President Robert Mugabe addresses
the 64th United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters in New York
September 25, 2009.
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Zimbabwean President
Robert Mugabe accused Western countries on Friday of “filthy antics” aimed at
undermining a power-sharing government forged in February under a pact with
former rival Morgan Tsvangirai.
In a speech to the U.N.
General Assembly, Mugabe said the United States and the European Union had
refused to lift sanctions on Zimbabwe, and “some of them are working strenuously
to divide the parties in the inclusive government.
“If they will not assist the inclusive government in
rehabilitating our economy, could they please, please stop their filthy
clandestine divisive antics.”
The United States imposed sanctions in 2003 on Mugabe
and other prominent Zimbabweans accused of undermining democracy. The European
Union imposed measures of its own.
Mugabe, in power since independence from Britain in
1980, has long been a pariah in the West, blamed by critics for plunging his
country, once the bread basket of Africa, into poverty through mismanagement and
corruption.
In response, Mugabe has blamed the West for
Zimbabwe’s steep economic decline, saying sanctions were imposed to retaliate
for the seizure of white-owned commercial farms for redistribution to
blacks.
The power-sharing government was cobbled together
after a disputed election, but the pact between Mugabe and Tsvangirai has been
beset with problems as their parties accuse each other of failing to fully
implement the deal.
Zimbabwe says it needs $10 billion in foreign
reconstruction aid. Western nations are reluctant to release cash without
further political and economic reform promised as part of the power-sharing
pact.
An EU delegation that visited Zimbabwe this month
said it was waiting to see whether human rights abuses had
ended.
Robert Mugabe was interviewed by Christiane Amanpour yesterday and CNN have
two clips from the interview on their website. As usual, Mugabe produced some
pirceless and incredible quotes. In his interview, Mugabe apparently denied that
the country was in economic shambles and claimed that food shortages were
exacerbated by sanctions and drought. He said:
“The land reform is the best thing (that) could have ever have happened to an
African country … It has to do with national sovereignty.”
Mugabe also denied that he lost the 2008 election and
denied that he was responsbile for the violence following the elections:
“You don’t leave power when imperialists dictate that you leave,” he
insisted. “There is regime change. Haven’t you heard of (the) regime change
program by Britain and the United States that is aimed at getting not just
Robert Mugabe out of power but get Robert Mugabe and his party out of
power?”
BASED on the little that I struggled to glean from CNN’s Christiane
Amanpour’s interview with President Robert Mugabe, I must say I am very
disappointed.
Christiane Amanpour
Not because it was another opportunity for Mugabe to rant and rave about his
exhausted nationalist mantra, but because Amanpour displayed painfully crass
ignorance of Zimbabwe’s history, which only gave Mugabe an enormous arsenal of
weapons to dismiss some of her concerns.
Firstly, how could Amanpour, who has compellingly covered international news
for so many years, approach Mugabe without a little bit of knowledge of
Zimbabwe’s colonial history and the roots of the land crisis in Zimbabwe? She
accused Mugabe of hounding out white Zimbabweans from “their” land just because
they are white. Mugabe of course, with an understandable look of incredulity,
reminded Amanpour that most of Zimbabwe’s white land owners are descendants of
British white settlers who brutally dispossessed indigenous Africans of their
land in the late nineteenth century and throughout much of the twentieth
century.
Still, Amanpour continued to insist that these white settler descendants had
the “right” to their land and that Mugabe was unjustifiably hounding them off
their farms and chasing them out of Zimbabwe. To my amazement, she also accused
Mugabe of unleashing “Operation Drive-Out Filth” on black farm workers who
resided on white-owned farms. Again Mugabe, visibly angry with Amanpour’s
ignorance, reminded her that “Operation Murambatsvina” was about clearing slums
in the urban areas and not about displacing farm workers on white people’s
farms.
Amanpour went on to ask many other questions that simply displayed her
ignorance of the history and dimensions of the Zimbabwean crisis, much to the
annoyance of Mugabe. Now, if Amanpour should know one thing, it is that Mugabe
is not her average “third-world” leader with limited intellectual capacity.
Mugabe easily gets irritated with shallow people, particularly journalists who
ask him shallow questions that display poor knowledge of the Zimbabwean
situation.
She should have known this from Mugabe’s recent reprimand of a US top Africa
envoy, Johnnie Carson, whom he branded as an “idiot”.
Of course, I am not interested in the nitty-gritty aspects of Amanpour’s
exchange with Mugabe, an exchange that was unhelpful to say the least. What I am
concerned about is the prospect of Mugabe being given such prominent media
platforms as CNN and not being confronted with well-researched questions, now
that he has resolved not to dodge the media in his attempts to whitewash his
many sins and transgressions of the recent past. I am sure Mugabe would still
avoid knowledgeable journalists like our own Geoffrey Nyarotas and others (I
hear he recently absconded from a meeting with Zimbabwean independent media
editors, even though he had invited them in the first place).
He would also be careful to avoid such excellent international journalists
like BBC Hard Talk’s Stephen Sackur.
But journalists like Amanpour give Mugabe the perfect platform to justify and
whitewash his horrendous land reform program, his state-sponsored terror in
rural Zimbabwe, and his total disregard for the rule of law and democracy. Such
journalists do so by approaching Mugabe with the littlest of knowledge of the
various dimensions of the Zimbabwean crisis.
For example, Amanpour’s ignorance of the simple fact that land reform in
Zimbabwe was necessary because of the history of white settlers ruthlessly
dispossessing blacks of their land gave Mugabe the perfect arsenal to justify
his violent and chaotic land seizures by reminding Amanpour of this historical
fact. Many Africans listening to this exchange would naturally side with Mugabe.
And herein lies the danger: Mugabe again emerges as the champion of formerly
dispossessed blacks and thus a victim of neo-colonial racists who want to
perpetuate white settler interests in Zimbabwe.
Of course, nothing could be further from the truth: Mugabe is no one’s
victim. In fact, he is a victimizer who has launched brutal reprisals on all of
his political opponents since the 1980s, black and white alike. The reasons for
his brutality do not lie in the history of land dispossession but in his own
insatiable thirst for power. But he gets to use these historical facts about
colonialism to his advantage because of the ignorance of journalists like
Amanpour.
Instead of asking Mugabe why he did not conduct a fair, non-violent and
transparent land reform program, Amanpour told Mugabe that white Zimbabweans are
entitled to that land just like any other Zimbabwean and that land reform was
unnecessary. Instead of asking Mugabe why he has presided over a corrupt,
kleptomaniac, and murderous government, she asked stupid questions that
demonstrated her little grasp of the Zimbabwean crisis.
It is these kinds of journalists that Mugabe relishes to speak with, for he
can continue with his dishonest narratives of “sanctions”, “British
neocolonialism”, and so forth, ad nauseum. The saddest thing is that Africans
and many other people with sympathies for Africans will believe him because he
speaks from a concrete history that journalists like Amanpour are ignorant
about.
Now, I foresee Mugabe’s handlers encouraging him to go on a media blitz,
particularly with Western media outlets where he will outshine and outsmart
uninformed journalists who approach him with un-researched questions and clichéd
lines like “why is there no democracy in Zimbabwe”, to which Mugabe will of
course simply reply by saying “we have held elections in Zimbabwe every five
years since 1980”.
If western journalists want to help Zimbabweans, and Africans in general, I
suggest that they either recruit competent Africa media practitioners or demand
their Amanpours to educate themselves about African issues before they embarrass
themselves in front of people like Mugabe.
CNN must particularly relay this message to Christiane Amanpour who seems to
be regarded as the doyen of “international” news.
(Munyaradzi Munochiveyi is based in Boston,
Massachusetts)
There have been mixed reactions to CNN's interview with Robert
Mugabe on Thursday. This was Mugabe's first interview with a foreign news
agency for at least five years. Some observers thought interviewer
Christiane Amanpour missed a few tricks and failed to push the Zimbabwean
leader on several of his answers.
In some cases it appeared her
producers had not fully researched the facts of the situation in Zimbabwe.
For example she thought Operation Murambatsvina was the forced removal of
farm workers, which gave Mugabe an opportunity to correct her.
But
for many Zimbabweans in the Diaspora and at home, this was a rare
opportunity to see a glimpse of Mugabe in a different setting, after years
of unchallenged interviews by the state controlled media.
People
posted varying views on the social networking site Facebook, with one angry
Zimbabwean writing: "Christiane's interview with Mugabe was so badly
researched, it's shocking. She went into that interview armed with nothing
more than hearsay, old rehashed accusations about Mugabe that he learnt to
easily fob off years ago... There was so much Christiane could have asked.
Yet, she pressed on with the line of enquiry preferred by western
journalists, a line that allows Mugabe to cast himself as the liberator of
black people."
But another Zimbabwean wrote: "I did not see any
winner in it. Zimbabweans should not be led in their know-how about Zimbabwe
by a CNN interview. A man who claims there is enough food in Zimbabwe is
just not normal and no matter (how) eloquent - he is still a liar.
" Amanpour did manage to catch Mugabe off balance in some parts of the
interview, most notably on the question of his victimisation of Roy Bennett.
The 85 year old leader seemed flustered and could hardly get his words out
when asked to clarify the charges facing the MDC Deputy Minister of
Agricultural appointee. He responded: "Charged with -- with having, you
know, tried to put -- I think he was found responsible for -- that's the
allegation. The allegation is that he's responsible for organizing arms of
war against Zimbabwe. ... and -- and -- and that this -- these are the
charges that are being made on the face of them." Strangely Amanpour
followed up by saying: "Well, we'll obviously have to ask him about that.
