By
Tererai Karimakwenda
05 October 2006
The Registrar General
Tobaiwa Mudede revealed last week that his
office does not have enough funds
to print passports and identification
cards due to a lack of funds. Our
Harare correspondent Simon Muchemwa told
us Mudede made the comments on the
programme "Behind The Camera" which aired
on state television last
Wednesday. Muchemwa said the problem is so serious
that Zimbabweans who
applied for I.D.s or passports in mid 2005 are still
waiting for their
documents to be issued. And the average waiting time is
now 6 months to 3
years.
Mudede said his department does not have enough in its
budget and has
had to focus its resources on elections. But Muchemwa said
this is confusing
because the government created the Zimbabwe Electoral
Commission (ZEC) which
has the mandate to compile the voters' roll and
organise all elections. He
also wondered whether Mudede's comments implied
that the ZEC fell under his
jurisdiction.
The Registrar
General's office used to issue metal I.D. cards made of
aluminium. But for
over a year the department has had to issue plastic ones
similar to bank
cards. Muchemwa said the RG is so broke that it is failing
to print even
these cheap plastic cards, and is now issuing a paper version
called a
waiting pass.
Zimbabweans are automatically issued an I.D. card
when they turn 18
years old. Without the card they cannot apply for a
passport and without a
passport they cannot travel. Muchemwa said the long
waiting periods have
made life very difficult for those who need personal
identification and
travel documents.
SW Radio Africa
Zimbabwe news
Steven Price in Harare
October 3,
2006
A bad week for Zimbabwe Cricket grew worse with a threat from Temba
Mliswa,
the controversial Zimbabwean political activist, that he was set to
challenge Peter Chingoka, the board's chairman, and Ozias Bvute, the
managing director, with the support of the country's "highest authorities".
The board were already reeling from the resignations of Crispen Tsvarai and
Bruce Makovah and will be further alarmed by this latest
development.
Mliswa, who has a chequered career, was the man widely
considered
responsible for driving Tatenda Taibu into retirement last year.
After
seeming to ingratiate himself with the Chingoka-led interim executive,
it
seems that, as Cricinfo exclusively reported last month, he had a major
falling out with the executive's top brass.
Mliswa addressed a media
conference at a Harare hotel this afternoon,
repeating virtually the same
allegations that have been raised against the
ZC bosses by players and
disgruntled stakeholders over the past two years.
But this time, Mliswa
vowed to finally deal with the alleged
maladministration and corruption by
the ZC top brass.
"We have confidence in the authorities and powers that
be in this country
that they will deal with this decisively now," he said.
He was sitting
alongside Makovah, the former convener of selectors who
resigned earlier
this week after a fall-out with the country's
board.
"I resigned because there were serious lack of transparency",
Makovah said,
adding another reason was the decision by Chingoka and Bvute
to allow Kevin
Curran, the coach, to dictate selection
matters.
Mliswa also revealed he had held discussions with Taibu and now
claimed to
be on talking terms with him. "I admit to be one of the people
who had a go
at him, but I never threatened him," he insisted. "I tried to
talk to him as
a brother. Tatenda is a Zimbabwean. He wants to play for his
country... but
in the best environment with the best
adminstrators".
He also said he had met some of the old provincial
chairmen, although he
evaded he said he was independent of the former
administrators.
© Cricinfo
VOA
By
Patience Rusere
Washington
04 October
2006
Zimbabwean local authorities continue to evict families by
force and destroy
dwellings, despite declarations by the Harare government
going back to late
2005 saying that the "clean-up" campaign called Operation
Murambatsvina had
been halted.
One lawyer representing residents
quoted a local official as saying the
latest drive was a continuation of
Operation Murambatsvina, Shona for "Drive
Out Rubbish."
The latest
round of evictions took place at Porta Farm Extension outside
Harare. The
residents of the exurban settlement were given 24 hours to
leave their
dwellings.
Attorney Tafadzwa Mugabe of Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights
said 37
families at Porta Farm were displaced by the Kuwadzana district
council
before the action was halted upon issuance of a court order sought
by legal
defenders. He said officials told him that the evictions were
intended to
mop up after Operation Murambatsvina.
The three-month
forced-eviction and demolition campaign, waged by national
and local
authorities, left some 700,000 people homeless or without
livelihoods or
both, said a report presented to United Nations Secretary
General Kofi
Annan.
In Harare's heavily populated district of Epworth, dozens of
families were
evicted and their homes destroyed last month before a court
order stopped
the operation.
