain in the country. His
whereabouts were unknown for some time until he appeared at the airport.
With the new court document in her hand, she talked her way
through immigration and airline officials and ran onto the airport tarmac, just
too late to prevent the plane from taking off
"Seeing her in action was quite amazing," says Mr
Meldrum's wife, Dolores Cortes, who witnessed the incident. "She goes for it and
will never let anything pass her by."
Beatrice Mtetwa continues her work despite having
been arrested on trumped-up charges, beaten and tortured by the police.
For several years she represented the Daily News, an
independent and often critical paper that was subjected to criminal defamation
charges by the government, before finally being closed down in 2003.
Ms Mtetwa is continuing with the case of 45 former
Daily News journalists who have been charged with working without official
accreditation in the period before the paper was shut down.
Love for the job
"She is the kind of person who has a love for the
job," says Columbus Mavhungo, an executive member of the Zimbabwe Journalists'
Union, and a former Daily News staff member.
 |
 The [legal] space has become narrow, expecially in the superior courts
- especially when appointments are made not on the the basis of expertise but of
political patronage 
| "That is the kind of person one would like to see more of in a
country fighting for democracy."
As someone who has used the law to secure justice,
often against the interests of the government, Beatrice Mtetwa is concerned at
the erosion of the independence of Zimbabwe's judiciary.
"The space has become narrow, especially in the
superior courts - especially when appointments are made not on the basis of
expertise but of political patronage," she says.
Magistrates
She is equally worried by government moves against
the independent press: "The media space has also shrunk. More and more
violations are occurring and are not getting exposure."
She believes that these days, the best chance of securing
justice is in the magistrates' courts, which are less likely than the higher
courts to be swayed by the political needs of the government.
"The magistrates are ordinary civil servants, without
perks. There is now a situation in Zimbabwe where it is in the lower courts that
people are most likely to get a fair hearing."
"The state say they will appeal but they seldom
follow through. It's done more to please their political masters than anything
else."
'Heroine'
It was in a magistrate's court that Beatrice Mtetwa
won her most recent battle in favour of foreign correspondents: Toby Harnden and
Julian Simmonds of the British Sunday Telegraph, who were arrested during
presidential elections in April.
Toby Harnden describes her as a "heroine".
"Despite the constant harassment and a brutal
beating, she maintains not only her dignity but also a wicked sense of humour
and a love of life that are a delight to experience," he says.
"If it wasn't for Beatrice, Julian Simmonds and I
might still be languishing in jail with another year to serve."
|
Green Hills Far Away
Those of us who have chosen to stay in Zimbabwe and
to "tough it out" are
variously regarded as "heroes", "stupid" and all sorts
of things in between.
The truth is, we each have our own reasons for staying
and fighting it out.
I sometimes wonder if the grass is greener on the other
side? Last time I
seriously looked was 25 years ago. At that time "the other
side" did not
impress me. The one thing it did do for me was to reinforce my
feeling of
being "African". There was no doubt when I got off the plane in
Harare that
I was "home". That has not changed for me and most who have flown
the nest
have found themselves hankering after their African
roots.
This past week, while the MDC seems to have been on the path to
self
destruction over the Senate issue, I was in South Africa, not in a city,
but
out in a rural district taking a break on a small farm with my wife
and
daughter and our grandson. I should have been at the MDC bun fight but
this
short holiday had been planned for some time and in my life, family
comes
first whenever I can chose.
It was instructive to see the South
African underbelly - not the sort of
face that it puts on for the world to
see and not in a mainstream tourist
area. It was not encouraging. I saw a
major tea estate abandoned by its
owners, the tea rank and in some areas
dying from the withdrawal of
irrigation. I asked why and was told that the
estate was the subject of a
land claim and was also a target by local Labor
Unions who were demanding
conditions of service for staff that the estate
simply could not meet.
The farm we stayed on was also the subject of a
land claim - mounted by some
of the staff on the farm. The owners who had
been there for 23 years said
that there was no basis for the claim and that
the organisation dealing with
land claims had ruled in their favor. However
there was ample evidence that
they were holding up maintenance and the
replacement of assets on the farm
with a consequential loss of production and
damage to the local economic
environment.
But it was in the social
sector that I was most disturbed by what I saw. The
wounds of apartheid are
still there for all to see. Racist's attitudes
persist, the staff housing on
farms is generally appalling and worst of all
are the "homeland" slums
created by the apartheid regime over the previous
40 years are still there
with little or no sign of any form of
transformation. The housing being built
by the State was simply a more
sophisticated (and probably less comfortable)
shack under a bare tin roof.
No sign of any sort of security of tenure that
would encourage the occupants
to upgrade their shacks or even build their own
homes. A wide modern highway
connected these sprawling rural slums to the
nearby provincial capital, a
modern City with all the trimmings. People still
had to commute 30
kilometers to work each day - not the urban middle class or
rich, but the
absolute poor.
For a country in a hurry to transform
itself after decades of oppression and
discrimination, South Africa is simply
not moving fast enough. Big companies
are building up their relationships
with the new elite and exporting their
surplus cash abroad as an insurance
against any future shocks. Many are now
major global players - South African
Breweries are now number three in the
world, Anglo is a resources giant with
as much invested in the USA as in
South Africa. Rembrandt is a global tobacco
company - one of the eight
majors and Barlow's stretch across the globe. But
they are not investing
anything like what they could be investing in South
Africa itself. New
legislation for the diamond industry seems like a warning
shot across their
bows, that caution is justified. The fact that De Beers is
now only
producing a small part of their global output in South Africa and
is
headquartered outside the country that gave its birth is simply a fact
of
recent history.
