LAGOS, 23 Sep 2002 (IRIN) - Leaders of a three-member Commonwealth committee on
Zimbabwe ended talks in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, on Monday without agreement
on fresh sanctions against President Robert Mugabe.
Australia's John
Howard, South Africa's Thabo Mbeki and Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo were
expected to review sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe in March following
controversial elections - hotly disputed by the opposition and condemned by
foreign observers - which returned Mugabe to power.
"There was a
difference of opinion," Howard said at a press conference held jointly with
Obasanjo and Mbeki.
"We've agreed that it's necessary to continue to try
to engage with President Mugabe in the interests of all the people of Zimbabwe,"
Mbeki was quoted as saying.
The Commonwealth, which unites Britain and
53 of its former colonies, set up the committee at the last summit of the group
in Australia early this year.
Zimbabwe is facing its worst political and
economic crisis since independence in 1980, with Mugabe's policy of seizing
white-owned farms under his land resettlement programme coinciding with a severe
drought affecting most of Southern Africa.
Mugabe had declined an
invitation by the Australian prime minister to attend the Abuja meeting as
"offensive" and an indication he would be facing a "court-martial" at the
talks.
"The meeting is going ahead without Mugabe and will generally
stick to the previous agenda of reviewing the sanctions imposed by the
Commonwealth against the current situation in Zimbabwe," a senior aide to
Obasanjo told IRIN.
A meeting in Abuja late last year brokered by
Obasanjo, in which Britain and Zimbabwe were represented, had agreed a deal
whereby Harare would suspend the land seizures. The British government, as the
former colonial power, was in turn expected to honour its obligations to fund
the land reform process as agreed under the terms of the country's
independence.
But critics of Mugabe accuse him of continuing land
seizures and forceful eviction of white farmers contrary to the
agreement.
Current symbolic sanctions against Zimbabwe by the
Commonwealth, which essentially forbids diplomatic contacts with Harare, are due
to come to an end in March 2003. Diplomatic sources in Abuja said they had
expected the current meeting, in the absence of Mugabe, to prepare grounds for
tougher action that could include outright expulsion by next
year.
IRIN-SA
Tel: +27 11 880-4633
Fax: +27 11
447-5472
Email: IRIN-SA@irin.org.za
September
19, 2002
In Quietly Courting Africa, U.S.
Likes the Dowry: Oil
By JAMES DAO
WASHINGTON,
Sept. 18
Africa,
the neglected stepchild of American diplomacy, is rising in strategic
importance to Washington policy makers, and one word sums up the reason:
“oil”.
Africa
already provides about 15 percent of the United States' crude oil imports, but
its share is expected to grow rapidly from new production in West Africa and
construction of a pipeline linking southern Chad to Atlantic ports. Within the next decade, recently discovered
offshore reserves are expected to enable West Africa to outproduce the North
Sea's oil rigs and capture
as
much as 25 percent of America's oil-import market. Though the Persian Gulf will
remain the nation's primary source of imported crude, the new African oil could
reduce dependence on countries like Saudi Arabia, whose relations with the
United States have been strained in the
year
since the Sept. 11 attacks.
"The
key to security of supply is diversity of supply," said Robin West,
chairman of the Petroleum Financing Company, a consulting firm for the
industry. "And I would argue that West Africa in the near to medium term
will be a more important source of oil to international markets than
Russia."
The
Bush administration demonstrated its growing interest in Africa by sending
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell there two weeks ago on a three-nation tour.
President Bush has said he intends to visit early next year. "Energy
from Africa plays an increasingly important role in our energy security," Energy
Secretary Spencer Abraham told the House International Relations Committee in
June.
New
African oil will probably not flow fast enough to compensate for lost Iraqi
production if the United States begins an invasion. In the first half of this
year, the United States imported 110 million barrels of crude oil from Iraq.
But African sources could eventually help soften price shocks during times of
upheaval in the Middle East. African oil has other advantages. Much of it lies
beneath the Atlantic or near the West African coast, which makes it simpler to
transport to the United States than oil from the Persian Gulf or the Caspian
Sea. Moreover, Nigeria is the only sub-Saharan country that belongs to the
Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, which means that much of
Africa's new production will not be constrained by any cartel quotas. Gabon was
an OPEC member but quit in 1995, and Nigeria is considering quitting, a move
that analysts believe would sharply weaken the organization's grip on world
markets. "There is a long-term strategy from the U.S. government to weaken
OPEC's hold on the market," said Roger Diwan, a managing director of the
Petroleum Finance Company, "and one way to do that is to peel off certain
countries."