The Combined Harare Residents
Association said dozens of families in Glen
Norah, another Harare suburb,
were evicted in August and taken to Caledonia
Farm, a resettlement camp some
distance outside the capital.
Attorney Mugabe told reporter Patience
Rusere of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe
that some evictions were conducted in
areas spared in the 2005 campaign.
VOA
By
Blessing Zulu
Washington
04 October
2006
The World Food Program said Wednesday that it is cutting
food aid to
Zimbabwe this month by two thirds because funding for assistance
is running
out. About 364,000 children and another 190,000 people in
vulnerable groups
are affected.
The United Nations agency said food
aid rations in cities will be halved.
A WFP spokesman said the agency
urgently needs $US61 million or 97,000
tonnes of grain to restore
distributions to previous levels.
WFP monitoring reports say food
security remains precarious for those in
Zimbabwe fighting HIV-AIDS or other
diseases, orphans and other vulnerable
children for whom the main source of
food is distributions originating with
the U.N. organization.
And
consumer inflation that ran over 1,200% in August has brought a 300%
increase this year in the cost for Zimbabweans of obtaining a basic 2,100
calories daily.
The cutbacks come just as Agriculture minister Joseph
Made has admitted for
the first time ever that the country faces a food
supply shortfall. Previous
official statements said domestic resources were
sufficient, describing WFP
aid as supplementary.
For more on the aid
cutback, reporter Blessing Zulu of VOA's Studio 7 for
Zimbabwe turned to WFP
Southern African spokesman Mike Huggins.
Deputy Director Nyika
Musiyazviriyo of Christian Care, one of WFP's main
partners on the ground,
said it would be hard to make up the cutbacks from
other sources.
The New Republic
Manchurian Candidate
by Joshua Kurlantzick
Only at TNR Online
| Post date 10.05.06
In last week's presidential election,
Zambian voters should have had plenty
to complain about. Endemic poverty in
this southern African nation. One of
the world's worst rates of HIV/AIDS,
which affects nearly one in six
Zambians. Repeated cycles of famine. When I
visited eastern Zambia, crowds
of emaciated farmers wandered the sides of
the road at night, begging for
coins and stopping at huts in search of
handouts of thin nshima porridge.
Yet much of the Zambian debate centered
on a completely different topic:
China. Opposition candidate Michael Sata
accused Chinese companies, which
have invested heavily in Zambian copper
mining, of exploiting Zambian
workers and undercutting Zambian goods.
"Chinese investment has not added
any value to the people of Zambia," Sata
told a Zambian radio station, also
threatening to toss Chinese companies out
of the country. In response,
China's embassy in Zambia became directly
involved in the election, very
unusual for foreign diplomats in any country,
warning that Beijing might
sever ties to Zambia if Sata won. The incumbent
president, Sata's opponent
in the election, reportedly apologized to Beijing
for Sata's comments.
Sata appears to have lost--he is alleging fraud--but
his rhetoric resonated
with many sections of Zambian society. Over the last
year, in fact, Zambian
workers in a Chinese-owned mine had erupted in
violent protest against low
wages and safety standards, which may have led
to an accident last year in
which some 50 miners died.
Zambia, in
fact, offers a window into a phenomenon American policy makers
have only
just begun to discover. In a short period of time, China has
become a major
donor and investor in Africa, and it has begun to play a
major role in
domestic African politics--not only in Zambia but also across
the continent.
In fact, China has so quickly amassed power in Africa that it
now rivals the
United States, France, and international financial
institutions for
influence--and potentially damages Africa's economic and
political
renaissance.
wo years ago, Stéphanie Giry chronicled the
beginnings of China's African
safari for The New Republic, but, since then,
Beijing has much more
aggressively wooed the continent. African states can
provide the natural
resources China desperately needs to power its economy.
And African
countries, especially those just recovering from years of war,
also are less
likely than Middle Easter oil providers to have established
relationships
with Western oil consumers. Cultivating African allies offers
China crucial
support at international forums like the United Nations, where
it is
beginning to have a more active presence. Perhaps most important, if
China
can play a major role in Africa, it could stake its claim as a global
great
power in the world, able to influence events far from its own
neighborhood.
China also has developed more sophisticated strategies and
tools for wooing
Africa. Beijing increasingly advertises its state-directed
model of
development, which can prove alluring on a continent where
neoliberal
economic reforms promoted by the West did not deliver promised
poverty
reduction--and where they sometimes saddled African nations with
high debt
loads. Beijing has backed up its claims of working for Africans'
benefit by
signing cooperation agreements with African nations; in November,
it will
host a high-profile China-Africa summit, even as American presidents
struggle to make it to Africa once a term.