White and black South Africans show few signs of
any kind of real
integration and reconciliation. There is a great deal of
overt racism and
those of us who come from Zimbabwe still feel a racial
tension that somehow
never was a part of our life "back home".
I
listened to the cultured voice of the IMF representative in South
Africa
saying in a speech in Johannesburg that the South African policy
of
retaining a strong Rand was "entirely appropriate". What utter bull,
the
experience of every country that has achieved rapid growth in the past
50
years is that you must undervalue your local currency to achieve the kind
of
home grown investment and development that will transform the
living
standards of the majority. This kind of ideological nonsense, which
favors
the rich at the expense of the poor, is why when we finally find our
feet in
this Zanu PF mud hole, that we must be careful to maintain our
independence
of policy and development strategies and avoid being dictated to
by the
industrialized countries and the multilaterals.
Well after our
break away, it was back to the mud hole - what a relief to
get back to empty
roads and silent vacant farms. It was a bit of a shock to
find bread at Z$25
000 and maize meal at Z$8 000 a kilo, but where else in
the world does your
home staff pick up your dirty clothes, wash them and
iron them and repack
your wardrobe? Where else are people with nothing, so
cheerful and generous
so caring and concerned? Where else can you walk into
the customs and
immigration and be greeted by your first name and welcomed
home - even if
they then try to stick you with a huge customs bill.
As expected, the
annual rate of inflation in September rose 100 per cent.
Scary stuff and I
remain very apprehensive about all those who are economic
prisoners here and
are on fixed incomes. If you know of anyone in this
category - please keep
your eyes open and help when you see signs of stress.
If you have relatives
at "home" and are not helping - then start doing so.
There is no doubt now in
my mind that thousands are going to die in the
coming months. This is going
to be our most "silent" spring season ever.
As for the Senate debate in
the MDC - I was just as confused as you were by
what I heard. Hopefully the
mature and sensible leaders that we have in the
Party are sorting it out. I
remain convinced that we are right not to
participate and are glad that the
majority who wrote to me after last weeks
note agreed. But we need to make
these decisions in the right way and then
get back to the real fight, which
is how to stop Zanu PF digging their own
grave in that mud hole.
Eddie
Cross
Bulawayo, 17th October 2005
Mugabe's party picks veterans for senate polls
Reuters
Tue
Oct 18, 2005 2:33 PM BST
By Cris Chinaka
HARARE (Reuters) -
Zimbabwe's ruling party has nominated veteran politicians
as candidates for
a controversial Senate poll to try to contain a power
struggle over
President Robert Mugabe's likely successor, analysts say.
Mugabe's
ZANU-PF has nursed a simmering feud since last November, when he
bulldozed
the party into endorsing his choice to fill the vacant post of
second
vice-president both in the party and in government, a stepping stone
to the
presidency.
Analysts say Mugabe has tried to manage anger over his
imposition of Joyce
Mujuru by giving jobs to those who were opposed to his
move, and is also
using the November 26 elections for a new Senate to bring
opponents in from
the cold.
ZANU-PF provincial councils have
nominated dozens of veteran politicians,
including Dzikamai Mavhaire, a
senior official once suspended from the party
after calling on Mugabe to
retire.
The list also includes former military commander, General Vitalis
"Fox-Gava"
Zvinavashe, who retired from the army two years ago and is
identified with a
faction opposed to Mugabe's selection of Mujuru as vice
president.
Veteran politician Edgar Tekere, a former ZANU-PF
secretary-general sacked
in 1989 after publicly criticising Mugabe and
branding him a dictator, also
made the list. Tekere recently returned to
ZANU-PF.
"These nominations show that Mugabe wants as many of the old
guard by his
side so that he can watch them, and try to manage any wrangles
over the
succession question," said Professor Heneri Dzinotyiwei of the
University of
Zimbabwe.
"This is all part of his game of political
patronage to consolidate his
position," Dzinotyiwei said.
MUGABE
SHOCKED THE PARTY
Mugabe shocked the party last November when he
appointed Mujuru, a woman
from his own ethnic group, as co-vice president
instead of Speaker of
Parliament Emmerson Mnangagwa, a ZANU-PF heavyweight
long seen as
president-in-waiting.
The 81-year-old veteran Zimbabwean
leader, who has been in power since
independence, is expected to retire when
his term ends in 2008.
Analysts say he ditched Mnangagwa, from the
Karanga tribe, because he did
not believe anyone outside his Zezuru ethnic
group would protect him from
possible prosecution for human rights abuses
when he steps down.
Mnangagwa has pledged his loyalty to Mugabe, but
analysts say tension has
built since ZANU-PF's congress last December,
pitting a Zezuru faction
backing Mujuru against politicians from the larger
Karanga tribe allied
loosely with officials from the minority Ndebele and
Manyika ethnic groups.
Lovemore Madhuku, a constitutional law lecturer
and chairman of political
pressure group National Constitutional Assembly,
said Mugabe was using the
Senate nominations to extend his political
patronage to keep a close eye on
rival factions.
"Within ZANU-PF,
Mugabe's style has generally been to try to keep potential
rivals close so
that he can control them by giving them jobs," he said.
The main
opposition Movement for Democratic Change has plunged into chaos
over
whether to contest the November 26 Senate elections, with its leader
announcing the MDC is boycotting them, but one faction saying the party is
participating.