Mr. Mugabe, that's certainly the first I'm hearing of it, and we will,
obviously, put that to them." Rashweat Mukundu, the programmes manager for
the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Regional Secretariat, wrote:
"Amanpour stated clearly that her Rhodesian journalists friends, some of
them ex-Rhodesian soldiers, really enjoyed the first ten years of Mugabe's
rule. In those ten years, Mugabe presided over the massacre of thousands of
Ndebeles who happened to support an opposition party and belong to an ethnic
group other than his. It is, therefore, wrong for CNN to say Zimbabwe's
crisis is a post-2000 phenomenon and only so because Mugabe started grabbing
farms from white farmers." Writing for the New Zimbabwe website, Mukundu
said: "Amanpour thus sunk into a familiar tune that Mugabe was well prepared
for, giving a full lecture of history which Amanpour was, again, unprepared
for. Statistics are there all over the internet on how Mugabe's government
abused donor funds and resettled farmers sank more into poverty. Mugabe's
views were never seriously challenged." Other observers say that for an
85 year old, Mugabe looked young, fresh and was alert, although as usual he
lacked any sense of remorse. His stance throughout was to deny everything
and he refused to accept any responsibility for his actions. Once again
he rejected the fact that his disastrous policies resulted in the
destruction of the country's economy and blamed the crisis on targeted
sanctions imposed by western countries and, of course, on another of his
favourites, the drought.
He refused to say if he was going to stand
in the next election and denied any knowledge of the fact that up to 4
million Zimbabweans had left the country, a third of the
population.
He also denied losing in last year's election and that white
farmers were being hounded out of the country. But then he contradicted
himself by saying they were being deliberately hounded off the land because
'historically they had a debt to pay' and he described white Zimbabweans as
'citizens by colonisation'.
When it came to the question on the
effect of the land grab on black farm workers he made it sound as though
they had three options - to stay on the farm under the new owner, be
repatriated to their land of origin, or be resettled by the government. As
all Zimbabweans know, the farm workers have been some of the most brutalised
people in Zimbabwe and most are now completely destitute and on the edge of
starvation.
A Facebooker concluded: "After it's all said and done, Mugabe
said himself that only God can remove him and I think that is what's going
to happen. Only thing is he's going to wish he had stepped down voluntarily
coz when the Almighty brings you down....ehe!"
Mixed reactions
over CNN interview with Mugabe 25 September 2009 By Violet
Gonda
There have been mixed reactions to CNN's interview with Robert
Mugabe on Thursday. This was Mugabe's first interview with a foreign news
agency for at least five years. Some observers thought interviewer
Christiane Amanpour missed a few tricks and failed to push the Zimbabwean
leader on several of his answers.
In some cases it appeared her
producers had not fully researched the facts of the situation in Zimbabwe.
For example she thought Operation Murambatsvina was the forced removal of
farm workers, which gave Mugabe an opportunity to correct her.
But
for many Zimbabweans in the Diaspora and at home, this was a rare
opportunity to see a glimpse of Mugabe in a different setting, after years
of unchallenged interviews by the state controlled media.
People
posted varying views on the social networking site Facebook, with one angry
Zimbabwean writing: "Christiane's interview with Mugabe was so badly
researched, it's shocking. She went into that interview armed with nothing
more than hearsay, old rehashed accusations about Mugabe that he learnt to
easily fob off years ago... There was so much Christiane could have asked.
Yet, she pressed on with the line of enquiry preferred by western
journalists, a line that allows Mugabe to cast himself as the liberator of
black people."
But another Zimbabwean wrote: "I did not see any
winner in it. Zimbabweans should not be led in their know-how about Zimbabwe
by a CNN interview. A man who claims there is enough food in Zimbabwe is
just not normal and no matter (how) eloquent - he is still a liar.
" Amanpour did manage to catch Mugabe off balance in some parts of the
interview, most notably on the question of his victimisation of Roy Bennett.
The 85 year old leader seemed flustered and could hardly get his words out
when asked to clarify the charges facing the MDC Deputy Minister of
Agricultural appointee. He responded: "Charged with -- with having, you
know, tried to put -- I think he was found responsible for -- that's the
allegation. The allegation is that he's responsible for organizing arms of
war against Zimbabwe. ... and -- and -- and that this -- these are the
charges that are being made on the face of them." Strangely Amanpour
followed up by saying: "Well, we'll obviously have to ask him about that.
Mr. Mugabe, that's certainly the first I'm hearing of it, and we will,
obviously, put that to them." Rashweat Mukundu, the programmes manager for
the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Regional Secretariat, wrote:
"Amanpour stated clearly that her Rhodesian journalists friends, some of
them ex-Rhodesian soldiers, really enjoyed the first ten years of Mugabe's
rule. In those ten years, Mugabe presided over the massacre of thousands of
Ndebeles who happened to support an opposition party and belong to an ethnic
group other than his. It is, therefore, wrong for CNN to say Zimbabwe's
crisis is a post-2000 phenomenon and only so because Mugabe started grabbing
farms from white farmers." Writing for the New Zimbabwe website, Mukundu
said: "Amanpour thus sunk into a familiar tune that Mugabe was well prepared
for, giving a full lecture of history which Amanpour was, again, unprepared
for. Statistics are there all over the internet on how Mugabe's government
abused donor funds and resettled farmers sank more into poverty. Mugabe's
views were never seriously challenged." Other observers say that for an
85 year old, Mugabe looked young, fresh and was alert, although as usual he
lacked any sense of remorse. His stance throughout was to deny everything
and he refused to accept any responsibility for his actions. Once again
he rejected the fact that his disastrous policies resulted in the
destruction of the country's economy and blamed the crisis on targeted
sanctions imposed by western countries and, of course, on another of his
favourites, the drought.
He refused to say if he was going to stand
in the next election and denied any knowledge of the fact that up to 4
million Zimbabweans had left the country, a third of the
population.
He also denied losing in last year's election and that white
farmers were being hounded out of the country. But then he contradicted
himself by saying they were being deliberately hounded off the land because
'historically they had a debt to pay' and he described white Zimbabweans as
'citizens by colonisation'.
When it came to the question on the
effect of the land grab on black farm workers he made it sound as though
they had three options - to stay on the farm under the new owner, be
repatriated to their land of origin, or be resettled by the government. As
all Zimbabweans know, the farm workers have been some of the most brutalised
people in Zimbabwe and most are now completely destitute and on the edge of
starvation.
A Facebooker concluded: "After it's all said and done, Mugabe
said himself that only God can remove him and I think that is what's going
to happen. Only thing is he's going to wish he had stepped down voluntarily
coz when the Almighty brings you down....ehe!"
Robert Mugabe has built up a secret farming empire
from land seized from at least five white-owned businesses, a Daily Telegraph
investigation has found.
By Peta Thornycroft in Harare and Sebastien Berger
Published: 5:59PM BST 25 Sep 2009
Violent land seizures began in Zimbabwe in 2000 carried out by so-
called "war veterans" (pictured)Photo:
AFP/GETTY
The discovery of the 10,000-acre holding worth £2
million is the first evidence of how he personally benefited from the land
seizures programme which started in 2000.
More than 4,000 commercial farmers had their land
taken in the drive that destroyed Zimbabwe's agriculture industry, the bedrock
of the economy.
The country, now being guided by a power-sharing deal
struck last year between Mr Mugabe and his rival Morgan Tsvangirai, desperately
needs to rebuild its shattered economy.
But Mr Mugabe's private farming empire is an obstacle
to resurrecting commercial agriculture, according to experts. They say an audit
of land ownership as part of essential structural reforms would expose the
president's controversial control of the 10,000-acre area.
The Daily Telegraph located Mr Mugabe's private
empire in the Darwendale area, near Mr Mugabe's tribal home, about 30 miles west
of the capital Harare.
It is made up of six farms, including five properties
seized from white owners over the years.
Violent land seizures began in Zimbabwe in 2000
carried out by so- called "war veterans" who fought against Ian Smith's
white-ruled Rhodesia before independence from Britain in 1980. A parallel
official process to take legal ownership of the white-owned land began the
following year.
The 1,100-acre Highfield farm near Mr Mugabe's tribal
home was bought commercially but five others were seized from their white
owners.
Three were owned by the Skea family – Cressydale,
John O'Groat, and Tankatara – who were forced out between 2000 and 2002 and have
emigrated to Australia and New Zealand. The owners of the other two farms –
Clifford and Cressydale 2 – were forced out in 2006 and 2008.
Leo Skea, who used to grow proteas and other crops at
John O'Groat, said: "We arrived back from Europe in July 2002 to a farm overrun
with war vets and we made the decision to leave as we could feel ourselves
getting back on the treadmill to who knows where."
According to staff, the five seized farms were
initially run by the government's Agricultural Rural Development Authority
(ARDA), which poured in millions of pounds of Zimbabwean taxpayers' money.
One long-serving worker recalled the frightening days
when the farm invasions began in 2000.
"First the president bought Highfield. Hordes of
people were brought into another farm in open trucks and gathered all the
workers, and told them it now belongs to ARDA," he said. "Those who didn't want
to work for ARDA were beaten up and told to leave the farm, and the invaders
started staying in the houses."
Workers said ARDA's role was reduced in 2006 and a
small group of "war veterans" occupying some of the land were also asked to
leave to make way for Mr Mugabe.
One of the war veterans, wearing faded blue overalls
and shoes made from car tyres said Mr Mugabe had made sacrifices for the freedom
of Zimbabwe, including a decade in jail, and deserved to have the land which now
makes up his estate. He said: "He is our hero."
On several visits to the estate by The Daily
Telegraph it was clear that the six farms were now being operated as a single
business.
Workers said they were now employed either by Mr
Mugabe or "Gushungo", his family name, which is also the new name for the
estate.
"We were told the farms belong to the president,"
said the worker, who cannot be named for his own safety, or the farm on which he
lives identified.
The appropriation of the farms by the president has
not been officially confirmed. Earlier this year, this year the state-
controlled Herald newspaper referred to Highfield as "the president's farm" but
there was no mention of the neighbouring land.
The total estate now stretches over 10,000 acres on
the edge of Lake Robertson including homesteads, managers' cottages, workers'
houses, huge barns, sheds, workshops and 19 recently-acquired portable rotating
irrigation systems known as centre pivots which cost about £80,000 each.