The
Bush administration has not trumpeted its interest in African oil, partly to
avoid antagonizing its Middle Eastern allies and partly to avoid generating a
perception that it cares only about Africa's resources. But the
administration has intensified its diplomatic activity with several African
governments, sending clear signals that it is paying closer attention.
Secretary
Powell, for example, visited Angola and Gabon, both major oil exporters to the
United States that rarely receive high-ranking American officials. (He was the
first American secretary of state to visit Gabon.) On Monday he addressed the
United Nations on the New Partnership for Africa's Development, a multinational
group seeking to increase investment in the continent. Last Friday, Mr. Bush
met with the leaders of 10 African countries at the
United
Nations, urging them to uphold agreements to end conflicts in Congo and
elsewhere, and requesting their help in the effort against terrorism. The president has also announced plans to visit
Africa early next year, with a possible stop in Nigeria, the largest oil
producer in sub-Saharan Africa and the fifth-largest exporter of oil to the
United States.
"I
think the administration is cognizant that we need to engage across the
board
with Africa," said Representative Edward R. Royce, California Republican
and chairman of African subcommittee of the House International Relations
Committee. "Paying Africa the diplomatic attention it deserves is
important."
The
State Department also plans to reopen a consulate in Equatorial Guinea that was
closed for budgetary reasons in the 1990's. American oil companies have been
expanding operations there to take advantage of recently discovered offshore
reserves.
During his visit to Angola, Secretary Powell broke ground for an embassy
building in Luanda, where American diplomats have been working for years in
temporary buildings known as the Trailer Park. "This has been the end of
the food chain for many years," Secretary Powell told embassy employees
during the ground breaking. "But we're here to stay."
There
has also been discussion in Congress and the Pentagon about increasing
military exchanges with West African countries and perhaps establishing a
military base in the region, possibly on São Tomé, an island nation in the Gulf
of Guinea. In their meetings with African leaders, administration officials
have talked less about oil and more about getting African governments
to end regional conflicts, reduce corruption, protect human rights, improve
schools and expand social services. As an incentive to better government, they
have offered increased American aid through a new program called the Millennium
Challenge
Account. But
administration officials acknowledge that greater stability will
Enhance
oil production and encourage investment and trade. At a time when South
American oil exporters like Venezuela and Colombia are enduring civil war and
unrest, officials say, many African countries
including Angola and Congo have made progress toward resolving long-standing
conflicts.
"Ultimately,
it is the market that determines how many barrels are produced," said a
senior State Department official. "But greater stability and transparency
makes them more efficient sources. If you have petroleum dollars increasing the
health and education of their people, and not flowing into someone's Swiss bank
account, that makes for more efficient
production."
Oil
analysts project that a quarter of all the new, non-Persian Gulf oil that comes
onto the world market over the next five years will come from sub-Saharan
Africa.
"In
the industry, there is a lot of excitement about West Africa," said Daniel
Yergin, chairman of Cambridge Energy Research Associates. "Its politics
may be complex, but the transportation and logistics are easier."
Nigeria
is expected to raise production over 3 million barrels a day by 2007, from 2.2 million now, according to the
Petroleum Finance Company. Angola's daily production is projected to double, to
nearly 2 million barrels. Chad is expected to produce 225,000 barrels a day
once a $3.5 billion pipeline through Cameroon is completed in 2004. Production
in tiny
Equatorial
Guinea is expected nearly to double, to 350,000 barrels a day, within three
years.
Before
the fall of the Soviet Union, the United States viewed Africa mainly as a cold
war battleground. Washington pumped aid into governments that proclaimed
themselves anti Communist and supported Jonas Savimbi's efforts to oust the
pro-Moscow government in Angola.