((ZIMBABWE-ELECTIONS, Reporting by Cris Chinaka;
Editing by Ross Colvin;
Harare Newsroom: +263-4 799-112-5; cris.chinaka@reuters.com)
Australia presses for 'dictator' criminal trial
news.com.au
By Ian
McPhedran
October 19, 2005
AUSTRALIA is pressing the world's most
powerful nations to put Zimbabwe's
brutal dictator Robert Mugabe on trial in
the International Criminal Court.
Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander
Downer stepped up his attack on the
Mugabe regime for crimes against its own
people.
"The thing about President Mugabe is he's not a threat to anyone else
. . .
but he is a terrible threat to his own people," he said.
The
Australian Government was pushing the UN Security Council to refer Mr
Mugabe
and his henchmen to the global court.
Zimbabwe is not a signatory of the
court so can only be prosecuted by a
Security Council resolution.
The
UN's peak body is considering a damning report from the Special
Representative on Zimbabwe.
"President Mugabe has simply
destroyed the economy of the country," Mr
Downer said.
"Half the country
is suffering from a lack of sufficient nutrition that he
has to have food
aid for a country that was once a great agricultural
nation."
Mr
Mugabe made a speech this week at the UN Food and Agriculture
Organisation
in Rome. Mr Downer said the speech was "offensive" and
"disgraceful".
Australian officials were instructed to walk out of
the conference venue
when the Zimbabwean strongman got to the podium. They
were the only ones to
do so.
"This is a country that used to be the
breadbasket - the food bowl of
Africa - a major exporter of food and under
his regime he has simply
decimated agriculture," Mr Downer said. "And they
are begging now for food."
Deportations continue while UK government decides policy
By Tererai
Karimakwenda
18 October 2005
A Zimbabwean asylum seeker,
with a Malawian passport, was finally
deported to Malawi on Saturday by
guards who gave him no notice. He had
avoided deportation from the UK a
couple of times by refusing to get on the
plane. Another failed asylum
seeker was deported on Monday, and a third was
due to be removed Tuesday
night. The removals come just days after an asylum
tribunal ruled that it
was not safe to return failed cases to Zimbabwe.
Although the home office
said it would consider the tribunal's findings,
deportations are continuing
while a general policy is being formulated.
The tribunal ruling had
given many Zimbabweans a false sense of
security, and the Legal Refugee
Centre is advising people to wait about 3
weeks to find out how best to
proceed. But it appears those who came into
the UK on Malawi passports will
be deported even if they have proven they
are Zimbabwean. Many people
escaping from Zimbabwe acquired passports from
Malawi to avoid detection and
because they are easy to get.
Dr Martine Stemerick has been active
in assisting Zimbabwean asylum
seekers and lobbying for a ban on removals.
She told us that the deported
asylum seeker, who will not be identified for
safety reasons, is now in
Malawi where he has no relatives, no place to stay
and no money to live on.
He had been waiting for a response to his appeal
but none ever came. Dr
Stemerick also said he was not given the 24-hour
notice that he is entitled
to under current UK immigration laws. In fact he
was watching TV in the
lounge when guards came to escort him to the
airport.
What is also disturbing is that the guards allegedly
treated him very
roughly when he attempted to resist getting on the plane.
Dr Stemerick said
they bashed his nose and put a cloth over it as they
forced him onto the
plane. He was bleeding as he got on and his hands were
allegedly bruised as
well. The guards returned his papers to him at Addis
Ababa airport in
Ethiopia. A sister of the deported man told Dr Stemerick
that the guards
said "We can kill you." Accusations of verbal abuse by
guards have been
levelled by other asylum seekers in
detention.
SW Radio Africa Zimbabwe news
Government blocking NGOs from feeding the hungry
By Tererai
Karimakwenda
18 October 2005
The government has been
limiting the activities of NGO's, including
their feeding programmes in
remote areas gripped by starvation. What is
surprising is that many NGOs are
going along with it, leaving people to
starve just to keep the peace with
government officials.
A classic case is that of Save The Children.
We found out that for
over three years, the people of one particularly poor
region had been
receiving a life-saving monthly food handout from Save the
Children UK.
Everyone over the age of 55 relied on a generous allocation of
mealie-meal,
cooking oil and beans.
But ever since the
introduction of the ill-fated Non-Governmental
Organizations Bill in 2004,
the Mugabe regime banned humanitarian
organizations like Save the Children
from continuing with their general
feeding programmes. Save the Children UK
was allowed to continue with
developmental work only, such as digging wells
to provide drinking water.
But they were ordered to discontinue the
feeding.
Local ZANU PF officials accused the NGOs of engaging in a
subversive
political programme in support of the MDC. Our elderly sources in
this one
area said this was absolute nonsense. They confirmed that NGO
officials had
not been talking politics to them at all. It is a known fact
that Zanu PF
want to use food to buy votes and many observers feel the
regime is involved
in a slow form of genocide, by starvation.
Audrey Gaughran of Amnesty International said all people have a right
to
food and in the case where a government itself is unable to feed them, it
is
obliged to use all the means at its disposal and allow the international
community to step in and help. As for the government's paranoia, Gaughran
said there is no evidence that any credible NGO in Zimbabwe has used food as
a political weapon. She said on the other hand there is plenty of evidence
that the Zimbabwe government and the Grain Marketing Board have politicised
the distribution of food.