The estate is valued at about £2 million and Mr
Mugabe visits every three months or so according to workers and some residents
of Norton, a small town nearby.
They said his 14-vehicle motorcade, which normally
includes an ambulance, would sweep along the dusty dirt roads of the area.
Staff say that Mr Mugabe grows maize, rice, wheat,
different sorghums, and sweet potatoes, and has a herd of Brahmin cattle, goats,
plus five camels. According to the official press, the Libyan leader Muammar
Gaddafi presented Mr Mugabe with some camels early this decade.
Under Zimbabwe's state cereal trading monopoly, Mr
Mugabe will have had to sell his produce to the Grain Marketing Board, which
distributes it within the country. The monopoly was abolished under the unity
government earlier this year, but it is not yet time for the next harvest.
The lush lands of Mr Mugabe's estate contrast sharply
with former white-owned land in much of the country.
Zimbabwe's white commercial farmers, and the tens of
thousands of employees they supported, used to produce exports which earned 40
per cent of the country's foreign currency. But now satellite images indicate
that less than 20 per cent of the 20 million acres that were seized are in use.
The white farmers' demise – and the distribution of
their farms to cronies of Mr Mugabe's Zanu-PF party – triggered the catastrophic
decline of the economy which has seen millions of people needing food aid.
A crucial clause in the political agreement signed
between Zanu-PF and Mr Tsvangirai's MDC party a year ago demands a land audit as
a preliminary step to rebuilding agriculture.
Brian Raftopoulous, a top Zimbabwean political
scientist, said: "This is part of Zanu PF's rapid accumulation of property since
2000 and explains in particular the deep relationship between Zanu-PF's
unwillingness to accede to a free and fair election, and its increasing control
of the land.
"A land audit would expose the deep levels of
corruption of public resources over the last decade, a very real blockage in the
political agreement."
Mr Mugabe even argued as part of his justification
for seizing farms that no one should have more than one farm.
Trevor Gifford, past president of the Commercial
Farmers Union, said that as the properties were originally six different title
deeds, Mr Mugabe was "breaking his own rules".
"None of owners of the five farms have been paid any
compensation for them, which they should be according to the law," he said.
With the workings of the inclusive government still
difficult, an MDC spokesman said that the party leader and prime minister Morgan
Tsvangirai would not want to be "discourteous" by commenting on Mr Mugabe's
personal affairs at this stage.
But Vincent Gwaradzimba, the MDC secretary for lands
and agriculture said: "A land audit would expose that he (Mr Mugabe) has
multiple farms, so one way to avoid a land audit is to make sure there is no
full implementation of the political agreement. The land reform exercise was
meant for the few, senior members of Zanu PF, and they have taken most of the
good land for themselves."
The Daily Telegraph has asked Mr Mugabe whether he
has received licences for the five seized farms but has not received a response.
No response has been received to requests for comment
from Mr Mugabe's office, his spokesman, the agriculture ministry, or the central
bank.
Harare/Johannesburg - Over 66,000
farmworkers in Zimbabwe have been made homeless since February and are
fighting for survival following a new spate of invasions of white-owned
farms, a farm union said Friday.
The report by the General Agriculture
and Plantation Workers Union of Zimbabwe (GAPWUZ) claimed the farm's new
owners had hired the police to force farmworkers and their families off the
land.
Most of the workers were living rough, by the roadside or in the
mountains where they had set up squatter camps, GAPWUZ said in a report
entitled Fresh Invasions and Challenges Faced by Farmworkers in Zimbabwe
that it presented to Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai this week.
The
report expressed concerns for the health of the labourers, most of whom come
from neighbouring Mozambique, Malawi and Zambia, saying they were forced to
walk long distances to find water and that they were drinking from rivers
contaminated with animal fecal matter.
GAPWUZ said the workers had been
laid off by the new farmers - mostly military officials and/or members of
President Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party - because they were seen as loyal to
their previous white bosses and because the new farmers were not engaged in
productive farming.
'Farmworkers have been turned into nomads,' the
report said.
The labourers, some of whom had been beaten by police, had
no access to medical assistance in the squatter camps, which were regularly
raided by the authorities, the report said.
Last year, GAPWUZ
estimated that 350,000 black farmworkers had been displaced by the
redistribution of farms to new black farmers since 2000.
In recent weeks,
evictions have been taking place 'almost daily,' the group said in a claim
that tallies with reports from the around 400 white farmers left on the
land, who have reported an increase in farm invasions in recent
weeks.
Several foreign newspapers reported over the past week that
the Land Ministry, which is controlled by Zanu-PF, had recommended to
cabinet that all remaining white farmers be expropriated.
The new
farmers have been given 'offer letters' from the government, which they say
entitles them to the land.
Mugabe defended his brand of land reform again
on Thursday, telling CNN in New York it was the 'best thing could have ever
have happened to an African country.'
An official from Tsvangirai's
office, Abisha Nyanguwo, said a government team would 'be on the ground from
next week to get to the root of the problem.'
Robert Mugabe always argued that his land
seizures would liberate Zimbabweans from poverty, but those who work on his
farms say they were better off under their former bosses.
By Peta
Thornycroft in Harare Published: 5:50PM BST 25 Sep 2009
Misheck -
whose real name cannot be disclosed for fear of reprisals - grew up on one
of the farms on Mr Mugabe's estate and his two children were born and are
schooled there.
"The farm managers are cruel. The new one doesn't let us
go into the fields after the combines have been in to pick what's left,
wheat seeds, potatoes, sweet potatoes," he said.
"The previous
farmers gave continuity and used the farm properly, and we got bonuses after
a good harvest. He also listened to our personal problems. Getting a loan
now is a thing of the past," he said.
After the farms were invaded, he
said, "they stopped workers from doing anything on the farm if they were
suspected of loyalty to the previous owner, or connected to MDC. They would
harass and beat people."
Later rumours circulated that the farms had been
taken for the president.
"First we were told we would be working for
ARDA, then later we were told the farms belong to the president. Some were
told by [agriculture minister] Joseph [Made], some were told by
management.
"Some who had been working for ARDA were upset because by
moving to Gushungo, [Mr Mugabe's company] they would lose their pensions."
Workers say they are paid minimum wage for the jobs they carry out, which
ranges from £13 to £25 a month. They receive enough maize meal for their
families and recently were also given vegetables, and have free
accommodation. Some of the workers' villages have electricity, while others
do not.
Three Shabanie mine workers were shot and injured by riot
police in Zvishavane on Friday, during a peaceful demonstration over a
salary and ownership dispute with management.
Hundreds more were
injured in a stampede when the heavily armed riot police also fired teargas
at the striking workers. 30 others were arrested and are being detained at
Zvishavane police station.
Tichaona Chivasa, a lawyer representing the
injured victims and those arrested, told SW Radio Africa that over a
thousand mine workers were staging a peaceful sit-in protest when police
opened fire on them and their families just after 7am.
He said the
condition of the three men who had been shot was serious but stable.
Although they had been taken to hospital they were receiving no medical
help. Chivasa said doctors at the district hospital were too afraid to
treat the gunshot victims because of threats from state security
agents.
'The doctors need an incident report from the police to treat the
victims. This document gives government doctors permission to treat gunshot
victims. Obviously this incident has turned political because CIO's are
roaming the hospital and this has instilled fear in the medical staff,'
Chivasa said.
The lawyer named the victims as Alois Zhou, Taurai Zhou and
Simbarashe Mashuku. He said Alois sustained a gunshot wound to the hand
while Taurai and Mashuku suffered leg wounds. Alois is also the chairman of
Zvishavane town council and an MDC councillor.
'These are serious
wounds, permanent wounds as explained to me by the doctors. There was not
the slightest justification or provocation for this attack. These people
were within the mining premises with their children and wives in
solidarity,' he said.
Chivasa, who was himself detained by the police for
four hours at the hospital, accused them of excessive force in dealing with
the demonstrators. The workers had already been on a month long strike as,
according to Chivasa, they had not been paid any salaries for the past nine
months. 'I do not understand why police reacted so heavy-handedly because
there was no need for them to be involved in the first place. What is
worrying is that these people were not in town but within company premises
and peaceful,' he said.
Chivasa added; 'What's shocking now is that
the three victims, complainants in this case, are now being treated as the
accused by the police. They are under police guard as if they've committed
any crime. This is absurd, a clear violation of human rights by the
authorities.'
The MDC meanwhile released a statement denouncing the
police action and called upon the co-Ministers of Home Affairs, Giles
Mutsekwa and Kembo Mohadi, to make urgent investigations into the conduct of
the 'trigger-happy policemen.'
'Today's shooting incident in
Zvishavane is unacceptable in the context of the inclusive government where
the culture and deportment of national security institutions have to reflect
a new culture of respecting human rights and people's freedoms. The MDC is a
party born from the labour movement and we believe in the sanctity of the
working people's right to engage in collective job action,' the statement
said.
Workers at the mine have for years been trying to find out the
status of the mine, since it was taken over by government from Mutumwa
Mawere, who is now in exile in South Africa.
In 2004 Mugabe's regime
placed SMM Holdings (Private) limited under the control of a state appointed
administrator, Arafas Gwarazimba. Defence Minister Emmerson Mnangagwa is
reportedly involved with activities at the mine as are other top government
officials.
The top political hierachy reportedly make a lot of money from
this asbestos mine, but the workers have not received their salaries since
January.
The unprovoked shooting of the demonstrators on Friday comes in
the wake of an arrest of a Kenyan environmental activist in Mutare on
Thursday. Police accused Patrick Ochieng of making 'undesirable political
statements' during a workshop organized by the Zimbabwe Environmental Law
Association (ZELA). Ochieng was being held at the Mutare Central Police
Station as of Thursday night. Reports say he is a director of Ujamaa Center,
an environmental lobbying organisation based in Nairobi.
The workshop
was attended by legislators and environmental conservationists from across
the country. Sources said that during discussions Ochieng criticised the
methods used by the government to exploit the Chiadzwa diamond fields.
MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa has told Newsreel
that Mugabe's defiant statement that he would 'never' remove Reserve Bank
governor Gideon Gono and Attorney General Johannes Tomana 'was nothing new'
and represented the usual intransigence. Responding to questions on Mugabe's
interviews with the Reuters and CNN news agencies Chamisa accused the ZANU
PF leader of sounding like a 'broken record.' He told us Mugabe's message
against targeted sanctions imposed by the west has been the same message
over the last decade and the 85-year old had nothing new to offer the
country.
Chamisa dismissed as 'absolute rubbish' claims by Mugabe that he
appointed Gono and Tomana before the power sharing agreement came into
being. He said Mugabe only became President as a result of the power sharing
agreement and so was bound by its provisions. 'Nothing that was done before
the power sharing deal stands. The fact that he was a president before the
power sharing deal doesn't make him one,' he said.
The Kuwadzana
legislator said attempts to keep Gono and Tomana were consistent with ZANU
PF's desire 'to protect their deadwood'. He said ZANU PF has to realize that
the power sharing deal means the parties to the agreement have to consult
each other on all senior appointments. The dispute over Gono and Tomana and
other outstanding issues are due to be tackled by the SADC
troika.
Reacting to Mugabe's claims that Roy Bennett could only be sworn
in once he has been cleared of the 'criminal charges' he is facing, Chamisa
called this 'absolute hot air'. He said Mugabe's argument 'had no legs to
stand on' as he knew deep down the charges were false and simply meant to
frustrate the MDC.
Commenting on Mugabe's call for targeted sanctions
to be removed Chamisa said the ZANU PF leader was 'clutching at straws,
shadow chasing and shadow boxing'. He said the MDC has always argued that
ZANU PF's 'mantra on sanctions' will never hold and be accepted by the
people of Zimbabwe. 'This message has been played over and over it now
attracts scorn in Zimbabwe,' he said. He added 'if you find yourself
complaining about the same problem for over a decade without any solutions
then you have no business being in government.'
HARARE - Police details from the Law and Order Section
are looking for MDC Director of Security Chris Dhlamini for
questioning.
Dhlamini last month presented a dossier of murdered MDC
victims of violence to the Attorney-General's Office.
The AG's office
has not taken any action on the alleged perpetrators of violence despite the
fact that some of the culprits are known and police reports were
made.
Dhlamini received a call today from an officer from the Law and
Order Section advising him to report at the Harare Central Police Station in
connection with the dossier submitted to the AG's Office.
Last year
Dhlamini and other MDC activists were arrested on trumped-up charges of
banditry charges and spent months in remand prison until his release on bail
in February this year.
HARARE, Sep 24 (IPS) - Primary and
secondary school education in Zimbabwe has "fallen woefully behind" other
southern African countries due to shortages of textbooks and other materials as
well as deteriorating working conditions and resultant low morale for
teachers.
Most affected are girls, who form the majority of children at
primary and secondary schools.
According to a newly published report by
the National Education Advisory Board (NEAB), there is now "a high level of
absenteeism (being) reported, including of school heads".
The 14-member
NEAB was appointed by the Minister of Education, Sports, Arts and Culture, David
Coltart in March to look into problems affecting the education sector and come
up with recommendations. Its chairperson, Dr Isaiah Shumba, is a former deputy
minister of education.
"Parents and pupils had deserted schools because
of the lack of teachers. Teachers were reported to be poorly motivated and
afraid. They were neglecting their professional duties most of the time," reads
the NEAB report, released just days before teachers called off a nationwide
strike over low pay and poor working conditions.
The report says 196,000
children drop out of primary school annually, out of a total primary school
enrolment that stood at just under 2.5 million at the end of 2008. If the
current trend continues, half of these children won't proceed to secondary
school.
"Such a large number of dropouts can prove a politically and
socially destabilising force, particularly given the lack of economic growth and
lack of employment opportunities," reads the NEAB's Rapid Assessment of Primary
and Secondary Education (RAPSE).
Failure to contain the situation could
have "a serious potential for political and social destabilisation", as it
condemns the youths to unskilled and poorly-paid work, if not outright
unemployment.
"The shrinkage of secondary education also raises
concerns," says the RAPSE.
Girls constitute 50.5 percent of the
enrolment at primary and secondary school at present. But enrolment is one
thing, actually getting an education is another.
"(Girls) are often not
at school, (which) renders them even more vulnerable to abuse in various forms,"
the NEAB report says. At school, "girls are often raped by their teachers,
especially headmasters."
Though the report contained no statistics, it
suggested that incidents are most common in the new resettlement areas, where
children have been uprooted from communities which would normally offer them
some protection.
Following land seizures by the government, a number of
schools have been set up, usually in warehouses in former commercial farms, to
cater for the children of the "new farmers".
The water crisis in urban
areas, which has led to the collapse of sewer and reticulation services, is also
impeding education. Girls are often forced to walk long distances looking for
water, exposing them to contact with raw sewage and unsafe drinking water. This
exposes them to diseases, which also affects their participation at school.
The report has proposals that could see school become the focal point
for rural water supply. It says the construction of at least one "borehole for
every rural primary school will assist girls and women who have to collect water
for the household. Girls will then be saved from having to fetch water from
distant areas."
The NEAB urges the Ministry of Education, Sports, Art
and Culture "to undertake some immediate reforms, many of which do not require
additional funding."
Among these reforms, the report proposes "bringing
teachers and communities closer together through a community development
approach to fund raising for the school". The establishment of school fees sub
committees will also ensure that fees are charged in line with the economic
status of parents, encouraging more accountability of fees and bursaries, in
particular recommendations to BEAM.
To ease the shortage of textbooks,
the report says the government should "remove customs duties on raw materials
required for printing text books, and suspend tax on sale of textbooks to enable
schools to acquire textbooks".
"There is a serious shortage of textbooks
in schools at present, making it difficult for quality education to be
achieved."
The report also proposes that primary education should be
free for all pupils, as is the case in some southern Africa countries. Early
this year, the government announced that primary education in rural areas would
be free.
Pupils in urban areas pay 20 U.S. dollars in high-density areas
and $150 in wealthier parts of town. Secondary school pupils are required to pay
between $50 and $200. But while the tuition fees are low, most schools are
charging more than double those amounts in development levies.
It also
proposes that at secondary schools, parents should contribute part of teachers'
salaries. In cases where parents cannot afford this, the state and donors should
subsidise indigent families.
Teachers' unions however view the plan as
scandalous.
"As teachers we are opposed to that," said Raymond Majongwe,
Secretary General of the Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ). "It will
create dual allegiance, where teachers ultimately don’t know who their employer
is. We should go back to a rare ZANU-PF success story, where the government paid
for the education of all children. It would be scandalous to allow a situation
where parents are fleeced of their hard earned cash."
Majongwe supported
the view contained in the report that scholarships should be structured in a way
that benefits girls, and cushion them from dropping out. He said teachers should
be specially trained to cater for girls’ needs.
"At the moment, the
environment at schools favours boys than girls. A lot of these girls come to
schools in numbers, but if you look at the top the girl child is not there. This
has long term effects even on the presence of women in decision-making
positions."
Most girls who fall pregnant at school are expelled and
usually find it to resume after maternity. Majongwe said there was "need to make
sure that those girls that fall pregnant at school should be accommodated."
The U.N. Children's Agency (UNICEF) has partnered with international
donors to inject 70 million U.S. dollars into the education system. The money
would be used to purchase textbooks and "reach every child in Zimbabwe with a
text book within 12 months."
The announcement was made by UNICEF
representative in Zimbabwe, Peter Salama, who also announced that his
organisation was reviving the Basic Education Assistance Module (BEAM) to assist
children with fees.
In the view of Education Minister David Coltart, no
matter how much resources are put at schools, the biggest challenge is to
convince teachers to work under current conditions while negotiations continue.
Coltart got some relief on Sep 19 when the Zimbabwe Teachers Association called
off a three weeks long teachers strike.
Published Date:
25 September 2009 By Jane Fields MUCH has changed in Zimbabwe in the seven
months since Morgan Tsvangirai was sworn in as prime minister. The fuel
queues are gone. Once-empty shop shelves are stocked with goods. You can buy
Marmite Cheese Spread in Spar.
But prices are still high. Teachers went
back to work on Monday after a three-week strike over pay: their paypackets,
worth £95, may be 150 times larger than last year's but the sum barely
covers the bill from the state TelOne phone company, let alone anything
else.
Tariffs are being set high to recoup losses of the last decade.
Discontent is rising. If anyone complains, Mr Tsvangirai gets the
blame.
President Robert Mugabe is cynically using continued EU and US
sanctions on his ZANU-PF elite to foster dissatisfaction with the former
opposition leader.
Official media, still controlled by the
presidential spokesman, has long maintained that "illegal western sanctions"
caused food and drug shortages, hyperinflation and hospital shut-downs. The
message is repeated on every news bulletin, with remarkable
success.
Ask almost any Zimbabwean, from manicurist to university
lecturer, how to repair the economy and he or she will reply: "We need
sanctions lifted."
As Zimbabweans feel the pinch, they're being told that
Mr Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), has
"failed" to get sanctions lifted.
The MDC is being shoehorned into a
defensive position. Which is exactly where ZANU-PF wants it. Mr Mugabe, who
at 85 shows no signs of slowing down, is enjoying himself.
He
welcomed an EU delegation to Harare with open arms this month (though he
later lectured them on Zimbabwean history). Delegates said he was at ease
and relaxed.
His ministers emulate his style. Wildlife operators in
the southern Masvingo area speak of a "friendly" phase of land reform that's
just been launched, this time without the messy militias. The ranchers were
summoned to a meeting with ZANU-PF officials and informed they had "new
partners" who'd been given 25-year leases on their properties.
"The
ministers were all almost jovial," said a businessman. "They know exactly
what they are doing and will not be deterred."
No matter that the
properties are protected by international investment treaties: with his
protégé, the Democratic Republic of Congo president Joseph Kabila, at the
helm of the regional Southern African Development Community, Mr Mugabe can
do just as he likes.
