• Can't afford to die
• Unique opportunity for Zim Pensioners
• JAG Open Letters Forum No. 157
• Fine words
• The unstoppable tide
• Govt moves to save SA property in Zim
• UN warns of big food shortfall
• Transport woes persist
• Daily News a victim of rule of law: Moyo
• Fake bearer cheques in circulation
• Moral myopia

Fine words

By Michael Hartnack

Robert Mugabe commandeered an Air Zimbabwe flight to go to New York, via
Casablanca, to address the United Nations General Assembly last week.
Sources say the French government refused him transit via Paris. Perhaps the
silencing of Zimbabwe's only independent daily, The Daily News, was a step
too far for even President Jacques Chirac, who had welcomed Mugabe to a
French-African summit this year despite a European Union ban. Mugabe's New
York appearance was reminiscent of how corrupt regimes have long learned to
work the system, posturing before the world while dirty work went on at
home. Many well-meaning people have failed to realise the threat these
regimes posed until it was too late. Despite the bankruptcy of Zimbabwe's
treasury, and the threat of famine hanging over eight million people, Mugabe
has indulged himself with, on average, two long-distance foreign trips each
month since he addressed the assembly a year ago. On each, he was
accompanied by his wife and a large delegation. In 2002 he demanded
democratisation of the Security Council and said land redistribution was
winning the war against poverty back home. We have seen no sign of this
victory these past 12 months, only worse misgovernment.

In his speech, Mugabe denounced the US and British action against Iraq as
"an unjust and illegitimate war" - as if oblivious of his own declaration of
a Third Chimurenga or civil war against 5 000 white farmers, 500 000
farmworkers, and millions of suspected opposition voters. He was appalled by
Israel targeting Palestinian militants, but coyly omitted to mention his own
Operation Tsuro death squads. Human rights groups allege these squads get
blood money for murders of opposition activists. Peace, he said - apparently
unaware how his words might be applied to successful land reform - was not
gained by violence and proclamations but by "just settlements". Having
shouted for years that Zimbabwe's minorities were second-class citizens (he
said just before flying out that whites "must be led to the gate" -
expelled), Mugabe is now anguish-ridden for the rights of small nations in
the UN Security Council and world financial system. "Citizens everywhere,"
Mugabe informed the world body, "were pressing for a greater say in national
governance," so governments must demand "democratisation'' of global
institutions such as the UN and the International Monetary Fund. This from a
man illegitimately kept in power by rigged polls.

At home, there is nothing his supporters do not have the right to do, but at
the UN "all nations, big or small, (must) have equal say in the way we
govern world affairs." Mugabe was heartened, he said, to hear public opinion
in the United States and Britain opposing military action in Iraq. And that
from a man who will do anything in Zimbabwe to silence journalists reporting
about his own adventures in the Democratic Republic of Congo, or about the
deployment of security forces against peaceful demonstrators in townships.
Mugabe said the allied action against Saddam Hussein had been "based on
falsehoods", yet told the UN his devastation of commercial agriculture in
Zimbabwe "is yielding tangible benefits to the majority of our people -
there is a new sense of empowerment yielding a happy sense of ownership
which has brought thousands upon thousands of marginalised families back
into the economic mainstream." Anyone going out into the Zimbabwean
countryside and seeing the derelict farms knows it is just not like that.

Churchmen last week, when they were able to get their statement published by
the remaining independent news media, accused Mugabe of unleashing the Beast
of Anarchy. His rule, they said, was like his land redistribution:
"irresponsible, inhuman, violent, partisan, and non-transparent". The 109
ministers and laymen from 59 denominations said by negating fundamental
moral laws, Mugabe's regime had "forfeited its God-given mandate to rule."
The principle of collective security is a noble one. Statesmen contemplating
the devastation of past wars cannot have been wrong to try to prevent their
recurrence through establishing regular consultative machinery such as the
UN, or its predecessor the League of Nations. The League was doomed when the
ideals of internationalism became a mask behind which tyrannies consolidated
themselves, each professing it was progressive. Mugabe's harangue, indeed,
brought back memories.