During
the 1990's, the Clinton administration tried to increase trade and investment
in Africa, while promoting efforts to fight AIDS. But there was not a sense
that the continent was strategically important. Oil is changing that
perception. "The oil stakes in Africa are rising," said J. Stephen
Morrison, director of the Africa program at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies, a Washington-based policy group. "The question
is: to what degree can growth in production be accelerated, and to what degree
is our political posture toward these countries important to the flow of
oil?"
Zim Standard
overthetop-Troubled cops show their colours
By Brian Latham
COPS from several southern African countries last
week proved their
commitment to human rights and democracy by electing as
their leader, the
top cop from a troubled central African
nation.
The move was seen as significant because the police
force in the
troubled central African nation has, over the last two and a
half years,
shown the world interesting new standards in various fields of
police work.
At the same time, the region's top cops signed a
document stating
that: "In the performance of their duties, police officials
shall respect
and protect human dignity and maintain and uphold all human
rights for all
persons. No police officer shall inflict, instigate or
tolerate any act or
other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or
punishment to any person.
They are required to ensure protection of health of
persons in their custody
and secure medical treatment where
needed."
Citizens of the troubled central African country were left
perplexed
by both the election of their top cop and the signing of this
document,
pointing out that there were certain.inconsistencies.
"Of course, much depends on the interpretation of the words in
the
agreement," an official from the More Drink Coming party pointed out.
"What
might be cruel and inhuman to me might be standard procedure down in
the
stinking cells of a certain police station in the city
centre."
Another official pointed out that the word "person" was
also subject
to different meanings. "As with much of the curious legislation
coming out
of parliament these days, we fully expect new laws to define
person as an
individual who supports the ruling Zany party and holds the most
equal of
all comrades in the highest esteem," he said, adding that the new
law would
make over half the population of the troubled central African
country
"non-people".
Meanwhile, people in surrounding countries
showed remarkable
consternation at the election of the troubled central
African nation's top
cop. They pointed out that the move heralded the way for
police inaction in
cases deemed political, not to mention interesting new
interview techniques
that involved blows to the soles of one's feet and an
entrepreneurial
approach to traffic offences.
Still, others
pointed out that all these problems had long existed
throughout the Sad And
Demoralised Community, Sadc, where a police uniform
was a license to make
money and beat civilians at will. In fact, to the west
of the region, there
was one country in particular that had taken violence
to new levels, while in
the east there was one that was so superbly clever
it even managed to fine
motorists for wearing sunglasses.
Meanwhile citizens of the
southernmost country in the region pointed
out that one of their policemen
had recently shot to death five petrol pump
attendants because he didn't like
petrol pump attendants.
All this pointed to the election of the
troubled central African
country's top cop as entirely natural and not to be
unexpected. "In a region
where police brutality and corruption are routine
from south to north and
east to west, it seems sensible to elect to the top
position the one man who
is determined to maintain our high standards," said
a policeman from an
indecisive southern African nation. "We welcome this
brave new development
as it means we can continue on our present path with
impunity."
All policemen who attended the conference vowed to stick
by the letter
of the agreement they signed, just as soon as they managed to
work out what
it meant or found a lawyer willing to interpret confusing
phrases like
'human rights' and 'inhuman treatment.'
Zim Standard
Feature
Never a dull moment in
Zimbabwe
By Chido Makunike
PEOPLE unfamiliar with our
inept political establishment, may think
that the only thing its members
do-apart from bungling their way through
life under the guise of leading
Zimbabwe-is threaten, impoverish and
embarrass us all. While they may do all
these things rather well, they are
also good for a lot of laughs, if one can
momentarily forget the pain and
misery they are causing
us.
Top cop, Augustine Chihuri, decided to attempt to kill
a mosquito with
a machine gun by over-reacting to a newspaper story which
alleged that many
of his fellow cops think he has been too ill for too long
to be effective,
and that he should perhaps begin to think of life beyond
being a policeman.
For reasons that are not at all clear to me, it
was the regime's chief
propagandist, Bee Ess Mafikizolo, renowned for almost
always saying the
wrong thing, who initially responded with an insipid and
typically
over-the-top statement. Then Chihuri himself came out swinging with
a harsh,
long-winded statement denying that he was ill. In what I'm sure was
sheer
coincidence, the reporter was thrown into jail a few days later on
an
"unrelated charge" intended to cool him off.