SW
Radio Africa Zimbabwe news
Judiciary under spotlight following pro-Zanu (PF) Judgement
s
by
Tichaona Sibanda
18 October 2005
The failure by the
Judiciary to nullify Zanu (PF) victories in
constituencies that were
engulfed with violence in the March parliamentary
elections has again shown
that the justice system in the country is heavily
compromised.
Political commentator Bekithemba Mhlanga said the unwillingness by the
Judges to overturn the election results, despite overwhelming evidence of
violence, indicates a system that is upholding the interests of its
masters.
'I don't know what the judges wanted the MDC candidates to
bring.
Maybe they expected them to bring dead bodies and broken limbs or
people
stitched up from election violence. Or worse they wanted them to
bring
entire villages that were displaced or people who fled the country and
sought refuge outside Zimbabwe to come and testify,' said
Mhlanga.
Almost all judges on Monday agreed that Robert Mugabe's
henchmen used
food and violence to win votes. The judges were delivering
rulings on a
number of election petitions filed by losing MDC candidates
from various
parts of the country.
MDC Legal Secretary David
Coltart said the judgements on the facts
were fair but was disappointed that
the results went against them. It has
long been known that the Supreme and
High Court benches are stuffed with
Zanu (PF) supporters and
sympathisers.
'You only need to look back and see who makes up the
judiciary and
whose interest they are actually serving.and you shouldn't be
very
surprised,' said Mhlanga.
SW Radio Africa Zimbabwe news
Survey shows signs of 'rampant corruption' in
Africa
Mail and Guardian
Ray Faure | Johannesburg, South Africa
18 October 2005 01:52
South Africa is ranked number 46 in the
latest Transparency
International Corruption Perceptions
Index.
Although its score of 4,5 on a scale of 10 beat the
global
average of 4,11 and was way above the average of three for African
countries, it only ranked third on the continent -- being pipped by Botswana
in 32nd place with a score of 5,9 and Tunisia in 43rd place with a score of
4,9.
According to Transparency International, 31 of the
44 African
states listed on the CPI 2005 scored less than three -- "a sign
of rampant
corruption".
Zimbabwe and Zambia were ranked
joint 107th with a score of 2,6,
while Namibia was 47th (score 4,3), Lesotho
70th (3,4) and Mozambique 97th
(2,8).
It was no surprise
that Nigeria ranks second worst on the
continent and 152nd globally with a
score of 1,9.
"Nigeria is marked by severe corruption, and
has consistently
received one of the worst scores in recent CPIs. This can
be attributed to
the prolonged military dictatorship and the resultant ad
hoc nature of
issues of governance. In addition, the lack of emphasis on
accountability
has led to the entrenchment and institutionalisation of the
practice of
impunity.
"In particular, anti-corruption
initiatives lack a holistic
approach and two major components in the legal
framework are missing, ie.
access to information and whistle-blowers
protection laws. Despite this
worrying situation, the slight improvement
recorded since last year can be
attributed to the vigorous pursuit of
sanctions by the government and the
energising of some structures for
combating corruption," Transparency
International noted.
Chad, however, with a score of 1,7, had the dubious distinction
of not only
being named the most corrupt nation on the African continent,
but also the
world's most corrupt state.
According to Transparency
International, the African state is
marked by political instability, human
rights abuses and weak press freedom.
Chad is also the location of the
challenging World Bank-funded Chad-Cameroon
oil pipeline project, which is
attempting to defy the "resource curse" by
using oil revenues to reduce
poverty. The project depends heavily on the
political will of the government
to respect the rule of law.
"While Chad has achieved a degree
of transparency not seen in
other oil-rich countries, ongoing reports of
mismanagement or corruption
must be followed by government action," points
out Transparency
International. - I-Net Bridge
Assistance to the population affected by the
'clean-up' exercise
Source: International Federation of Red Cross And Red Crescent Societies
(IFRC)
Date: 18 Oct 2005
Zimbabwe: Appeal No. 05EA016 Programme Update
No.2
The Federation's mission is to improve the lives of vulnerable people by
mobilizing the power of humanity. It is the world's largest humanitarian
organization and its millions of volunteers are active in over 181 countries.
In Brief
Appeal No. 05EA016; Operations Update no. 2; Period covered:
September 2005; Appeal coverage: 15.7%;
Appeal history:
Launched on 26
July 2005 for CHF 2,481,818 (USD 1,788,110 or EUR 1,487,813) for 5mon ths to
assist some 15,000 persons (3,000 households)-
http://www.ifrc.org/cgi/pdf_appeals.pl?05/05EA016.pdf
Operations Update no.
1 - http://www.ifrc.org/cgi/pdf_appeals.pl?05/05EA01601.pdf dated 26 August 2005
was issued.
This Operations Update provides a revised plan of action for the
period October -December 2005, in light of funding received.
Disaster Relief
Emergency Funds (DREF) allocated: CHF 100,000.
Outstanding needs: CHF
2,093,035 (USD 1,617,492 or EUR 1,344,247).
Related Emergency or Annual
Appeals: Zimbabwe 2005 Annual Appeal no. 05AA017-
http://www.ifrc.org/cgi/pdf_appeals.pl?annual05/05AA017.pdf
Operational
Summary: The relief efforts promoted by the Zimbabwe Red Cross Society and the
Federation have alleviated the suffering of approximately 1,500 most vulnerable
households affected by the 'clean up' exercise, particularly those of people
living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA), orphans and other children made vulnerable by
HIV/AIDS (OVC) and those who sought shelter in holding camps (in June and July
2005). However, at the onset of the rainy season, the needs of most households
affected by the 'clean up' exercise remain largely unmet. Combined with the
effects of a drought that severely impacted on the 2004/05 agricultural season,
the capacity of thea ffected households to cope with the situation is limited.