The unstoppable tide

Sean O'Toole

‘I’m tired of this," remarked a South African National Defence Force (SANDF)
soldier offloading a small group of glum-looking immigrants at the Musina
police station, a ramshackle collection of squat buildings in South Africa’s
most northerly outpost. It was not yet mid-morning and the soldier’s company
had arrested yet another batch of desperate Zimbabweans illegally crossing
the nearby Limpopo river. "Night and day, all the time, every day the same,"
he sighed, leading the men to the station’s cells. "I haven’t eaten for two
days," said 24-year-old Phillip Chikumbo, his dark eyes bloodshot with
fatigue. There was no hint of outrage or bitterness in his comment; he was
simply hungry. "They do not have food for us here because we are unexpected
visitors." Dressed in a blue-and-white check shirt, his hair closely
cropped, Chikumbo is one of about 20 young men - all Zimbabwean - patiently
awaiting deportation to a place he no longer wants to call home.

"My father is not very happy," he said, squatting on his haunches among a
tangle of roots belonging to a wild fig that prospered in the middle of the
prison courtyard. "He is angry that I left; he says it’s running away. But
there is nothing to do [in Zimbabwe] as far as a job. It’s hard to raise
money." A qualified mechanic, Chikumbo was born and raised in Chiredzi, in
Zimbabwe’s central Mashonaland district. Long disheartened by the lack of
opportunity in the country, he is an old hand at crossing the border
illegally. Chikumbo works as a junior mechanic at a private trucking company
on the road to Thohoyandou. It is not an uncommon story told in the prison
courtyard. Maxwell (33), "caught in an ambush along the river", has been a
mall security guard in Johannesburg for nine years. Morris (18), from
Masvingo, earns R750 as a tractor driver on a Mpumalanga farm. "I get paid
R600 a month," said Chikumbo. Exploitation wages to be sure, but he is happy
with the opportunity to work. The income allows him to visit his girlfriend
Sara every three to four months in Chiredzi. Chikumbo said his arrest is a
minor inconvenience, his words echoing the sentiments of many of the
detainees. Take, for example, Freedom Kulalelo (23). Arrested two weeks ago
in the Johannesburg suburb of Berea, he spent 10 days at Lindela
repatriation centre near Krugersdorp. After his return to Zimbabwe he headed
straight back to South Africa.

It used to be, a policeman told us, that Zimbabweans detained illegally
crossing into South Africa were fined upon repatriation. They were even sent
away to Harare. But occurrences of illegal crossings are so frequent along
this border (26 742 in 2000, 19 932 in 2001, and 18 033 recorded last year)
that the Zimbabwean authorities have stopped imposing punitive sanctions. At
worst, one border-jumper told us, they might be told to clean the Beit
Bridge police station before being released. "I have been disturbed from my
programme," commented Maxwell, who had been following our conversation
intently. Tinged with a suggestion of humour, Maxwell’s comment nonetheless
articulated the thoughts of many of those in the Musina prison. "I am late
for work now," he quipped, adding: "It’s very obvious. I can’t live in that
place of [President Robert] Mugabe anymore. I’m coming back - today."
Chikumbo smiled: "Me too." We arranged to meet Chikumbo in Beit Bridge with
the aim of accompanying him on his illegal border crossing. Having
previously visited this Zimbabwean town perched on the periphery of Mugabe’s
politically besieged country, we knew it to be relatively docile, which is
not to say it is a benign, sleepy hollow. Stern Zanu PF banners in the town’
s centre offered a reminder of the larger context: "Land Reform for Economic
Empowerment," one of them read. A necessary pit stop for migrants travelling
south, the town of Beit Bridge presents many obstacles. Aside from the
obdurate plainclothes policeman from the criminal investigations department,
there are also exploitative taxi drivers, dissolute gangs of robbers
(otherwise known as the guma guma), rapacious crocodiles and the SANDF. "You
have to be clever," Kulalelo told us, particularly when it comes to the guma
guma. "They don’t have guns, but they carry spears, screwdrivers, axes,
knives." While crossing the Limpopo, Kulalelo saw a woman being raped by
eight of them, an allegation later confirmed by a SANDF patrol.