Now you tell me,
was the reaction likely to salvage the police
commissioner's wounded pride
and reputation, or was it simply likely to get
even more tongues wagging
about why exactly he had become so hot and
bothered?
Long after
he has been enshrined at Heroes Acre, we will remember
President Mugabe not
only for the state he has brought Zimbabwe to, but also
for some major
rhetorical blunders.
One that will haunt him long after he has gone
was his boast of having
"degrees in violence." Another was his reference to
this country as "my
Zimbabwe" during his now famous (or is it infamous)
Johannesburg speech, in
which he solved all of Zimbabwe's many problems
through yet another spirited
attack on his nemesis, British prime minister,
Tony Blair while waxing
lyrical about the soil of Zimbabwe, its roaring lions
and so forth.
His wife, too, has had her fair share of bloopers.
She turned many
people off with her imperious reference to "my people", a few
years ago and
very recently when she used the phrase "cats and dogs" to refer
to the many
rude, misguided Zimbabweans who think her husband a loser. Many
hooted with
laughter and uttered some unprintable words when she famously
said "neniwo
ndiri gandanga", perhaps claiming to be a war veteran, a very
hip and
fashionable claim nowadays in Mr Mugabe's Zimbabwe.
But
the one blunder I will always remember her for, because I howled
with pain as
I spilt hot coffee all over my shirt with incredulity as I
watched her say
it, was when during a TV interview several years ago, she
sweetly quipped: "I
am a born again Christian." In all fairness, the cats
and dogs remark came
after this pious claim, so she could have had a change
of heart about her
religious convictions since the interview.
An expression I have
only recently become acquainted with but whose
sharp irreverence I enjoy is
'chicken hawks' which usually refers to people
too chicken hearted to put
their lives on the line for an ideal and who
instead become extremely
belligerent and hawkish even when there is no
personal cost or danger to
them.
The real veterans of armed conflict never romanticise it
because of
their personal experiences of the hell of war, while the chicken
hawks who
have experienced war only through novels or the movies, like to
pretend to
be the toughest, 'baddest' guys in town.
We have
quite a number of chicken hawks in our present cabinet.
Liberation war
credentials are very important in Mr Mugabe's regime, and are
recalled
whenever the regime has to defend itself against its failure to
govern
successfully but some of the ministers who are not war veterans
become very
self-conscious about it.
While some of his peers were fighting the
Smith regime from
Mozambique, one of the two most prominent chicken hawk
ministers was taking
music and political science lectures in the safety of
sunny, laid back
California but the same minister is now a real rhetorical
hell raiser,
always talking about 'the third Chimurenga' and so forth. Some
people
believe that Zimbabwe's image would not be so bad if he did not
constantly
vomit out so much putrid bile, but with the cockiness derived from
his
recent reappointment to his portfolio by comrade Mugabe, there ain't
no
stoppin' him now!
What disappoints me about him is that
whenever he misfires one of his
frequently thrown rhetorical bombs and 'the
enemy' fires back, hitting him,
he doesn't bravely defend himself from his
safe ministerial bunker but
scurries for cover under the skirts of his
lawyers like the typical chicken
hawk he is.
Perhaps its just as
well he was in California during the liberation
struggle! Given how he shoots
himself in the foot every time he opens his
mouth, he would surely have
crippled himself for life if he had been allowed
to handle an actual
gun.
As the economy continues its free fall under the stewardship
of Mr
Mugabe-the conquering lion of the British empire, rhetorical slayer of
the
Western dragon, president of presidents, mighty spokesman of the
world's
downtrodden, and much feared ruler of 'his' Zimbabwe, crime levels
have
reached unprecedented levels.
Almost everyone has a tale to
tell about some violation of their
property or personal safety. As times get
more desperate, and as people
trust and fear the law enforcement authorities
even less, the criminals are
becoming ever more daring.
But the
cruelest, most humiliating statement about the security
situation in Mr
Mugabe's Zimbabwe was the brazen theft of US$100 000 from
the hotel room of
the minister of the dreaded CIO. Knowing who he was, and
the dire, possibly
fatal consequences of robbing this well guarded (or
perhaps not so well
guarded) top spy of the country, the thieves apparently
stole the money from
right under his nose.
Some rude people have suggested that the CIO
minister was not robbed
at all, but had merely changed the money on the
lucrative black market, but
I trust and fear the minister, and therefore
believe his version of events.