To date, the appeal has received 15.7% coverage and further donor support to
meet the needs of the targeted 3,000 household s is encouraged. An extension of
the current emergency operation is envisaged- should the pledged funding be
received after the end of October 2005.
Operational developments
The
'clean up' operation- started by the government of Zimbabwe in May 2005- was
concluded in July 2005, when operation 'Garikai/Hlalani Khulhe' (operation stay
well) was launched. Under operation 'Garikai/Hlalani Khulhe', construction of
shelter for the families affected by the 'clean up' operation is planned by the
government of Zimbabwe. Most of affected people- scattered all over Zimbabwe-
are seeking opportunities for resettlement; some in the government designated
areas, other in rural areas and others by being hosted by families and relatives
within the cities. This phenomenon is negatively affecting he t most vulnerable,
especially OVC and the chronically ill people, who in the process can hardly
access basic services such as medical care, shelter, food, water and sanitation.
The situation is worsened by the general economic decline currently being
experienced in Zimbabwe, the protracted fuel shortage crisis and the effects of
the drought experienced during the 2004/05 agricultural season-resulting in a
poor harvest.
Currently, the people affected can be classified into the
following categories:
- The people who went to rural areas directly from
where they where removed and those who initially went to holding camps and later
moved to rural areas. According to recent reports from the Mashonaland,
Matabeleland North and Matabeleland South provinces Red Cross branches, some of
these families are returning to urban areas. Initial reports and verifications
portray changes in the whereabouts of the same families as of September 2005
since their coping mechanisms and safety nets have been drastically reduced.
Several households have been contacting the national society's provincial
offices seeking for assistance, mostly in the form of food and other basic
requirements- like shelter.
- The households that remained camped within
illegal settlements (previously demolished), such as in Epworth, Hopley,
Hatcliffe and White Cliff suburbs- in Harare, Victoria Falls, Gwanda, Beitbridge
and Bulawayo. Assistance to this group presents operational challenges because
of the government directive of assisting only those within designated areas and
with housing development approved by the city councils. Most of the households
in this category are destitute, with increasing difficulty in meeting their
basic needs and with very little capacity to look into strategies to access
accommodation schemes. Some children in these illegal settlements are
malnourished due to lack of adequate food and have no proper communication
channels to present their problems and needs.
- The households that will
benefit from the housing being constructed in designated areas and those who
have been allocated stands by local authorities. These families currently use
basic infrastructure of very low standard for shelter. While some of them are on
the government's waiting list, the progress of h t e construction of the houses
is slow due to alleged constraints such as lack of fuel and building materials.
It is estimated that only a few are going to benefit from the programme compared
to the high numbers of households affected by the 'clean up' exercise.
Red
Cross action
Emergency Appeal no 05EA016 was launched on 26 July 2006 for
CHF 2,481,818 million to provide assistance to 15,000 vulnerable people for a
period of five months. It followed the release of CHF 100,000 from the
Federation's Disaster Relief Emergency Fund (DREF) on 10 June 2005. With the
DREF allocation, the Zimbabwe Red Cross Society (1)- with support from the
Federation- was able to offer in itial assistance by providing relief items to
meet th e basic needs of 1,400 vulnerable households within the holding camps in
all the provinces. Between May and July 2005, the Red Cross distributed
blankets, kitchen sets, soap and jerry cans. It also provided portable toilets
for use in transit camps.
Following the dismantlement of the holding camps
in July, the Red Cross continued to ensure th e availability of safe drinking
water for the affected (by distributing water purification tablets to 1,500
households) and improved hygiene (by conducting hygiene education in the newly
designated area of Hatcliffe, Harare). The national society is still
constructing five two-bed roomed houses for the identified most needy
child-headed vulnerable households. The houses will be ready for occupation by
mid-October 2005. Property titles for the land have been granted by the councils
concerned.
As part of livelihood recovery programme, 1,000 households in
rural areas are receiving seeds and fertilizers.
Footnote:
(1) Zimbabwe
Red Cross Society- http://www.ifrc.org/where/country/check.asp?countryid=13
For further information specifically related to this operation please
contact:
In Zimbabwe: Emma Kundishora, Secretary General, Zimbabwe Red Cross
Society, Harare; Email: zrcs@ecoweb.co.zw; Phone: +263.4.77.54.16; Fax:
+263.4.75.17.39.
In Zimbabwe: Françoise Le Goff, Federation Head of Southern
Africa Regional Delegation, Harare; Email: i f rczw02@ifrc.org; Phone:
+263.4.70.61 55, +263.4.70.61.56; Fax: +263.4.70.87.84.
In Geneva: Terry
Carney, Federation Regional Officer for Southern Africa, Africa Dept.; Email:
terry.carney@ifrc.org; Phone: +41.22.730.42.98, Fax: +41.22.733.03.95.
All
International Federation assistance seeks to adhere to the Code of Conduct and
is committed to the Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster
Response in delivering assistance to the most vulnerable. For support to or for
further information concerning Federation programmes or operations in this or
other countries, or for a full description of the national society profile,
please access the Federation's website at http://www.ifrc.org
Africa 'looking away from Zimbabwe' -
Frazer
Cape Argus
October 18, 2005
By Peter
Fabricius
America's top Africa official Jenday Frazer says she is
"disappointed"
with Africa's leaders for "looking away" from the Zimbabwe
crisis.