Should anyone back home challenge him, state radio
reminds Zimbabweans once an hour that the president is commander-in-chief of
the defence forces. In the last fortnight, army commanders have made threats
against foreign-based radio stations and NGOs.
Determined not to
suffer another election loss, Mr Mugabe's party is "restructuring". It's a
bloody process: two women were badly injured at the weekend when rival
factions of the ZANU-PF women's league threw chairs at each other in
Harare.
Ominously, former information minister Jonathan Moyo is back on
the scene. The brains behind internationally condemned press laws, Professor
Moyo was dismissed from ZANU-PF in 2005 after plotting against Joyce Mujuru,
Mr Mugabe's choice of vice-president.
After penning vitriolic
anti-MDC pieces, his application to rejoin the party should succeed. ZANU-PF
secretary for administration, Didymus Mutasa calls him an "important
asset".
The MDC's victories are being overturned. Though a government
committee ruled in July the banned Daily News could apply for an operating
licence, the newspaper is still not on the streets: Mr Mugabe is stalling
the appointments of media commissioners who will issue the licences.
Meanwhile, the ZANU-PF-controlled Zimpapers group is bringing out new
titles.
With reports of intimidation of MDC supporters in rural areas, Mr
Tsvangirai is frustrated. "We in the MDC have shown respect, conciliation
and understanding to ZANU-PF and what have we got in return? Nothing," he
told his supporters this month.
He's asked them to decide whether he
should stay in the coalition. Few believe he will pull out. A snap election
would be held under the current Lancaster House constitution, which gives Mr
Mugabe unfettered powers.
A commentator recently likened the
power-sharing government to an attempt to keep a lion pride co-existing with
a family of zebras during a drought.
As ordinary Zimbabweans try to
stretch their 'Obamas' - local slang for US dollars - they're wondering when
the lions will pounce.
. Jane Fields has reported from Zimbabwe for The
Scotsman since 2001.
Chinhoyi -September 25, 2009
- Zimbabwe's new black farmers, who in the past have depended on free
handouts, are now finding it difficult to survive, as government is no
longer able to assist them.
The new unity government
says it is broke and is failing to pay its civil servants decent salaries.
Donors have shunned away, demanding an improvement in the implementation of
the Global Political Agreement (GPA), which brought about the new government
in February.
Givemore Marigachando, a farmer in Banket, says he is
no longer able to continue with his farming activities without the free
handouts.
''I used to get a monthly allocation of 2 500 liters of
diesel and I had an open market for that as I used to sell to transporters,
but now I am failing to get seed maize as well as the loans from banks,'' he
says.
Marigachando, used to get free diesel even if he did not own
a vehicle.
His 60-hectare plot near Banket farming town in
Mashonaland West province, now lies idle in a country, which is battling to
feed its people and relying on donors. In the past weeks,
Marigachando has been queuing at Agribank for hours, trying his luck on a
loan. Armed with a torn khaki envelope with his offer letter signed by
then minister of Agriculture Joseph Made, he recently spent four hours at
Agribank in Chinhoyi town, about 120 kilometers north-west of Harare, trying
to locate a Zanu PF politician to facilitate his loan
application.
He still believes politicians are still influencing
everything.
Dejected, he summons courage to ask a bank teller who
reluctantly tells him that there must be security before he gets a loan
approval. Agribank used to disburse agricultural loans for new farmers,
particularly to Zanu PF youths as well as war veterans.
Marigachando says he has failed to feed his family of four kids and wife and
is begging for food.
''The bank tellers are no longer respecting us
these days'' says Edfan Mutakagura, another past beneficiary of free
handouts.
However a bank teller who spoke to Radio VOP says: ''I
remember some of these youths acquiring seed and fertilizer for winter wheat
for four consecutive seasons but never harvested a bucket full of wheat to
feed the nation." In its un-audited interim results released on
Wednesday, Agribank welcomed the inclusive government that has created the
basis for sound macro economic policies. ''The bank holds
collateral and security against loans and advances to customers in form of
mortgages properties with estimates of fair value of security based of
collateral assessed at the time of borrowing.'' The bank teller says
many of these farmers will find it difficult to survive as they were taken
for a ride and made to believe that farming was not a business.
As Zimbabwean President Robert
Mugabe noted in remarks to the United Nations on Friday, the country while
making some progress against HIV/AIDS faces a major challenge making
antiretroviral drugs available to all of those who need them to live with
HIV.
The Ministry of Health and National Aids Council announced this week
that the drop in HIV prevalence to 13.7% from 15.6% in 2008 and 24.6% in
2003 was due to heightened awareness, showing that state and donor programs
are working.
Frenk Guni, technical director for HIV-Aids with
Management Systems International in Washington, told reporter Sandra Nyaira
of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that celebration is not in order as 13.7% is
too high a level of infection among those 15 and older.
Elsewhere,
health experts have been warning for months of a potential resurgence of
cholera in Zimbabwe, where a major epidemic of the disease claimed more than
4,200 lives through mid-2009. Now nine confirmed new cases of cholera have
been reported in Musikavanhu district of Manicaland province, bringing the
total of new cases there to 21.
Musikavanhu Member of Parliament Prosper
Mutsemayi said Health Ministry officials confirmed the outbreak is cholera,
having concluded earlier that they were only diarrhea.
Communications
Officer Tsitsi Singizi of the United Nations Children's Fund or Unicef, said
she could not provide independent confirmation of the Manicaland cases, but
added that another outbreak is inevitable because much of the country still
lacks clean water.
Harare - Zimbabwe's health system is out of
intensive care but is still wobbly on its feet, the country's health
minister said Friday as he appealed for 1.3 billion dollars in donor funding
to rebuild the health system.
After a battle to stem cholera, a
diarrhoeal disease that killed close to 5,000 people in Zimbabwe last year,
the country's new coalition government is now grappling with an outbreak of
the A H1N1, or so-called swine flu virus.
So far, 27 cases of swine
flu have been confirmed in two provinces east of the capital Harare, out of
631 suspected cases in total, health officials announced Friday in
Harare.
The health department also confirmed five new cases of cholera
out of a total 29 suspected cases, also in the east.
Confirming swine
flu cases is slow because Zimbabwe's laboratories, having suffered a decade
of neglect under President Robert Mugabe's past government, do not meet
World Health Organization standards and samples have to be sent to South
Africa or Zambia for testing.
If we get a little bit of money, we have
laboratories here which can do a good job,' Health Minister Henry Madzorera
told a press conference.
'The health system is no longer in ICU
(intensive care unit) anymore. It is now up and about,' he said.
n
'When we start giving free health (treatment) to the old, the HIV-positive
and pregnant women, then we know we are there,' he added.
When I made up my mind to come to Zimbabwe to start an HIV clinic,
everybody told me: You are naïve – this will never work!
Six years ago my wife Rosy and our youngest son Philipp came to
Harare with me. It was unexpectedly cold here, I knew hardly anybody but I was
convinced that it would work.
Looking back, I have to admit, it was more than naïve. Today’s
coordinators and administrators would have required me to prepare a business
plan before embarking on such a project. In those days a nurse’s salary was
equivalent to 30 USD and six months later, when we opened the new clinic it
already had doubled. Quite a challenge to make a budget - even for an
economist!
But let me go back to the time when it all started. During the
nineties it became evident that the HIV epidemic had disproportionately affected
southern Africa. Yet the price of anti HIV drugs or antiretroviral drugs was
exorbitant compared to resources available. Only when generic drugs became
available, it was possible to develop strategies for a rollout of ARV’s in the
domain of public health care. However, experience with HIV treatment was still
limited in this part of the world. That’s where I felt I could contribute by
sharing my knowledge and experience which I had acquired over the past years.
And that’s how the idea was born to open an HIV clinic here in
Harare. In October 2003 we recruited six nurses, a laboratory scientist and a
receptionist; in February 2004 they underwent a training course in the medical
management of HIV patients and before we knew it, patients started to flock into
Connaught Clinic which became a rapid learning experience for the nurses.
Connaught Clinic was conceived to be a nurse led clinic because of the serious
shortage of medical doctors. It seemed a natural thing to do since nurses would
be supervised by a doctor.
From the onset we sought to reach out to the very poor and
marginalized communities who lacked access to the newly started national ARV
programme. This became possible through networking with partner organisations in
the field, especially the Dominican Missionary Sisters. We defined criteria by
which patients would be admitted into a programme of free care. The criteria
focused on widows with children, parents and caregivers of children, teachers,
nurses and students.
We used to call it an “orphan prevention programme”. What I had not
expected was that many mothers and caregivers came to the clinic with their
children on the back and it soon became evident that they needed care as
well.
What started as an outpatient clinic for adults was soon populated
with children, many of whom were so sick, they couldn’t sit. To watch them
recover under the care of our nurses – sometimes within a few weeks – is one of
the highlights that we are privileged to observe regularly at Newlands
Clinic.
The issue of treating babies and small children with ARV’s scared me
probably more than it did our nurses. I had simply no experience with treating
babies and small children.
In November 2004 a friend of mine who is a paediatrician at the
University Hospital in Basel, Switzerland came to our help. He offered us a two
week crash course in HIV management of children and soon after we were able to
administer ARV’s to babies and children. It wasn’t easy then because there were
no generic pediatric formulations available. We learned how to grind tablets,
weigh the correct amount of drug and fill it into capsules to ensure that the
dosage was appropriate for children. During the following two years my wife
produced thousands of capsules for children until generic pediatric formulations
became available.
Now that we were treating both adults and children it seemed only
natural to develop the concept of a family centred clinic where all members of a
family, who were HIV positive, would be admitted into our free
programme.
Alongside with the growth of the clinic went a development of an
in-house laboratory. Treating patients with ARV’s without the back up of a
laboratory can expose them to serious side effects putting them at high risk.