China has become a major
aid donor, offering Africa nearly $2 billion in
annual aid, along with at
least $2 billion in loans, creating programs to
train African students, and
establishing Chinese language programs at
African universities. What's more,
Chinese companies invest in nations no
other major powers would consider,
and the Chinese government encourages
firms to invest in select countries.
Chinese construction firms have swarmed
into war-torn countries like Sierra
Leone, rebuilding factories and hotels.
Many African nations have
welcomed China's new safari. Since 2000, African
trade with China has
quadrupled, and some African elites and publics have
welcomed China's aid,
investment and model of development: Program on
International Policy
Attitudes polls show strong favorable opinions of China
across Africa. Even
the head of the African Development Bank has announced
that, "We can learn
from [the Chinese] how ... to move from low to middle
income status." And
African leaders clearly are treating China like a great
power on the
continent, affording Chinese officials and businesspeople the
type of
welcome and access once reserved for Western leaders.
ut, at the
same moment, for the first time in decades, Africa has entered
the radar
screen of international corporations and Western governments. In a
world
facing a potential peak in production from major Middle Eastern oil
fields,
Africa's untapped oil and gas are proving quite attractive.
Meanwhile, parts
of Africa are posting some of their strongest growth rates
since
independence. The continent has begun to climb the rankings of the
World
Bank's index of domestic environments for doing business.
China's
emergence could threaten this progress. As a Treasury Department
paper
reportedly warns, growing Chinese loans to Africa, especially at high
commercial rates, could threaten billions in recent forgiveness by the World
Bank and IMF's Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative. China's aid to
Africa also sometimes comes linked with Chinese investment, a practice major
donors shun. The fear is that Chinese investment could contribute to
environmental destruction and poor labor standards, since Chinese firms have
little experience with green policies or unions at home, and many African
nations have powerful union movements.
Worse, if China continues to
offer aid without any conditions, it will allow
itself to serve as a wedge
between developing countries and the West, and it
will support Africa's
pariahs. This has already begun to occur. In Angola,
Chinese aid has helped
the government avoid IMF programs designed to ensure
that aid money actually
gets the poor. In the Central African Republic,
Chinese assistance helped
the government weather sanctions after staging a
coup, and, in Sudan,
China's refusal to countenance sanctions has rendered
the United Nations
impotent.
In Zimbabwe, Chinese backing has allowed Robert Mugabe's
government to
resist pressure from its democratic African neighbors to open
a dialogue
with the Zimbabwean opposition. During the run-up to Zimbabwe's
last
national election, in fact, China reportedly sent planeloads of
T-shirts for
supporters of Mugabe's party, offered the Zimbabwean government
jamming
devices to be used against independent radio, and sent Zimbabwe riot
control
gear. At a rally later held on Zimbabwe's independence day at a
stadium in
Harare, Mugabe touted his "Look East" policy favoring ties with
China. As he
spoke, Chinese fighter planes looped over the stadium, which
had been built
for Zimbabwe by China.
Joshua Kurlantzick is a special
correspondent for The New Republic.
zimbabwejournalists.com
By a
Correspondent
LONDON - OPPOSITION legislator, David Coltart, is
in the United
Kingdom where he is campaigning for the West to help solve the
political
crisis in Zimbabwe by putting more pressure on the Zanu PF
government.
Coltart, speaking on the BBC's Newsnight programme
yesterday said,
Zimbabwe could explode into a bloodbath anytime if nothing
is done to help
solve the political and economic crisis that has dragged on
for more than
six years now.
He said it was sad that countries
in the West have turned a blind eye
to suffering in Zimbabwe while focusing
more attention on places like Iraq,
Afghanistan and Sudan's Darfur
region.
Coltart, a member of parliament for Bulawayo South and
justice
spokesman in the Movement for Democratic Change faction led by
Arthur
Mutambara, is on a tour of Europe lobbying for more pressure to be
exerted
on Zanu PF and efforts by the West to end the political impasse in
the
country.
His colleagues, Priscilla Misihairabwi-Mushonga
and Trudy Stevenson
are also on a tour of Europe campaigning for more
diplomatic efforts to be
channelled towards ending the crisis in Zimbabwe.
They were in Germany last
week.
Commenting on the attacks by
the police on labour leaders protesting
about poor workers' salaries and
related issues last month, Coltart said:
"In the past torture was used to
extract information but this time it showed
the government of Zimbabwe is
ready to use extra judicial punishment. the
regime is more paranoid than
ever."