Frazer, former US ambassador to SA and now assistant
secretary of
state for Africa, was in South Africa where she met foreign
minister
Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma yesterday.
She acknowledged
that South Africa was not looking the other way on
Zimbabwe in so far as it
was trying to mediate there.
But on the other hand it was not
openly saying there was a crisis
there either as it had, for instance, in
the Togo crisis.
"When I say African leaders are looking the other
way, I ... mean they
haven't taken it up as the African Union," Frazer
explained.
The whole international community should be taking
up the Zimbabwe
issue because the country could easily descend into
violence.
She said she agreed with the South African government
that only
Zimbabweans could solve their problems. But she disagreed that
Zimbabweans
should be left to do this in isolation. "It is ironic that the
ANC should
take that stance since the ANC itself built a strategy which
included both
inside and outside forces for change here. It is not
either/or. It can't
be."
Zimbabwe police seize huge drug
consignment
Angola Press
Harare, Zimbabwe, 10/18 - Security forces in Zimbabwe
Sunday seized a large
consignment of drug weighing 900 kilograms from
cross-border traffickers who
entered the eastern city of Mutare from
Mozambique.
Police spokesman Oliver Mandipaka said the drugs, consisting
mainly of
marijuana, had a street value of ZWD1.5 billion (ZWD26,000=1USD),
and was
probably destined for the lucrative South African market.
He
said a combined police and army team laid an ambush for the traffickers
in
Mutare, near the border with Mozambique, but all the peddlers escaped and
abandoned the consignment after their car was hit.
He said apart from
the drugs, security forces recovered Mozambican passports
and the vehicle
and trailer in which the drugs were being transported.
Zimbabwe, which
lies at the heart of southern Africa, is a major transit
point for drugs
going in all directions, particularly South Africa, the
biggest
market.
Police regularly confiscates the illicit products and jails the
offenders,
but so far this has proved not to be a sufficient deterrent.
Zimbabwe players demand reinstatement of Simmons
cricinfo
Cricinfo
staff
October 18, 2005
The unrest between Zimbabwe's players and
board has again spilled into the
open with the leaking of a letter from
almost all the team calling for the
reinstatement of Phil
Simmons.
Simmons, who was replaced by Kevin Curran as national coach in
August, had
stayed on the coaching staff and remained as an employee of
Zimbabwe Cricket
(ZC). Ten days ago his contract was abruptly terminated, a
decision he
contested claiming that it had been taken in contravention of
the board's
own rules. The case is now in the hands of both sides' lawyers.
Insiders
told Cricinfo that ZC had spoken to Zimbabwean immigration
officials about
the possibility of Simmons's work permit being
withdrawn.
But in a letter to Peter Chingoka, the ZC chairman, 30
players, including
Tatenda Taibu, the captain, and Heath Streak, asked for
the decision to be
reconsidered. "We believe Phil still has much to offer ZC
as national coach,
and we feel the decision to terminate his employment is
unjust and unfair
and is not in the best interests of Zimbabwe
cricket."
Some board members openly blamed Simmons for the team's
problems, something
the players disputed. "A number of factors have affected
our ability to
perform as a unit," the letter continued. "So it would not be
right to make
Phil the scapegoat. Phil knows a great deal about the game,
and has taught
us much in a short period. We therefore have faith in him and
believe that
Phil has a great awareness of the current squad of players as
individuals,
therefore we still believe he has the best chance to position
the national
team to win games in the future."
The letter
concluded by stating that they believed Simmons was "the right
person to
continue as national coach and to take the team to India. Please
may we urge
you as concerned players who want the best for Zimbabwe cricket
to
reconsider your decision to terminate Phil's employment."
This is the
second time the players have united to write to the boad in five
weeks. In
September, they lambasted the board for its treatment of them, and
were
especially critical of the handling of controversial new player
contracts.
It also raises serious questions about the role of Curran.
Although not
mentioned in the letter, in calling for the reinstatement of
Simmons the
implication is that Curran would have to step aside.
This
is sure to be yet another embarrassment for the Zimbabwe board, and one
which comes on the day that Streak announced that he would be putting his
role as captain of Warwickshire ahead of any international demands. On
Saturday, a full-strength Zimbabwe side were humiliated by Kenya in a
one-day match.
© Cricinfo
The
Zimbabwean crisis could increase struggle
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/article.php?article_id=7622
Zimbabwe is in crisis. Rampant
inflation, soon to hit 400 percent a year,
has debased the currency, wiped
out the livelihoods of people on fixed
pensions and cut almost everyone's
living standards.
Everything from sugar to petrol to vegetables is hard
to find and expensive.
Six boxes of matches cost 20,000 Zimbabwe dollars. If
you change £40 you are
given a wad of notes as thick as two bricks.
Unemployment is estimated at 75
percent, with over 70 percent of the
population living under the poverty
line.
Only the rich and the
clique around the regime, with their access to foreign
currency sources,
live well. Operation Murambatsvina, the government's
"Operation Restore
Order" which swept people out of their shacks and tiny
businesses, has left
700,000 people without homes or their livelihoods or
both.
Near the
Harare to Bulawayo main road Simbisdo Hadebe lives with her three
children.