I suspect it was the British who sponsored the
humiliating theft, to test
our readiness for an invasion because they are so
sore about comrade Mugabe'
s principled, heroic stand on the land
issue.
If I am right, we need to pull up our socks. The CIO may
score very
highly in the area of causing great fear amongst innocent
Zimbabweans who
just want to exercise what they mistakenly thought to be
their right to
reject Mr Mugabe for two decades of non-performance, but they
may not be so
fierce against neo-colonialists trying to make fools of
them.
Zimbabwe may be hurtling towards disaster, but there is never
a dull
moment on our way there.
Zim Standard
Families collapse as the 'great trek' continues
9/21/02
Story by By our own staff
AS hordes of people
continue to inundate Harare International Airport
heading for overseas
destinations, especially the United Kingdom and the
United States, the
destruction of the country's social fabric
gathers
momentum.
Bank teller, John Magama, left for the
UK in 2000 and was among the
first hordes to flee the suicidal policies that
President Mugabe has
embarked on in his bid to cling to power. He went with
the intention of
finding any type of job that would earn him a decent living.
Magama is now
working at an old people's home as an aide and he supplements
his income by
doing many other part-time jobs.
Although he
promised to return "soon", news reaching his wife in
Harare's high density
suburb of Mufakose is that Magama is now staying with
a Zimbabwean woman,
Stella, the daughter of a Mrs Rufaro. Their baby is said
to be due anytime
now.
Magama's wife said she has resorted to her "own means" of
survival.
"Although he occasionally sends money, the fact that he is now
staying with
another woman means that he no longer loves me and the family.
Waiting for
him would be a waste of time. As a result, I have resorted to my
own means
of survival." She however, declined to reveal what those "means"
were but
did disclose that she had plans of her own to "fly" to the USA. "A
(male)
friend of mine will be sending me a ticket and I will be off to the
USA. I
will leave the children with my mother."
An uncertain
future now awaits Magama's three children. Magama's case
is just one of many
which have seen Zimbawean families break up as spouses
join the great trek to
the UK, the USA, Canada, Australia and neighbouring
countries. Some couples
which left together have broken up once overseas.
"People have no
choice but to flee the economic terror Mugabe has
unleashed on this country,"
said an emotional Solomon Hungwe of Highfield,
who added that he was making
his own plans to flee to the UK.
The great trek is not confined to
one class. The wife of Gerald Ndura,
a company executive, left for the UK so
that they could have money to build
their dream house. "My wife is a senior
nurse who left for the UK last year.
It was a welcome move because we
desperately need to complete the
construction of our house at Zimre Park. But
I am now worried about the
children as they miss their mother's care. I am
finding it extremely
difficult to care for them on my own," he
said.
Sports administrator, Wilfred Pawadyira, who is the former
director
general of the sports and recreation commission, went to the UK for
the
Manchester Commonwealth Games and never returned home. His family don't
not
even know where he is at the moment.
Life overseas is not
all roses, however. Reports reaching the country
are that some of its sons
and daughters, out of desperation, are engaging in
activities such as
pornography and prostitution in pursuit of the pound.
Gloom and
doom continue to hang over the country as things fall apart
as some families
come under severe strain and others collapse.
Zim Standard
Power cuts cost Byo businesses millions
9/21/02
Story by By Cynthia Mahwite
BULAWAYO-The business
community in Bulawayo has lost millions of
dollars in the last two weeks as a
result of power cuts experienced in the
city, Standard Business has
established.
Bulawayo has been experiencing frequent power
cuts during the day; in
some cases as many as four power cuts are experienced
per day.
Estimates from the Matabeleland Confederation of Zimbabwe
Industries
(CZI) indicates that companies in the production sector are losing
about $7
million each day due to the unscheduled regular ZESA
cuts.
What has irked residents of the city is that the power
failures have
been occurring continuously with no explanation or apologies
from the
bankrupt power utility.
Confederation of Zimbabwe
Industries President, Ken Jerrard, said
power failures have had a negative
impact on production and also affected
the working conditions of many
employees.
Jerrard said most industries in the city have had their
sales and
production highly interrupted and workers were being forced to work
overtime
so as to meet production levels.