He said the situation in Zimbabwe at the moment was
catastrophic with
a debilitating HIV/Aids crisis, a shrinking economy (the
fastest shrinking
economy in the world), a political crisis and related
issues.
"Zimbabwe will undoubtedly spill out of control is nothing is
done
now. The country may degenerate into bloodshed," she told the programme
that
also showed slips of the police severely assaulting the labour
leaders.
Speaking on the same programme was Vauxhall MP, Kate Hoey,
chair of
the inter-party parliamentary group on Zimbabwe. Hoey, who has just
returned
from a visit to Zimbabwe, talked of the sorry plight of people in
Zimbabwe,
especially those affected by last year's Operation Murambatsvina.
She said
most of the programme's victims were still without shelter while
others had
either died or moved to their rural homes.
The
prominent Zimbabwe campaigner said there was so much misery
amongst most
ordinary people she met on her visit to Zimbabwe.
Asked about the
impact of an opposition the journalist said lacked
cohesion, Hoey said the
opposition MDC did have some problems leading to
their split last October
but the groups had agreed to work together with
other civic groups and
political parties to seek a solution to the country's
crisis.
She said she was happy the British government has over the past few
months
been doing more behind the scenes to deal with the Zimbabwean crisis,
What
needed to be done, she added, was to get the African Union to speak
with a
collective voice on the crisis in Zimbabwe. Most African leaders are
said to
speak openly about the problems in Zimbabwe in private but adopt a
"softly
softly" approach towards Robert Mugabe in public.
Hoey said with
the reported divisions in Zanu PF over the succession
issue, it looked like
"the regime is at last vulnerable to pressure".
Urging her government
to work together with other progressive forces
and deal with the problems in
Zimbabwe, she said: "We could sort out
Zimbabwe. We are not going to sort
out Afghanistan and Iraq so easily but
Zimbabwe we could."
Also
on the programme was The Zimbabwean newspaper's editor-in-chief,
Wilf
Mbanga. He said his newspaper was under scrutiny by Harare following
its
critical coverage of the crisis in the country. Mbanga said efforts to
muzzle the newspaper will not deter him from doing his work.
The Herald (Harare)
October
5, 2006
Posted to the web October 5, 2006
Bulawayo
Bureau
Harare
GWERU has gone for two days without water after
lightning struck a power
line supplying the city's major source of water,
Gwenoro Dam.
Zesa were still battling yesterday to restore power and if
all went well
then the city should see water in its taps early this
morning.
The Executive Mayor of Gweru, Mr Sesel Zvidzai, said the
Zimbabwe
Electricity Supply Authority was working flat out to solve the
problem.
"They spent the entire Tuesday night there and the whole of
yesterday
working to repair the damaged lines but they are having
difficulties. The
cables were extensively damaged but an engineer attending
to the problem
said we should keep our fingers crossed. He said if all went
well the line
would be operational again by 6pm (yesterday) but water
supplies are
expected to resume four or five hours thereafter," he
said.
Residents said the council should have put in place contingency
plans, and
at least arranged for bowsers, as most of them were caught
unawares by the
unavailability of water.
Another resident, Mr John
Gumbo, of Ivene suburb said the soaring
temperatures forced him and his
colleagues to buy mineral water from
supermarkets.
Some schools had
to send children back home. Later in the evening, some
enterprising people,
mostly at garages, who have wells were selling water to
desperate
residents.
"I just bought this five litres for $300 from a garage along
9th Street.
They had the water in a well and there was a long queue there,"
said Mr
Tinos Shumba.
The Zimbabwean
HARARE - Four
detectives from the Law and Order section of the ZRP this week
visited the
distribution offices of The Zimbabwean in Harare this week and
demanded
information and a statement from the proprietor.
They were particularly
interested in last week's issue, although they did
not specify which article
had attracted their attention. Last week's front
page story, headlined "ZNA
top brass slam corrupt ZRP" outlined the tensions
between the army and the
police after the arrest of a former colonel for
alleged corruption at the
state grain monopoly, the Grain Marketing Board.
The detectives took
away documents pertaining to the importation of the
weekly newspaper from
South Africa, where the southern African edition is
printed.
"We will
not be intimidated by any bully-boy tactics on the part of the
police or
anybody else," said UK-based publisher Wilf Mbanga.
"Our mandate is to be
a beacon for freedom of expression and of the press in
Zimbabwe and we
intent to continue doing that, no matter what."
Meanwhile, government has
stepped up its crackdown against perceived
opponents, ransacking the offices
of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
(ZCTU) and the Combined Harare
Residents Association (CHRA) reportedly on
the hunt for firearms and weapons
of war.