They were cleared from another part of Harare in May and have
lived since
with only asbestos sheets and cardboard boxes for shelter.
"Mugabe
attacks rich pepole abroad but he tortures the poor at home," she
says.
Workers cannot afford to get a bus to work, so tens of thousands of
them
walk for ten kilometres or more.
The crisis is causing tension in the
ruling party and the MDC opposition. It
is divided over whether to contest
the next set of elections, for the
Senate, on 26 November.
The result
may be a return to genuine mass action in the country, with
Tuesday of next
week set to see the beginning of a campign over political
rights and
collapsing living standards.
© Copyright Socialist Worker (unless
otherwise stated). You may republish if
you include an active link to the
original and leave this notice in place.
Another reason the UN is
useless
The QandO
Blog
Posted by: McQ on
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
|
Because it gives an international
platform to dictators and tyrants like Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe:
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe yesterday railed against
President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, calling them
"international terrorists" bent on world domination like Adolf
Hitler.
Mr. Mugabe departed from his text at a ceremony marking the 60th
anniversary of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to accuse Mr.
Bush and Mr. Blair of illegally invading Iraq and looking to unseat governments
elsewhere. Of course, if you were Mugabe, you might be a little
paranoid about being "unseated" by others who see your rule as tyrannical,
oppressive and murderous. Of course, that said, it won't be by the US or
Britian, and it certainly won't be the the UN which steps in to save the people
of Zimbabwe. No, as in Darfur, the plight of the people being oppressed and
killed will be ignored while the likes of Mugabe and the bandits who run the
Sudan are left to rail against the rest of the world at UN sponsored
events.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization has simply become
another in a long line of UN organizational forums for tin-pot dictators to
spout their anti-American and anti-Western tripe.
"The voice of Mr. Bush and the voice of Mr. Blair can't decide who
shall rule in Zimbabwe, who shall rule in Africa, who shall rule in Asia, who
shall rule in Venezuela, who shall rule in Iran, who shall rule in Iraq," he
said. It is instructive to note with whom Mugabe aligns
himself.
Of course Robert Mugabe has been the hand at the tiller which
has run the ship of the prosperous nation of Zimbabwe aground on the rocks of
tyranny, oppression, fraud, corruption and outright political murder and turned
in into a sinking derelict.
Mr. Mugabe accused Britain and the United States of working to
unseat him because of his forcible redistribution of white-owned farms among
blacks, helping plunge his country into its worst economic crisis since
independence from Britain in 1980.
Regime critics in Zimbabwe and abroad
say Mr. Mugabe's land policies have turned what was the breadbasket of southern
Africa into a country facing mass shortages at home.
Aid groups estimate
5 million of Zimbabwe's roughly 12 million people may need food aid this
year. But that doesn't mean it's his fault, oh no, it's the
Bush/Blair cabal's fault. And, this being the UN, also known as the world's
largest debating club for third world dictators, Mugabe had a chance to play to
supporters:
Some FAO delegates applauded several times during Mr. Mugabe's fiery
speech yesterday. It is time to consider something new in terms of
an effective world body. The UN is simply no longer an appropriate vehicle for
the pursuit of peaceful goals among democratic nations any longer. It has long
since destroyed any credibility it might have had through its corruption and
ineffectiveness.
We've seen discussions about the formation of an
alternate body come and go, but at this point it should be clear that the UN is
not the institution that can handle the job.
It will take a bold leader
to say "enough" and pull the US out of the organization. It has had its day and
its deterioration into an ineffective and expensive organization has been
percipitious. It survives today on impetus, tradition and a lack of an
alternative.
Maybe it's time to seriously discuss a "League of
Democracies" or some alternative world organization where being a tin-pot
dictator actually disqualifies you from memebership instead of automatically
providing you with a forum, paid for by others, from which to spew lies,
disinformation and hate. |
S.Africa maize exports surge on Zimbabwe shipments
Reuters
Tue Oct 18, 2005 2:57 PM GMT
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Maize exports from
South Africa nearly tripled last
week to over 60,000 tonnes due to heavy
shipments to Zimbabwe, data showed
on Tuesday.
Maize exports totalled
60,498 tonnes for the week to October 14, compared to
21,377 tonnes the
previous week, according to the South African Grain
Information
Service.
The bulk of the exports, 45,048 tonnes of white maize, went to
Zimbabwe,
which is suffering from food shortages along with several other
southern
African nations.
Earlier this month, the Zimbabwe government
said it would have to import
222,000 tonnes of maize to feed around 2.2
million needy people.
Aid agencies say around four million people, a
third of the population, will
need food handouts until the next harvest
comes in around next April.
Smaller amounts of white maize went to eight
other African countries, with
Angola buying 4,817 tonnes and Botswana 4,364
tonnes.
Exports of yellow maize, mostly used for animal feed, were little
changed at
2,600 tonnes to four neighbouring countries.
The higher
exports will put a small dent in a huge surplus in South Africa
following a
bumper grain harvest this year.
Producers say the surplus could reach
five million tonnes if official
estimates for the 2005 crop of 12.18 million
tonnes prove correct.
Maize prices, which tumbled early in the year on
the big crop but have
staged a recovery, gained on Tuesday mainly due to a
weaker rand, traders
said.
Benchmark December white maize futures
climbed 2.9 percent to 841 rand per
tonne by the midday close and December
yellow maize added 3.3 percent to 789
rand.
The rand against the
dollar was trading at 6.593 by 1230 GMT, about 7 cents
weaker on its levels
late on Monday.