Checking the laboratory response to ARV’s in a country with restricted resources
is frequently considered a luxury, but in all seriousness, do we consider
sterile instruments or procedures in surgery a luxury? There was a time when a
CD4 count, which is a measure of the functionality of the immune system or a
viral load which indicates if a treatment is successful or failing, were
considered a luxury because they were far more expensive than a year’s worth of
ARV’s.
But technology has advanced and in the past few years the cost of a
CD4 count has gone down to 2 USD and a viral load costs approximately 10 USD.
Together, this is roughly the cost of one month of
ARV’s.
As the number of patients continued to increase we realized that the
capacity of six consultation rooms which we had in Connaught Clinic would soon
be exhausted and during 2006 we were no longer able to accept new patients.
Having said that, I would like you to imagine for a moment how you would feel if
you were in charge and had the responsibility of rejecting a mother of two
children, knowing very well that her chances of survival would be bleak and two
orphans would be left behind.
Therefore, it became imperative to increase our capacity and that
meant we had to build a new clinic. With the support of several major donors,
including our neighbour, the Royal Netherlands Embassy across the street, we
were able to buy this property here and then a rather complex process of
planning, permission seeking and later construction began. It happened during a
period when workers salaries seemed to double every other month, cement became
unavailable and most of the construction material had to be imported from South
Africa.
In June of last year we were able to move from Connaught Clinic into
the new clinic, which we called Newlands Clinic. It was at a time when none of
us felt like celebrating and that is the reason why we invited you
today.
An opening ceremony is an occasion to express thanks for the support
we received during the planning and construction phase. Without the steadfast
resolve of Richard Beattie, our architect, we would probably still be in the
planning stage. I would like to thank him, as well as the company Elevate
Construction and the many sub-contractors who actually did make it
happen!
It is also a unique opportunity to thank our staff. Some of you have
built the team in 2004; many more have joined us later. It has been a
magnificent experience to see the team grow, interact with each other, to learn
and provide comprehensive care to so many children and adults. What you don’t
see today is how they interact with their patients. It is our philosophy to
practice a patient approach which is born from empathy, coupled with knowledge
and experience thus providing far more than ARV’s. But a philosophy or a mission
statement only comes alive when it is practised. Many of our small and grown up
patients have developed a relationship of confidence and trust with their nurses
and doctors that remind me of the closeness you experience in a family. This is
far more than I had ever hoped for.
But comprehensive care also includes nutritional support for 750
patients and their immediate family members, psychosocial support for those in
the most desperate situations, dental care and physiotherapy for children. We
have a close collaboration with the outreach services of the Dominican
Missionary Sisters and with Maoko ane Tsitsi, a home based care organisation
that looks after our patients where they live.
Two years ago we started an outreach service with a mobile clinic
which provides follow up visits to our patients close to their place of
residence. In several sites our nurses are able to use the facilities of City
Health Department Clinics for which we are very grateful. We hope that in the
near future three instead of one mobile clinic will be able to provide these
services to our patients. Decentralisation will not only reduce the cost of
transport for the patients, the interaction between the City Health nurses and
our nurses may facilitate a knowledge transfer that could be beneficial for both
parties.
All of this became possible through the unwavering support of many
different organisations. Above all, I would like to mention the Ministry of
Health and Child Welfare, the City Health Department, the World Food Programme,
Médecins sans Frontières, the Clinton Foundation, the College of Health Sciences
of the University of Zimbabwe, the Embassies of the Netherlands, Norway, the
United Kingdom and Switzerland. The Swiss Agency for Development and
Collaboration has supported us since 2005 – we and especially our patients are
very grateful for their assistance.
Without the foundation Swiss Aids Care International, Connaught
Clinic and Newlands Clinic would not exist. Today the foundation is represented
by her manager, Mrs. Susann Mäusli and my sincere thanks go to her and the Board
of Trustees and of course to the many donors in Switzerland who have made this
possible.
And then there are some individuals that I would like to mention
specifically: Sister Patricia Walsh of the Dominican Convent here in Harare and
the previous Ambassador of Switzerland to Zimbabwe, Marcel Stutz. Both have
given me invaluable friendship and advice and helped our clinic to transform
problems into challenges and opportunities.
Last but by no way least I would like to add a personal note and
thank my wife and children for their commitment to this project, for enduring
long separations and hectic times. I hope I was able to share my enthusiasm with
you.
Let me conclude with an outlook into the future:
ØBy the end of the year the number of active patients at Newlands
Clinic will be close to 3000, of which one third will be children.
ØOur outreach team will have tripled which will reduce the workload
of our resident nurses and at the same time contribute to the decentralization
of ARV provision.
ØProvided that support will be granted we will start a screening
programme for women to facilitate the early detection of cervical cancer, a
major killer of HIV positive women.
ØIn August we started an intensive theoretical and practical training
programme for nurses from rural and city hospitals in the management of children
and adults with HIV infection. If we can find the necessary financial support we
hope to train at least 50 and maybe more nurses per year. It should enable them
to provide comprehensive care for many HIV positive patients in
Zimbabwe.
Even today I will admit that the idea of starting a clinic in Harare
was naïve. But I do hope that I could convince you that if the time has come,
it’s time to act.
Zimbabwe reported new progress in its fight against
Aids, saying its HIV infection rate has declined to 13.7 percent of youths
and adults, from an estimated 14.1 percent in 2008.
Health
minister Henry Madzorera said the rate was still too high, calling for
concerted efforts to push the rate down into single digits.
"We
have to redouble our efforts and commitment and keep the sense of hope that
indeed one day we will get to the single digit prevalence," Madzorera said,
according to the state-run NewZiana news agency.
The figure
estimates the percentage of people aged 15 to 49 who have HIV.
Zimbabwe is one of the few countries in the world to have recorded a sharp
decline in its HIV prevalence rate, down from a high of 33 percent in
1999.
The drop is attributed to government and donor-backed
prevention campaigns, but also to the nation's economic collapse, which has
made it more difficult for people to maintain multiple sexual
partners.
The country is struggling to care for people with AIDS
because of severe shortages of anti-retroviral drugs. About 60 000 people
receive the drugs, only one-fifth of those who need them.
Madzorera said the government was exploring new strategies to fight the
pandemic, including male circumcision, which has been shown to reduce
infection rates among men.
Just over 1 000 men have been
circumcised under a new campaign, he said. - Sapa-AFP
by Sebastian
Nyamhangambiri Saturday 26 September 2009
HARARE - Zimbabwean
health authorities on Friday reported five cases of cholera and 27 cases of
influenza A H1N1 or swine flu in the southern African nation where health
facilities have collapsed after a decade of economic
recession.
Ministry of Health director of communicable diseases Portia
Munangazira said efforts were underway to combat diseases but conceded that
the country still lacked capacity to contain major outbreaks without outside
help.
"In terms of fighting future outbreaks we are still not quite there
yet but we have started," Munangazira told a press briefing in
Harare.
Addressing the same briefing, health minister Henry Madzorera
said that out of the 631 cases of swine flu that had been reported in the
two provinces of Manicaland and Mashonaland East, 27 had since been
confirmed.
He said the five cases of cholera were from the 29 cases that
had been reported in Chipinge district in Manicaland several weeks
ago.
Madzorera said Zimbabwe has to send samples to laboratories in
neighbouring countries such as Zambia and South Africa for A H1N1 testing
because the country's labs do not meet World Health Organisation
standards.?
But Madzorera also said Zimbabwe's public health system,
which before the collapse of the last decade was one of the best in Africa,
was on the way to recovery.
He said: "The health system is no longer
in ICU (intensive care unit) anymore. It is now up and about. It has
recovered and is recovering everyday .. people are getting treatment and
things are getting better."
Most of Zimbabwe's public hospitals began
operating only seven months ago after formation of a coalition government by
President Robert Mugabe, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and Deputy Premier
Arthur Mutambara.
The power-sharing government has promised to rebuild
Zimbabwe's economy and to restore basic services such as health and
education that had virtually collapsed after years of recession.
But
the administration, which says it needs US$10 billion to revive the economy,
could fail to deliver on its promise unless it is able to unlock financial
support from Western governments that have remained reluctant to provide aid
until they see evidence that Mugabe is committed to genuinely share power
with Tsvangirai. - ZimOnline
Leo and Bev Skea fled to New Zealand
to make new lives for themselves in the face of Mugabe's thugs.
By
Peta Thornycroft in Harare Published: 5:51PM BST 25 Sep 2009
The
couple were debt-free on their 1,600-acre farm, John O'Groat, having bought
in 1996 after the government said it had no interest in acquiring it for
land resettlement.
But when the couple returned from holiday in July 2002
they found their farm overrun with "war veterans" loyal to Mr
Mugabe.
It was two years since the land invasions had begun, and they
quickly decided their was no hope.
They emigrated to New Zealand two
weeks later with only $2000 in their pockets and three months to find jobs
before their visas ran out.
"We were growing flowers, paprika, grass
seed, maize, and had a Brahman-Simmental cattle herd," said Mr Skea. "We had
a general store, abattoir and butchery and a large service station in
Norton."
But they were young enough, in their late 30s, to go to the
other side of the world and begin again.
Other members of their
family from the same farming district, whose land was later taken into Mr
Mugabe's growing estate in the Darwendale district, were invaded a year
earlier, had already paid off their workers and left for Australia as the
scale and violence of the land invasions peaked.
The Skeas were
astonished to learn, after they left, that their profitable protea section
on their home farm had died.
"The irrigation pumps were flooded very soon
after we left, despite them digging holes into the main line they could not
get the water to come out of the pipe," said Mr Skea.
The Skeas are
convinced they made the right move to quit Zimbabwe.
"We had a lot of
fun, and made a bit of money in our last season, but we love our life in New
Zealand," Mr Skea said.
HARARE - UK-based mining firm African
Consolidated Resources Plc (ACR) announced on Friday that the Zimbabwe High
Court had confirmed the company's right of title to claims on the Marange
diamond field.
In a statement, the mining firm said: "Following the
group's success in the Zimbabwe High Court the group remains committed to
dialogue with the Zimbabwe government."