The search on CHRA's Daventry House headquarters and the ZCTU's
Chester
House headquarters in central Harare over the past week followed
mass
protests organized by the two civic groups against government's ruinous
handling of the economy.
Plain-clothes secret police spent the whole
of last week at the CHRA's head
office, monitoring the movement of people in
and out of the building. - Own
correspondent
The Zimbabwean
The comments by
veteran Zanu (PF) spokesman Nathan Shamuyarira on
Gukurahundi are a clear
indication of the party's insensitivity to the
misery it has caused the
people of Zimbabwe.
The systematic killing of more than 20 000 people, for
whatever reason, is
something that can never be justified.
To the
thousands of survivors and the families of the victims of this
appalling era
in our history, Shamuyarira's comments must be like salt in a
wound.
The
Zanu (PF) government owes the people of Matabeleland and Midlands an
apology
for the Gukurahundi genocide. It owes the people of Zimbabwe,
outside of
its top hierarchy and favoured few, an apology for destroying
their homes,
their livelihoods, their health and their children's futures.
The fact that
Shamuyarira has long been regarded as one of the more
level-headed people in
Zanu, with whom it was still possible to have a
rational discussion, makes
his recent utterances even more shocking.
The late Eddison Zvobgo earned
himself nationwide acclaim and respect
shortly before his death when he
publicly apologised to the victims of
Gukurahundi and their families,
confessing that the memories were giving him
sleepless nights. As he was a
senior member of the ruling party at the time
of his apology, it was deemed
that he had apologised on behalf of Zanu (PF).
This was confirmed when Mugabe
made a grudging, but public, statement that
Gukurahundi had been "a moment
of madness" and should not be allowed to
happen ever again.
The subject
seemed to have been laid to rest - but there was always the
outstanding
issue of compensation. This has never been addressed. And
therefore it will
never go away.
It was the thorny issue of compensation that raised its head
in Vumba last
week that elicited Shamuyarira's attempted justification of
the sending of 5
Brigade into Matabeleland.
The message is clear. Zanu
(PF) has robbed Zimbabweans of everything they
have and it is not going to
share its ill-gotten gains with anybody. Least
of all victims of its own
lust for absolute power.
The Herald
(Harare)
October 5, 2006
Posted to the web October 5,
2006
Harare
THE Republic of Korea, through the Korea International
Cooperation Agency
(KOICA), will tomorrow provide medical assistance
amounting to US$50 000 to
Government for the 2006 fiscal year.
The
handover ceremony will be held at the National Pharmaceutical Company in
Harare's Southerton industrial sites, an official with the company told
Herald Business yesterday.
"Mr Jong-soon Park, the ambassador of the
Republic of Korea, and Dr Timothy
Stamps, health advisor in the Office of
the President and Cabinet, will
officiate at the ceremony," the official
said.
Also in attendance will be the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry
of Health
and Child Welfare as well as NatPharm officials.
The
medical assistance includes a variety of drugs, namely Amitryptylline
(600
boxes), Atenolol (320 boxes), Captopril (450 boxes), Glibenclamide (310
boxes), Adrenaline (460 boxes) and Salbutamol Aerosol Inhaler (5 400 boxes)
which were requested by Dr Stamps and NatPharm.
Since the
establishment of diplomatic ties in 1994, Zimbabwe and Korea have
enjoyed
cordial relations. Among other things, KOICA -- Korea's official
development
assistance agency -- has played a key role, providing US$680 000
worth of
assistance and inviting 47 officials from Zimbabwe for training
programmes.
"The Embassy of the Republic of Korea wishes that the
medical assistance
could be of any help in addressing the health-related
concerns of the people
and Government of the Republic of Zimbabwe," the
official said.
Meanwhile, Ambassador Park said Zimbabwe and Korea have
witnessed a
sustained expansion of trade and investment flows over the past
decade as
well as enhancement of economic co-operation.
Ambassador
Park said this while delivering a speech at celebrations to mark
the Korean
national day on Tuesday. He said Korea had risen from one of the
poorest
countries in the world in the 1950s to become the 10th largest
economy in
the world today.
"This is why Korea has been endeavouring to share its
development experience
with other developing countries, including Zimbabwe,"
he said.
The function was attended by senior Government officials, and
members of the
diplomatic and business communities.
The Herald
(Harare)
October 5, 2006
Posted to the web October 5,
2006
Harare
GOVERNMENT has started issuing lease application forms
to A2 (large-scale)
farmers with a minimum record of three years of
production, a Cabinet
minister has said.