By all accounts the guma guma are motivated by economic expediency alone, a
fact emphasised by the Shona meaning of the word. Loosely translated, guma
guma means to get something by no effort. One migrant we spoke to said the
word was actually onomatopoeic, deriving from the sound of pigs eating. This
aptly pegs the guma guma for what they are, scavengers who prey on naive,
often cash-rich border-jumpers. Operating in banded groups along the Beit
Bridge border area, the guma guma ostensibly offer guided walks and/or taxi
journeys to various points along the South Africa/Zimbabwe border. They
charge a minimum of R50 for leading migrants to purpose-cut holes in the
South African border fence, a 180km tangle of electric wires delineating the
political boundary between the two countries. Chikumbo’s protracted ritual
breaching of this patchwork fence, a toothless beast that is a throwback to
apartheid times, merely highlights the ease with which border-jumpers cross
the border with impunity. With the cost of processing undocumented migrants
said to be R16 000 a person, the implications of these crossings are by no
means inconsequential. Last year the SANDF arrested 50 852 immigrants along
South Africa’s borders with Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Swaziland and Botswana.

After being offloaded by a Department of Home Affairs truck at the Beit
Bridge police station Chikumbo immediately headed for the township of
Dulibadzimo, on the outskirts of town. At the central market he chartered a
sky-blue Datsun taxi, at a cost of Z$35 000 (R90). "It’s not a good
business," the lanky taxi-driver confided as he drove us an hour or so east
of Beit Bridge. "Fuel is too expensive." The scenery on our drive was
revealing. Drought and profligate overgrazing have destroyed the landscape.
Only the baobabs prosper. We passed four men walking. Chikumbo waved. "They
were with me in prison this morning," he chuckled. "They’re also going
back." The taxi ride came to an end at a dusty soccer field 20km east of
Beit Bridge. From there we had to walk, the mass of small rural paths
finally congregating into one well-worn (smuggler’s) path that led us to the
river. I asked Chikumbo about the crocodiles, which have been known to take
migrants. "It’s a matter of starvation," he said. "You can’t worry about
those things." We eventually forded the Limpopo by moonlight, darting around
slimy pools of stagnant water. When there was no way around these, we waded
knee-deep through the river. On the South African side a bedraggled series
of farm fences hinted that we were not the first visitors to crawl under the
first, then hop over the second. It is really that simple gaining entry into
South Africa, though the reality for many border-jumpers is that they will
be detained by the SANDF in Musina. But this is nothing compared with the
disastrous situation in Zimbabwe. "It’s true! It’s real!" said Chikumbo.
"People from the opposition are being killed; even job applications are
turned down. People are angry." As long as this anger is unattended to, it
seems that Musina’s prison courtyard will continue to be a congregation
point for the youths who gather there like the collected flotsam of some
invisible shipwreck: Zimbabwe.

GOVERNMENT is crafting an investment protection agreement with Zimbabwe in a
bid to protect South African investments in that country.

This follows concern among SA investors that some of their property in
Zimbabwe has been earmarked for seizure under Mugabe's land reform
programme.

Government officials are hurriedly finalising the agreement while hoping top
level secret talks between ruling Zanu-PF and the Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) don't fail.

There are growing fears in government circles that if the talks fail,
Zimbabwe's woes will worsen.

There are also fears that as Zimbabwe's economy consistently declines many
other investments, aside from farms, are at risk of being confiscated by the
government.

Department of trade and industry spokesperson, Gaynor Kast, confirmed a
bilateral agreement with Harare was being finalised. But she could not
divulge details or say when it would be signed. It is understood that
foreign affairs wants it signed soon.

Although SA was hoping for a breakthrough sooner, it is understood the only
threat to the talks are increasing leadership problems and divisions both
within Zanu-PF and the MDC.

The secret deal includes constitutional reforms allowing for a transitional
government made up of both parties before democratic elections are held. The
talks also cover how a cabinet of the government of national unity would be
constituted.
President Thabo Mbeki has been pressing Mugabe and the MDC to take this
route.

Government officials are now putting pressure on both Zanu and the MDC to
speedily conclude the talks in an attempt to alleviate the economic collapse
of the country.

SA has indicated it was not prepared to abandon its "quiet diplomacy" on
Zimbabwe.

SA bid to save its farmers' property through a bilateral agreement comes
after reports that Zimbabwe reneged on a promise not to seize the farms of
Southern African Development Community citizens.

In August this year SA sent a list of properties, accompanied by a request
for immunity from seizure, but the Zimbabwean government wanted a bilateral
protection agreement signed.