The government seized ACR's
Marange diamond field in October 2006 and allocated the claim to the
state-owned Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation.
The government
moved into the controversial diamond field after thousands of illegal miners
descended on Marange, which ACR had held for some time but apparently
without any production.
A team from the Kimberley Process Certification
System (KPCS) that visited Zimbabwe last June called for a temporary ban on
trade in diamonds from Marange after unearthing gross human rights
violations and other illegal activities at the notorious diamond field
allegedly committed by the army.
Zimbabwe's government deployed the army
at Marange in 2008 to flush out illegal miners and dealers from the diamond
fields. But human rights groups have accused soldiers of using brutal force
to take control of the diamond field and later forcing villagers to
illegally mine the diamonds for resale on the black market for precious
minerals.
However Zimbabwe's army and police have refused to leave
Marange while Harare denies allegations of human rights abuses and says
calls to ban diamonds from the controversial diamond field were unjustified
because Zimbabwe was not involved in a war or armed conflict. -
ZimOnline
Posted: Fri, 25 Sep 2009 16:04:01
+0200 Seven of the 2 513 prisoners who were recently released under the
Presidential Amnesty programme are back in jail after they were re-arrested
for committing various offences ranging from armed robbery, theft and other
miscellaneous offences.
Seven of the 2 513 prisoners who were
recently released under the Presidential Amnesty programme are back in jail
after they were re-arrested for committing various offences ranging from
armed robbery, theft and other miscellaneous offences.
The
re-arresting of the pardoned prisoner exposes the "old habits die hard"
element in them.
Zimbabwe Prison Services Public Relations Officer Ms
Elizabeth Banda said she learnt with surprise and shame the commission of
offences by people whom she believed had learnt and mustered how to blend
well with their respective communities.
Ms. Banda observed that of
the seven men who were nabbed by the police some of the offences they
committed were a result of over-excitement and drunkenness.
At the
time of their release, the former prisoners were advised to approach some
specialised non-governmental organisations which were expected to offer them
advisory services in order for them to perfectly integrate into society as
well as embarking on meaningful income-generating projects.
HARARE, Sept. 24 (Xinhua) -- China was ready to work
with Zimbabwe to further strengthen their friendly relations and cooperation
to bring more benefits to the two peoples, Chinese Ambassador to Zimbabwe
Xin Shunkang announced Thursday.
At a reception celebrating
the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, Xin
said that he would do his best to enhance the friendship between China and
Zimbabwe.
China and Zimbabwe enjoyed a profound friendship that
went back a long way. Their friendship was established by generations of
leaders, he said.
In the 1960s, China strongly supported
the Zimbabwean people in their struggle for national liberation. In the past
29 years since the independence of Zimbabwe and the establishment of
diplomatic relations between the two countries, their friendship had
remained as vigorous as ever, he added.
China valued their
long friendship and viewed Zimbabwe as a trustworthy friend and important
partner, Xin concluded.
On the same occasion, Zimbabwe's Higher
Education Minister Stan Mudenge, who is also acting foreign minister,
applauded China's development during the last 60 years.
He
said Zimbabwe should emulate the example of china that had dynamically
transformed the lives of its people.
"China has modernized from
a semi-rural economy. Now it is one of the biggest economies of the world, "
Mudenge remarked.
"We want to learn from that," he said. "We
thought that through those good examples of opening up to the world, of
using the market principle in the development of their economy, we can also
find some convergence with the international community and
globalization."
A year after the onset
of the largest ever epidemic of cholera in Africa, the European Commissioner for
Development and Humanitarian Aid, Karel De Gucht, has visited EU-funded
humanitarian projects in Zimbabwe.
Touring the Prince Edward Dam Water Works in Chitungwiza, a commuter town
just outside Zimbabwe's capital, Harare, he said: 'We have been providing
humanitarian support consistently over many years in Zimbabwe underlining our
solidarity with the world's most vulnerable people."
More than 98,500 people were infected with the water-borne disease in the
epidemic, which was officially declared over in July. Of those almost 4,300
died, including 170 in Chitungwiza
The European Commission through its Humanitarian Aid department was the
leading international donor during the outbreak, providing funding of €12
million for both prevention and treatment projects. Karel De Gucht stressed: 'By
limiting the next cholera outbreak here, or ideally preventing one altogether,
we are helping to consolidate the conditions for longer term recovery and
development.'
A wide range of projects have been implemented by the Humanitarian Aid
department's partners in Zimbabwe. These have included the rehabilitation and
repair of water systems, support for cholera treatment centres, hygiene
education and the distribution of items such as soap and water purification
tablets.
Daniel Dickinson European Commission Humanitarian Aid department
(ECHO) September 2009
Ian Smillie addresses human
rights, diamonds and the Kimberley Process
From Rapaport News (US), 10 September
By Ian Smillie, Chair,
Diamond Development Initiative
The following address was delivered by
Ian Smillie of the Development Diamond Initiative, during the Rapaport
International Diamond Conference in New York on September 10,
2009
Less than a month ago, the Chair of the Kimberley Process told
an Agence France Presse reporter in Angola that "The Kimberley Process is
not a human rights organization. That is what we have the United Nations
for." Is this true? I suggest that it is not. The issue of human rights and
the diamond industry is not new, and it cannot be divorced from the
Kimberley Process and the effort to halt conflict diamonds. It is worth
reviewing the history of conflict diamonds, because from the very beginning
the Kimberley Process was all about human rights. Let me go through some
not-so-distant history. The war in Angola, much of it fuelled by diamonds:
half a million dead; The wars in DRC, heavily fuelled by diamonds: 3.3
million dead if not more, from direct and indirect causes; Liberia: Charles
Taylor took control of his own country's meager diamond resources and then
fostered a proxy war in Sierra Leone; Sierra Leone: a war characterized by
banditry and horrific brutality, waged primarily against civilians and
fuelled almost entirely by diamonds. 75,000 people or more lost their lives.
Rebel butchery left thousands of women, men and children without hands and
feet, disfigured physically and psychologically for life.
No
human rights issues here? The second paragraph of the KP preamble speaks of
'the devastating impact of conflicts fuelled by the trade in conflict
diamonds on the peace, safety and security of people in affected countries
and the systematic and gross human rights violations that have been
perpetrated in such conflicts.' I start with this because it is important to
remember why the Kimberley Process was created. It was created first and
foremost to end the phenomenon of conflict diamonds, and to prevent it from
returning. Ending conflict diamonds meant ending the conflicts they fuelled
and the human rights horrors that were the sub-text of those conflicts.
Clearly it was all about human rights. That did not need to be spelled out
beyond the KP preamble, because nobody imagined at the time that some
governments, in pursuit of the internal controls required by the Kimberley
Process, would shoot their own citizens to death, and would beat, rape and
rob others. The Kimberley Process also aimed to protect the legitimate
interests of the diamond industry, and the millions of people who depend
upon it for a livelihood, most of them in very poor countries. And it
offered a hope: the hope that diamonds might in these war torn countries be
transformed from a negative to a positive, into something that might provide
revenue and jobs and hope.
The Kimberley Process has accomplished a
lot. The very fact of the KP negotiations helped choke diamond supplies to
rebel movements in Angola and Sierra Leone, and contributed to the end of
hostilities. The KP has the best diamond data base in the world. And the
KPCS is credited by several countries with the growth in legitimate diamond
exports and thus of tax revenue. The Kimberley Process is discussed as a
model for other extractive industries, and as a model of participation and
communication between governments, industry and civil society, all of which
play an active and meaningful role in its management. But there was no
provision in the Kimberley Process to do what all regulators must do. There
was no provision to plug holes, tighten loose bolts and fix the parts that
were not working. A fundamental part of law enforcement is the need to keep
one step ahead of the crooks as they figure out new ways around rules and
regulations. But in the Kimberley Process, there has, from the beginning,
been a prohibition against "opening the document". In practical terms, this
means that while some things can be changed, anything one or two
participants don't like can be blocked by a single veto and a chorus against
reopening the document. This is like saying that there can never be any
additions to the Magna Carta. We will live in the 13th century
forever.
Problems
Despite these handicaps, for a while,
there was optimism. Today, almost seven years on, in my view, the Kimberley
Process is failing badly, and would not rate a four out of ten from any
serious independent observer. Accountability is the primary issue. There is
no KP central authority. Problems are shifted from one internal 'working
group' to another; debates on vital issues drag on for years. There is no
voting in the Kimberley Process. All decisions are reached by 'consensus',
which in the real world means 'general agreement'. But in the KP it means
unanimity. Individual countries can, and frequently do, hold up forward
movement on anything and everything. Nobody takes responsibility for action
or inaction, failure or success; and nobody is held responsible. The KPCS
peer review mechanism, which I helped to design, is a disaster. Some reviews
are thorough and recommendations are heeded. In many cases, however,
recommendations are ignored, and there is little or no
follow-up.
Some reviews are completely bogus. In 2008, a bloated,
nine-member team visited Guinea, a country whose diamond industry is beset
by corruption, weak diamond controls, rotten statistics and almost certain
smuggling. Over the past two years, official Guinean diamond exports have
increased by a staggering 600%. The Kimberley team spent less than two hours
outside the capital city and its report remained unfinished for almost 11
months. This is a parody of effective monitoring, and sadly, it is not the
exception. Angola has obvious human rights problems. Hundreds of thousands
of illicit Congolese diamond diggers have been expelled over the past three
or four years to the accompaniment of serious human rights abuse. Miners are
beaten, robbed, raped and force-marched hundreds of miles. The Kimberley
Process has had nothing to say about this because, 'it is not a human rights
organization.'
Zimbabwe, rife with smuggling and gross
diamond-related human rights abuse, has consumed months of ineffectual
internal KP debate throughout 2009. Let me dwell on this one for a moment,
because it is indicative of so much. Late in 2008, between 80 and 200
illicit diamond miners were killed by the Zimbabwe armed forces. This was
widely reported in the media and by Zimbabwean human rights organizations.