Minister of State for
National Security, Lands, Land Reform and Resettlement
Cde Didymus Mutasa
said the Agricultural Land Settlement Board has already
inspected 96 A2
farmers and successful farmers would be issued with 99-year
leases.
The minister said this while moving a motion to have the
Gazetted Land
(Consequential Provisions) Bill read for the second time in
the Senate
yesterday.
The Bill, which seeks to punish illegal farm
invaders, sailed through the
House of Assembly last month without
amendments.
He said 206 previous farm owners had since been compensated
for immovable
improvements, excluding land.
"The acquisition of farm
equipment and material is done in respect of idle
equipment only. It is only
in the case of farms covered by
country-to-country agreements that
compensation is paid for both land and
immovable improvements," said Cde
Mutasa.
He said land audits have been done in all provinces and completed
in
Manicaland, Mashonaland West and Matabeleland North.
The Bill
validates all offer letters issued by the ministry and would punish
farmers
who continue holding gazetted land after the prescribed 90 days'
notice.
Senators said it was important for the State to liaise with
the new farmers
before payment for equipment is made to the former
farmer.
They said some of the previous farmers were receiving payment for
equipment
which they vandalised to sabotage the new farmer.
It was
felt that traditional leaders should preside over the affairs of
resettled
farmers since they were the custodians of the land.
Senators also noted
that there was still confusion as some people had offer
letters to a farm
but another person would come claiming ownership of the
same property armed
with a mining prospecting letter from the Ministry of
Mines and Mining
Development.
Masvingo Senator Cde Dzikamai Mavhaire (Zanu-PF) urged the
State to address
the issue of double allocation.
He said one farmer
had a permit while another had an offer letter on the
same farm and called
upon the Government to address these anomalies.
Chitungwiza Senator Cde
Forbes Magadu said the Bill was silent on what would
become of people
occupying peri-urban areas.
He said town planners should not interfere
with farmers practising
agriculture in peri-urban areas in their expansion
of cities.
Mutasa-Mutare Senator Cde Mandy Chimene was worried by the
laxity of law
enforcement agencies in evicting defiant former
farmers.
She said there had not been any reported case of white farmers
jailed for
defiance yet it was common knowledge that most of them were
resisting
eviction.
Non Constituency Senator Guy Georgias said the
State should be careful on
the long-term implications of the laws being
passed, especially those
relating to eviction, because the same laws could
be used against some of
them in future.
He said the Bill was not very
distinct on who it applied to.
"If you remember, a former president of
Zambia (Mr Frederick Chiluba) once
put laws that only allowed two terms for
an incumbent president but the same
laws were used against him when he tried
to seek a third term. So you need
to be very careful," said Sen
Georgias.
He said the State should be cautious when evicting farmers
because some of
them might have applied for loans.
There might be a
double loss of both the money and the skill if the eviction
exercise was not
carried out with caution.
President of Council of Chiefs Chief Fortune
Charumbira said resettled
people should fall within the jurisdiction of
chiefs.
Cde Mutasa said the necessary Government arm would take care of
the chiefs'
concerns.
He said contract farming was allowed and going
into partnership with another
person was permissible, but it was critical to
inform the ministry through
the relevant arms.
He said a farmer
should not use the land as collateral to borrow money from
the bank since
the land belonged to the State.
The lease agreement to be given to
farmers would act as title deeds in that
a spouse could take over in the
event of death or the lease bequeathed to a
child.
By
Lance Guma
05 October 2006
What started off as a debate on
the role of Zimbabweans in the
Diaspora on our Behind the Headlines series
has turned out to be a very
controversial if not sensitive topic for many.
Alois Mbawara a coordinator
with the Free-Zim Youth UK pressure group and
Duran Rapozo from the Zimbabwe
Development Network based in Manchester
started off the debate last week.
SWRA has been inundated with submissions
on why many Zimbabweans do not
participate in political gatherings. And the
contrasting arguments reveal a
very divided community.
Rapozo
had strong words of criticism for the opposition who he feels
ignored the
diaspora for too long without recognising their political
potential. Mbawara
on the other hand argued that people could still show a
commitment to their
motherland without necessarily being a member of an
opposition party. His
group Free-Zim Youth UK has organised aggressive
campaigns in the United
Kingdom over various issues including a solidarity
demonstration for
Zimbabwean students, a protest at the offices of the
British prime minister
in Downing street and several other forms of action.
Mbawara urged pressure
groups to change tact and become more militant
because an over-reliance on
old strategies was discouraging people.