Zimbabwe court to decide on MDC vote nominations
Reuters
Tue Oct 18, 2005 12:00 PM GMT
By Stella Mapenzauswa
HARARE
(Reuters) - Zimbabwe's nomination court will decide next week on
whether to
allow opposition candidates to stand in senate elections in
defiance of
their leader, a state newspaper said on Tuesday.
Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) president Morgan Tsvangirai said last
week he was against the
party taking part in the polls, despite opposition
from senior colleagues,
triggering the party's worst crisis since it formed
in 1999.
On
Tuesday the Herald newspaper said the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC)
had "dampened" attempts by Tsvangirai to block MDC members from filing
nomination papers next Monday ahead of the November 26 vote for the restored
second chamber of parliament.
"ZEC chairman Justice George Chiweshe,
who was responding to a letter
written by Mr Tsvangirai ... that those
registering to contest the Senate
polls as MDC candidates should be deemed
independents, said nomination
courts would accept papers from candidates who
meet laid-down criteria," the
paper said.
ZEC officials were not
available for comment on Tuesday.
Tsvangirai's spokesman, William Bango,
confirmed that the MDC leader had
written to the ZEC.
"Mr Tsvangirai
has taken note of the statement from the chairmain of the ZEC
and he has
adopted the position that he shall see the colour of the sky when
the clouds
clear on Monday," Bango told Reuters.
At the weekend Bango said
Tsvangirai had launched a campaign to reunite a
party he says is split over
the senate polls.
Tsvangirai says the senate polls are likely to be
rigged by President Robert
Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party, which denies MDC
charges that it has
fraudulently won parliamentary and presidential
elections since 2000.
The pro-participation faction within the MDC says a
boycott of the Senate
vote would merely widen ZANUJ-PF's already comfortable
majority in the
house, while further edging out the opposition.
MDC
spokesman Paul Themba-Nyathi said last week that the party's
decision-making
national council had voted in favour of participation by a
narrow two-vote
margin and that its decision was binding.
Mugabe has been in power since
independence from Britain in 1980. The
European Union has imposed travel
sanctions on Zimbabwean government
officials over the accusations of vote
rigging in parliamentary polls in
2000 and in Mugabe's re-election two years
later.
Absa's Zim bank pretext 'nonsense'
Mail and Guardian
Thebe Mabanga
18 October 2005 08:59
Absa's claim that it had no knowledge of irregular lending
practices at its
Zimbabwe associate, the Jewel Bank, is "nonsense", says a
senior employee
formerly stationed at the Harare bank.
In August, reports
revealed that the Jewel Bank -- then known as
the Commercial Bank of
Zimbabwe (CBZ) -- in which Absa has a 25% stake, had
helped Zimbabwe's
Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) acquire a stake in
two privately
owned newspapers. This happened under the stewardship of the
then MD Gideon
Gono, now Zimbabwe's Central Bank governor.
At the time, Absa
said it had no operational control and thus no
knowledge of the bank's
day-to-day activities.
Tom van Heerden, seconded by Absa to
Jewel Bank as senior credit
manager in 1998, this week told the Mail &
Guardian: "There is no way they
[Absa's South African management] could not
have known."
Van Heerden said he had told Absa that Gono
"lent out money
left, right and centre without authorisation". Van Heerden's
immediate boss
at Jewel, director for credit and now CEO of the bank Nyasha
Makuvise, was a
"willing sidekick" who did not oppose Gono. All of Van
Heerden's attempts to
have loan transactions turned down were thwarted by
Gono and Makuvise's
combined approval.
Van Heerden's
Harare tenure ended in 2000, two years before the
CIO transaction. But
during his time, he said he regularly informed his
South African bosses
about flagrant disregard for procedure and the bad
shape of Jewel Bank's
debtors' book.
His direct South African contact was Lukas de
Swart, who was
general manager, people management services. Absa
spokesperson Errol Smith
said De Swart was "probably
retired".
Van Heerden said Gono's generous lending practices
were extended
to a wide range of clients including Zimbabwe company
Chitchem, National
Railways of Zimbabwe and Zisco Steel, as well as
individual Zimbab-wean
business people.
On the debtors'
book, Van Heerden found the bank did not make
adequate provision for bad
debts. Stated properly in accounting terms, the
book would probably have
rendered the bank insolvent.
Van Heerden's continued
disagreements with Gono and Makuvise led
to his stint ending before December
2001, as originally scheduled. The end
began with an attempt to suspend him.
In a letter, dated September 2000,
Absa noted, "there were sufficient
grounds to continue with a disciplinary
inquiry", adding "we have found that
the relationships between yourself and
your superiors at CBZ have
deteriorated to the point that no viable basis
exists to continue with the
employment relation".
The letter refers to "incompatibility"
between Van Heerden and
"the managing director [Gono] and credit director
[Makuvise]". Van Heerden
believes that, for Absa, "their stake was more
important" than the concerns
he was raising.
This week,
Smith continued to insist that Absa had no
operational control of Jewel
Bank. He said the bank was not a subsidiary but
an associate in which Absa
held a minority stake. He refused to respond to
Van Heerden's claims, but
said they had never arisen at board level, where
Absa had representation.
Smith said this suggested the matter was resolved
internally.
Smith said Van Heerden's deployment to Jewel
did not constitute
operational involvement, but was "part of the price, and
related to
technology and skills transfer". Van Heerden's secondment
agreement was
between Absa, Van Heerden and CBZ.