Partnership Africa Canada reported on it in March this year, and Human
Rights Watch issued a report in June. The KP was finally shamed into sending
a review mission. It found evidence of serious non compliance with minimum
KP standards, as well as dramatic human rights abuse. The testimony of some
victims was so poignant that the Liberian team leader left one of the
meetings in tears. The team's interim report recommended, inter alia,
suspension of Zimbabwe from the KPCS, but the suspension recommendation was
quickly denounced by the Kimberley Process Chair who told reporters in
Harare, before the team's report had even been completed, that suspension
would never happen. Under pressure, he has since denied that he ever made
the statement.
It is obvious that regional politics are at work, and
that vetoes are being lined up. Australian diplomats paid quiet visits to
the governments of team members recommending against any action that might
damage the interests of a diamond mining company with Australian connections
in Zimbabwe. For these governments and the others that are currently active
behind the scenes, business and politics trump human rights and the very
purpose of the Kimberley Process. They trump good management; they trump
common sense and decency; and they trump the long-term interest of the
entire diamond industry.
Other cases of flagrant non compliance have
been ignored until they became media scandals: fraud and corruption in
Brazil; Ivoirian conflict diamonds smuggled through neighboring countries.
In two of Africa's largest diamond producers - Angola and DRC - internal
controls are so weak that nobody can be certain where half of the diamonds
really come from. Venezuela has a record of shooting artisanal diamond
miners, but this has never been discussed in the Kimberley Process. In fact,
elaborate measures were taken in 2008 to allow Venezuela to remain a KP
participant - despite its flagrant non-compliance - on the understanding
that it would suspend exports and imports until it had regained control of
its diamond industry. A study by Partnership Africa Canada in May 2009,
corroborated by a BBC team that visited Venezuela in August, found that
Venezuelan diamonds are still being openly mined and openly smuggled. The KP
continues, however, to accept the official Venezuelan position. As a result,
for more than four years, the KP has implicitly sanctioned Venezuelan
diamond smuggling.
The consequence of failure
The cost of
a Kimberley Process collapse would be disastrous for an industry that
benefits so many countries, and for the millions of people in poor countries
who depend, directly and indirectly on it. A criminalized diamond economy
would undoubtedly re-emerge and conflict diamonds could soon follow. The
budget of the UN Peacekeeping Mission in Liberia this year is $561 million,
over $200 million more than the budget of the entire Liberian government.
The UN Peacekeeping operations in Côte d'Ivoire and the DRC have a combined
budget of $1.8 billion between July 2009 and June 2010. The UN spends
billions on peacekeeping, but after seven years the KP cannot get even close
to proper diamond tracking in Angola and the DRC. The KPCS is too important
to fail, and it is too important to too many countries, companies and people
for make-believe. Its problems are not insurmountable. They can be fixed.
They can even be fixed without a major overhaul, but it will require a
degree of honesty, commitment and energy that has so far been
absent.
The solutions are straightforward: the Kimberley Process
requires explicit reference to human rights in the management of diamond
resources. It requires an independent, proactive and efficient body of
expertise that can analyze problems and act quickly to correct them,
applying meaningful sanctions where necessary. It needs an independent
review mechanism. It needs a conflict of interest policy that will recuse
parties with commercial or political interests. It needs a good dose of
transparency. And it needs a voting system instead of a vetoing system. Too
much to ask? Some governments may think so. The industry may think the ideal
is not worth fighting very hard for. But remember where we came from.
Remember the death, destruction and warfare that was fueled by diamonds.
Remember how this industry - whose product is held by so many as a symbol of
love, fidelity and beauty - was tarnished by smuggling, tax evasion, theft
and sanctions busting. And remember that we already have a global agreement
that involves 78 governments, an agreement with a box full of tools that
with some fine-tuning are more than capable of dealing with the issues.
Things can change if governments and the industry really want to turn the
Kimberley Process from the talk shop it has become into the shining example
of responsible management that we thought it would be when we first began to
talk about it ten years ago.
The Combined Harare Residents' Association (CHRA) registers
its objection to the City of Harare's resolution to borrow US$150 000 to
service the water channeling and sewer reticulation pipes. The decision to
object to this resolution is informed by the poor prioritization of service
delivery issues displayed by the City Council in the past. Recently the City
Council has spent over USD300 000 on purchasing 3 luxury vehicles for the
Mayor and two directors. CHRA reiterates that it is not the position of the
Association that the council must not buy vehicles for the Mayor and its
workers. However, the Association makes it categorically clear that it was
unnecessary and an act of extravagant expenditure for the council to buy
such expensive vehicles at a time when service delivery is at its lowest in
the city. The Mayor's car costed USD153 000 while the two Directors' cars
costed USD90 000 each. The Association is of the view that such money could
have been used to service the water and sewer pipes as well as procure water
treatment chemicals. CHRA would like to first be satisfied with how the
Council has used the revenue collected from the residents so far, before the
council decides to borrow from anywhere. CHRA has since written to the Mayor
expressing its objection to this resolution. The Association informs
residents and its members to submit their letters of objection addressed to
the Town Clerk. We however advise our members and residents to approach the
CHRA offices for assistance in this regard. CHRA has since developed a
standardized objection letter which residents and members can complete for
submission to the Town Clerk. CHRA remains steadfast in lobbying for
accountability and transparency in local
governance.
"Pass a law no whites are allowed to farm," said a white
commercial farmer this week, "Then it makes it clear." It's not hard to
understand the white farmer's bitterness, anyone with a white skin in
Zimbabwe, farmer or not, knows very well that the possibility of his or her
being declared a non-citizen at any time is never far away. Accurate
population statistics are a thing of the past in Zimbabwe but I can't
believe there are more than 20-30.000 whites left inside the country but if
Robert Mugabe and his Zanu PF apologists are to be believed, this handful of
people is responsible for every evil under the sun.
Mugabe is at the
UN this week, no doubt loving the opportunity to outdo all his friends in
their anti-imperialist rhetoric. It was Gadaffi's turn earlier in the week
and he ranted on for over an hour; Iran's man was also there with his
holocaust denial and claims that his recent hotly contested election was all
above board and today it will be Mugabe's turn. More of the same, no doubt!
How he loves these opportunities to rub shoulders with world leaders and
play the international statesman! As a foretaste, perhaps, of what he will
say today, Mugabe gave an interview to CNN's Christiane Amanpour yesterday.
She asked him some pretty direct questions but, as usual, Mugabe was in
total denial of the facts; he prefers his own version of reality. When taxed
with the vexed question of sanctions by Amanpour who reminded him that
sanctions were directed only at individuals within his regime, he simply
told her she was wrong. Sanctions had ruined the country's economy and thus
harmed the whole population, he claimed, while at the same time stating that
the country's economy was healthy! On the question of land, Mugabe said,
"The land reform is the best thing that could have happened to an African
country. It has to do with national sovereignty." That old chestnut again!
The problem is that Mugabe has never defined exactly what he means by this
catchall label. What it appears to mean is that he can do exactly as he
likes with 'his' Zimbabwe and 'foreigners' must just keep out -except those
with money to give, of course. And who are these 'foreigners'? Now we come
to the nub of the matter, "Zimbabwe belongs to Zimbabweans, pure and
simple." he said, "White Zimbabweans, even those born in the country with
legal ownership of their land, have a debt to pay. They occupied the land
illegally. They seized the land from our people." And if that wasn't clear
enough, he went on, "They are British settlers - citizens by colonization,
seizing land from original people, the indigenous people of the
country."
When I read those words of his I was reminded of an incident
that happened when I was living in Murehwa. In one of the only racially
motivated incidents I experienced in my twelve years in Murehwa as the only
white person in an all-black town, a complete stranger stepped out into the
road as my vehicle passed, stuck his clenched fist in the air and shouted
"Go back to Britain!" 'How does he know I'm British?" I thought, I could be
any European nationality.' Then it struck me, what that complete stranger
saw was not my nationality but the colour of my skin. If my pigmentation was
white, then I was a foreigner, in the eyes of Mugabe and his followers and
apparently not a part of the 'national sovereignty' that he constantly
refers to.
So, like the white farmer quoted at the beginning of this
Letter, I too wonder why Mugabe doesn't come right out and say clearly that
whites are not and cannot ever be Zimbabweans? My five children were all
born and brought up in Zimbabwe but to Mugabe they are still 'settlers' who,
in his words, 'have a debt to pay'. That nonsensical argument is used to
justify the hideous violence and injustice being meted out not only on white
farmers but also on black farm workers who are caught in the tsunami of land
invasions that rolls across the country. Are they not 'the indigenous people
of the country' to use Mugabe's definition of what it is to be a true
Zimbabwean? The truth is that anyone, black or white who stands in the way
of the bottomless greed and corruption displayed by Mugabe's followers and -
dare I say it - perhaps some newly powerful MDC followers too, is liable to
be beaten or killed and have his property destroyed or stolen. The police
will not lift a hand to defend them, they are too busy invading
farms.
Week by week, we hear of the moral collapse that has engulfed
Mugabe's Zimbabwe. The lack of response from the population at large to
actions that would once be totally unacceptable in African culture is
shocking. A seventy-year old woman is stoned to death by Zanu PF youths for
daring to protest at the mini-murambatsvina being proposed by Harare City
Council against market traders; a man is beaten bloody for wearing a T shirt
saying 'No to the Kariba draft' and forced to don a Zanu PF T shirt and at
the Chiadzwa diamond fields another young man is killed by soldiers anxious
to protect the 'blood diamonds' for greedy army generals. Zimbabwe seems to
have totally lost its moral compass. Even the churches remain strangely
silent about the abuse of basic human rights in the country. As for the MDC,
having 'sat down with the devil' they appear powerless to raise their
collective voice above a whisper to defend anyone from Mugabe's vindictive
spite against all his perceived enemies, be they black or white. We are all
'paying the debt' for our complicity in permitting thirty years of Zanu PF's
tyrannical rule. Yours in the (continuing) struggle PH.