Bekithemba Mhlanga, an
academic, believes over 90 percent of people in
the diaspora are economic
migrants and not political activists, 'A good
number of them still hold the
man in charge of Zimbabwe's mess in high
esteem.' He further says, 'the real
cadres are out there at vigils,
meetings, community groups, doing their bit.
The rest could not care what
happens in Zimbabwe.' He says some of these
individuals do not know what is
happening politically but are very aware
when it comes to issues to do with
jobs or the latest exchange
rates.
Others interviewed, expressed disappointment with the way
some of the
protests were organised saying people leading some of these
often tended to
have strong ego's which discouraged people from
participating. Although some
blamed poor organisation and advertising on the
part of some of the pressure
groups it was noted that events like the Zim
Vigil every Saturday at the
Zimbabwean embassy in London have been going on
for over 4 years since being
set up in October of 2002. This has however not
translated into large
numbers of people participating.
NB: For
the full debate listen to the Behind the Headlines programme
from last week
on the archives (28/09/06) and the second part played on
Thursday this
week.
SW Radio Africa
Zimbabwe news
Asia Times
By Kent
Ewing
HONG KONG - When China, one of the world's most corrupt countries,
starts
dishing out tens of billions of US dollars in aid and business
contracts in
Africa, the world's most corrupt continent, alarm bells go off
in Washington
and other Western capitals. The fact that China turns a blind
eye to
widespread human-rights abuses on the continent further heightens
concerns
in the West.
To secure oil supply is a major reason for
China aggressively to expand its
economic ties with Africa. To fuel its
phenomenal economic growth, which has
averaged more than 9% annually for the
past 20 years, China needs oil as
well as raw materials. Not rich in oil
reserves, China is becoming
increasingly dependent on imported oil.
According the Ministry of Commerce,
oil imports accounted for 47% of the
country's total consumption in the
first half of this year.
Last
year, the US Congress successfully blocked the attempted takeover of
the US
oil company Unocal Corp by CNOOC Ltd, a subsidiary of China National
Offshore Oil Corp, one of China's three largest energy firms. Energy
security rose to the top of the national agenda and Chinese oil companies
became even more aggressive in search of possible petroleum sources in other
parts of the world.
Africa is home to 8% of the world's oil reserves,
which has prompted Beijing
to spend billions of dollars to secure drilling
rights in Nigeria, Sudan and
Angola and to negotiate exploration contracts
with Chad, Gabon, Mauritania,
Kenya, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia and the
Republic of the Congo. The
continent now accounts for 25% of China's oil
imports.
In addition, the Chinese are also key investors in the copper
industry in
Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. And they are buying
timber in
Mozambique, Liberia, Gabon, Cameroon and Equatorial
Guinea.
In exchange for securing energy, mineral resources and other raw
materials,
China has been doling out aid and providing technical assistance
and
interest-free loans to business-friendly African governments. At the
same
time, Chinese companies are winning contracts to build highways,
pipelines,
hydroelectric dams, hospitals and sports stadiums and to upgrade
railways,
ports and airports.
In recent years, China has been
increasingly aggressive in diverting and
expanding its trade with other
parts of the world as its trade frictions
with the United States and the
European Union intensify. Hence China's trade
with Africa continues to soar
and, not coincidentally, the long-suffering
economies of sub-Saharan Africa
are enjoying their fastest growth in 30
years.
According to the
Chinese government, China's trade with Africa has increased
from US$10.6
billion in 2000 to $39.7 billion last year. During that same
period, the
International Monetary Fund reports, the economic growth rate in
sub-Saharan
Africa has nearly doubled. This year's 5.8% rise, the IMF says,
is the best
Africa has seen since 1974.
Where Western companies fear to tread because
of small profit margins or
environmental or political concerns, the Chinese
have plunged in. China's
state-owned companies have the ability to put
short-term profit aside and
focus on the government's long-term economic
plans.
As for environmental and political qualms, Chinese leaders have
made it
clear that they don't have many. In that way, China's
no-strings-attached
approach to doing business in Africa flies in the face
of Western concerns
about democratic development and respect for human
rights.
So despite the largely negative reaction in the West to China's
push into
Africa, Chinese investment is clearly paying off. But how and for
whom?
Those are the sticky questions.
For China, the benefits have
been substantial, and Chinese leaders hope to
build on their success at the
third Ministerial Meeting of the Forum on
China-Africa Cooperation, to be
held in Beijing next month.
Premier Wen Jiabao summed up the Chinese
strategy at a stopover in
Brazzaville during his Africa tour in June: "China
has been developing
relations with Africa under principles of mutual benefit
and
non-interference in Africa's internal affairs."