The SA government also put pressure on Mugabe's government to investigate
reports properties owned by South Africans were already attached. Zimbabwe's
justice minister, Patrick Chinamasa, who leads the investigation, is yet to
report on it.

      James Morris, UN special envoy for humanitarian needs in the region,
called donors' response "alarmingly slow". Two thirds of the amount the UN
is seeking is earmarked for Zimbabwe, in the middle of a political and
economic crisis. John Reed, Johannesburg

By Arnold Beichman

    I'll tell you what is disgusting and disgraceful: The fact that all
those African leaders, especially Nelson Mandela, who are so busy moralizing
about America's faults and Europe's faults and yet cannot find a moment in
which to repudiate the dictatorship of Robert Mugabe over the starving,
dying people of Zimbabwe.
    And I'll tell you what else is disgusting and disgraceful. Why isn't the
so-called Court of Criminal Justice or some busybody prosecutor in Spain or
somewhere indicting Mr. Mugabe for his crimes? And where is the U.N. Human
Rights Commission, always so preoccupied with human rights in the Gaza?
    The most shameful behavior is that of Nelson Mandela and his successor,
South Africa President Thabo Mbeki who, ignoring Mr. Mugabe's atrocities,
has appealed to the West to drop its sanctions against the Mugabe regime.
And most recently, the Southern African Development Community (SADC) gave
Mr. Mugabe - would you believe? - a standing ovation.
    Of all people, they and especially Mr. Mandela himself, who once aroused
the world's conscience about the infamy of apartheid, sit by and legitimize
the rule of one of the worst dictators since Pol Pot, Mao Tse-tung, Josef
Stalin and Adolf Hitler.
    Exaggerated? Here is the detailed indictment by a Canadian member of
Parliament, Dr. Keith Martin, the conservative Alliance Party expert on
Africa:
    c  In two years, between 1983 and 1985, Mr. Mugabe ordered the killing
of more than 15,000 people of the Matabele tribe. Africa, let alone the
international community, ignored this savagery
    c  The people of Zimbabwe, except for the thugs who bodyguard Mr.
Mugabe, are starving.
    c  He ignores the AIDS pandemic that afflicts a quarter of the country's
12 million people.
    c  He has created the "Green Bombers," a youth militia who hound and
murder his opponents.
    c  Children as young as 11 are forced to join his militia.
    . Mr. Mugabe has destroyed an independent judiciary and his cronies are
now judges.
    c  He rigged the last presidential election by using state-sponsored
violence and intimidation.
    c  He has used his thugs to beat up journalists and his police and
military to shut down newspapers and thus has destroyed freedom of speech.
    . He has destroyed Zimbabwe's agriculture that once employed
three-quarters of its labor force and supplied almost 40 percent of its
exports.
    Mr. Mugabe has taken a once relatively prosperous country, where most
people had jobs, ate three meals a day, enjoyed some amenities - where there
were decent relations between farmers, many of them white, and their
employees - and turned this potentially rich country into a wasteland. And
Nelson Mandela and President Mbeki, who benefited mightily from arousing
white guilt in the West, today protect a man whose actions are as bad if not
worse because this is the 21st century, as anything that happened in the
days of apartheid.
    Zimbabwe is just another episode in the sad and tragic story of
postcolonial Africa. Think of what has happened in Burundi, in Liberia, in
Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone, in the Congo Republic, in Nigeria and the war in
Biafra, in Ghana, site of the first African dictatorship under Kwame
Nkrumah; the second African dictatorship under Sekou Toure in Guinea; of Idi
Amin and Milton Obote in Uganda; the murderous Dergue in Ethiopia; the
30-year civil war in Sudan; the cannibal Emperor Bokassa of the once Central
African Republic. How reminiscent of the poem of William Blake:
    The hand of Vengeance sought the bed
    To which the purple tyrant fled;
    The iron hand crush'd the tyrant's head,
    And became a tyrant in his stead.
    And now we have the tyranny of Robert Mugabe and there is a great
silence among Africa's conscience idols such as Nelson Mandela and Thabo
Mbeki. They and their cohorts who fought so hard for so long for freedom for
the people of South Africa, who endured such trials and tribulations for
decades and who finally achieved victory - how can they lead Africa in a
guilty stillness?
    Nelson Mandela, President Mbeki, have you no shame?

    Arnold Beichman, a Hoover Institution research fellow, is a columnist
for The Washington Times.