"In order to meet
delivery dates some workers have had to work on
weekends which also means
employers have to pay them overtime,"said Jerrard.
A number of
businesses with computer systems without uninterrupted
power supply (UPS)
networks have also been seriously affected by the
unscheduled power
cuts.
Regional Director for ZESA Bulawayo, Sindiso Chimbima, told
Standard
Business that the numerous power failures in the city were a result
of a
technical fault caused by the instability of network protection in
the
electrical cables.
"A big chunk of this network protection
is not operating as expected
and this results in the tripping of the
electricity. We are not
load-shedding but Bulawayo operates a complex network
of electricity feeding
from three sectors and what we are experiencing now is
a technical fault in
the system which has resulted in four cable faults,"
Chimbima said.
He said ZESA was implementing a temporary measure
where all protective
schemes are being recommissioned and a radial network
adopted.
Chimbima dismissed allegations that the power failures
were due to
shortage of foreign currency in the country."These technical
faults are due
to unstable electrical networks and our technicians were out
in full force
rectifying the problems when they occurred," he
said.
The numerous electrical failures in the city come at a time
ZESA
employees are negotiating for a 5% cost of living
adjustment.
"Electrical failures in Bulawayo are not linked to this
collective
bargaining, as the issue is currently being negotiated.We actually
have our
technicians working overtime to fix this current problem," Chimbima
said.
Corpses Detained At Hospital
Zimbabwe Standard
(Harare)
September 23, 2002
Posted to the web September 23,
2002
Vimbai Kandemiri
AS medical institutions fight to stay
afloat in the harsh economic
environment, it has emerged that Harare Central
Hospital now detains corpses
in a desperate effort to force bereaved families
to pay the medical bills
left behind by their departed
Investigations
by The Standard have revealed that the hospital, one of
Zimbabwe's major but
ailing health institutions, demands cash up front
before releasing corpses to
relatives, forcing the cash-strapped among them
to delay the funerals or
abandon the corpses altogether
This has caused untold anguish to the
affected families who have to cope
with the added trauma of letting strangers
bury their relatives
Speaking to The Standard some of the families said
that they had been left
with no option but to settle for a pauper's burial
for their deceased after
failing to cough up the required amount
"My
relative stayed in hospital for some months before he died, leaving
behind a
huge bill. We couldn't meet it and he may have by now had a
pauper's burial,"
said a distraught woman from Mbare
Ishmael Machado of Kuwadzana, whose
sister-in-law died last week said: "They
demanded that we pay $12 000 before
they could give us the deceased for
burial and they warned us that we would
not be allowed to collect the body
if we failed to pay up, so we had to
scrounge around for the money. It was
only after a relative chipped in with
the money that we were able to collect
the body. Sekuru vaadzimai vangu ndivo
vakabhadhara," he said
When The Standard visited Harare Central Hospital
last week, relatives of
deceased persons could be seen running backwards and
forwards between the
accounts office and the parking area, consulting with
family members as they
battled to raise the required amounts
One man
had to get assistance from the social welfare department in the form
of an
affidavit before being allowed to process the papers of a relative
identified
as Tony James
Another family confirmed that they had been asked to pay an
outstanding
hospital bill of $3 652 before they could collect their
relative's body
Another sorrowful looking man whose relative spent only a
night in hospital
also showed The Standard receipt No 427804 for one Shaibi
James
Mortuary attendants confirmed that people were leaving their
relatives'
corpses for as long as a week while trying to source the money
demanded by
the hospitals
Authorities in charge of mortuary
administration are demanding full payment
of bills alleging that relatives
will be difficult to trace once they have
been given the corpses of their
loved ones
In an era in which the country is hard hit by the deadly
HIV/Aids virus,
most patients accumulate huge hospital bills due to their
prolonged stay in
hospital
"The average person cannot afford the hefty
fees charged which sometimes
amount to as much as $100 000 when they have to
also contend with funeral
expenses which are sky rocketing because of the
high death rates," said one
Harare hospital mortuary employee who spoke on
condition of anonymity
At Parirenyatwa hospital, an adult admitted to the
hospital is charged about
$3 000 per night and a child $1 500 whilst Harare
Central Hospital which
caters for the majority of referral cases from remote
clinics and rural
hospitals charges $252,00 per adult per night
These
fees cater for bedding and meals but in most instances, relatives are
asked
to provide the medication which is unavailable at hospital
pharmacies
Ironically, hospitals are on record as complaining that
mortuaries were over
crowded because relatives were failing to claim corpses
on time
Health minister, Dr David Parirenyatwa, said his ministry had not
sanctioned
the detention of corpses
"It is not the ministry's policy
to make relatives of those who have died at
the hospital, pay outstanding
hospital bills before they can collect the
corpse from the mortuary. I am not
aware of this and I am going to find out
from the authorities of these
hospitals since it is a serious issue."