Wen was only
reinforcing the see-no-evil, hear-no-evil policy that President
Hu Jintao
had articulated during his earlier visit to the continent in
April.
The offer is clear: in return for securing the raw materials
necessary to
feed its voracious economy, China will not meddle in the
internal affairs of
African governments, even if those governments are known
for rampant
corruption and human-rights abuses.
From Beijing's
perspective, the partnership is working brilliantly.
Africa's ruling
elite are also happy as the Chinese pump money and cheap
manufactured goods
into their economies without the ritual hectoring about
democracy and human
rights that they have grown accustomed to hearing from
Western
partners.
Thanks to China, demand for African oil, copper and platinum is
surging, and
everything from Chinese-made T-shirts to kitchen utensils to
motorcycles is
widely available across the continent at prices lower than
those for
comparable goods imported from elsewhere. Two companies in South
Africa have
announced plans to sell cheap Chinese automobiles.
And
certainly African leaders such as Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe and Sudan's
Omar
Hasan Ahmad al-Bashir are grateful for China's promise of an "equal
partnership" with their nations.
President Mugabe, 82, who has ruled
Zimbabwe since 1980, has the Chinese to
thank for the blue-glazed tiles on
the roof of his new $13 million,
25-bedroom presidential palace. The tiles
came gratis, but the Chinese have
also won contracts totaling hundreds of
millions of dollars to provide
hydroelectric generators for Zimbabwe's power
authority, which happens to be
run by the president's
brother-in-law.
In addition, China is supplying jets to the perennially
mismanaged Air
Zimbabwe and buses -1,000 of them - to the country's
municipalities.
Zimbabwe's air force has also been strengthened by China, to
the tune of
$200 million. The Chinese are even farming about 1,000 square
kilometers of
the land that has been seized from white farmers since
2000.
In Sudan, Beijing is one of Bashir's leading arms supplier and has
supported
the president's resistance to the stationing of United Nations
peacekeeping
troops in the Darfur region, where the United States alleges
government-sanctioned genocide has killed hundreds of thousands. Chinese
support should come as no surprise, since more than half of Sudan's oil
exports go to China. Overall, Sudan accounts for 5% of China's
oil.
China National Petroleum Corp owns 40% of the Greater Nile Petroleum
Operating Co. Sinopec (China Petrochemical Corp) is building a
1,500-kilometer pipeline to Port Sudan on the Red Sea, where the China
Petroleum Engineering and Construction Group is constructing a tanker
terminal.
It's safe to say that the Sudanese president won't be
hearing many
complaints from Beijing - unless, of course, the oil stops
flowing.
In Washington, China's relationship with such nations as Sudan
has officials
worrying that Chinese investment could, either directly or
indirectly, be
used to support terrorists. To Beijing, this is just another
example of
alarmist thinking from a White House that seems determined to
contain
China's rise as a world power.
While Chinese and African
leaders are celebrating what Beijing describes as
their current "win-win"
relationship, the average African may not be so
thrilled. On a continent
where nearly half the people live on less than $1 a
day, a cheap car or
air-conditioner- or even a new T-shirt - is still out of
reach of ordinary
people.
Africans need jobs. And while there is no question that Chinese
projects
have created jobs in some places, they have also clearly taken them
away in
others. In South Africa and Lesotho, for example, cheap Chinese
imports are
blamed for the loss of tens of thousands of local jobs in the
textile
industry, while in Angola, China has insisted on using Chinese
laborers as
it upgrades the country's railways.
In Zambia, opposition
party leader Michael Sata has tapped into resentment
of the Chinese with his
suggestion that they be expelled from the country
along with other foreign
workers who he claims have taken jobs away from
locals. Sata was defeated
last week by incumbent Levy Mwanawasa in a
presidential election that his
supporters claim was rigged.
In Zimbabwe, Mugabe may be admiring the blue
tiles on the roof of his
palace, but ordinary citizens have coined a new
phrase to describe Chinese
goods - from buses that break down to clothing
that falls apart - as
substandard in quality: "zhing-zhong". Some
Zimbabweans have even started
using this epithet to describe Chinese
people.
Although China's Africa policy has won the hearts and minds of
the
continent's rulers, the people themselves appear to lag behind. They are
waiting to see whether the Chinese model of engagement with the continent is
going to be any different than those of the exploitative colonial powers of
the past.
So far - with China using the continent as a source of raw
materials and a
dumping ground for its own manufactured goods - the formula
seems much the
same.
Kent Ewing is a teacher and writer at Hong Kong
International School. He can
be reached at kewing@hkis.edu.hk.