Efforts to obtain comment from the
medical superintendent of Harare Central
Hospital, Dr Chris Tapfumaneyi, were
fruitless as he was said to be
constantly busy
A lady who was at the
reception denied The Standard access to Dr Tapfumaneyi
saying: "It is against
our policy to grant strangers permission to see our
medical staff without
prior arrangement. It's for their safety, we don't
know your motive. What if
you harm him? Go back and make a formal
appointment with him or his
secretary-maybe then you can see him. He is a
very busy man." The lady would
not reveal her identity nor the position she
holds at the hospital.
Daily News
Residents demand explanation on wombs saga
9/23/02 8:19:54 AM (GMT +2)
Staff Reporter
THE
chairman of the Bulawayo United Residents Association, Edward
Simela, has
called on the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare to explain
its position on
claims that Cuban doctors working at Mpilo Central Hospital'
s maternity wing
have been removing the wombs of Bulawayo women without
their
knowledge.
In the last five months alone, the Cuban doctors are
reported to have
surgically removed more than a hundred wombs without the
women's knowledge.
Medical practitioners say under normal
circumstances, a hundred wombs
would be removed in five years and it is
usually only those with cancer or
fibroids which are
removed.
The permanent secretary in the ministry of Health and
Child Welfare,
Elizabeth Xaba, declined to comment while the minister, David
Parirenyatwa,
could not be reached.
Said Xaba: "I cannot comment. I
am in some other country attending to
some business."
Simela
said:"Reports of what is going on at Mpilo appeared in the
newspapers more
than a week ago. If they are not true, the ministry should
deny them and not
just keep quiet.
"If they keep quiet, then we will start asking
questions, such as: why
is this taking place in Bulawayo and not other parts
of the country? People
might end up reading too much into this
issue."
He said it was possible that Bulawayo women were being used
as guinea
pigs in experiments being conducted by the Cubans.
"We
should not just point fingers at the Cuban doctors. Maybe there is
a much
bigger hidden hand which has authorised the use of our women in
some
experiments."
Women who were interviewed more than a week
ago said after delivering
at the hospital's maternity wing, they were
informed by nurses that their
wombs had been removed by the doctors. This
means they won't be able to have
more children
Daily News
Cataract operations in Rusape
9/23/02
8:23:31 AM (GMT +2)
By Columbus Mavhunga
EYES For
Africa will carry out cataract operations at Rusape General
Hospital this
week as it fights a disease which has blinded more than 100
000
Zimbabweans.
Dr Dennis Sibanda, the Eyes for Africa board
secretary, last week said
the organisation was looking forward to operate at
least 100 patients in
Rusape between 27 and 29 September.
"At
each camp we set up, we aim to surpass the 100-mark of
underprivileged people
who are now blind as a result of cataract as they
cannot afford to pay
hospital fees," said Sibanda.
Dr Solomon Guramatunhu of Harare
chairs Eyes for Africa, which is made
up of mainly eye surgeons
(ophthamologists). It was officially launched in
April this year and aims to
remove cataracts from sufferers in Africa.
It has conducted five
cataract operations in Harare (April), Chivhu
(May), Kwekwe (June) and in
Mutare and Binga (July) and more than 500 people
have had their eyesight
restored.
"We plan to go to Bindura in November and Zambia and
Mozambique soon
after that, as we are regional," said Sibanda.
"We feel this is the only way we can assist the underprivileged who
cannot
pay hospital fees."
Cataract affects mainly the elderly, children
and diabetics and often
results in blindness.
"There is no way
yet we can prevent it, but it is reversible through
the operations we are
carrying out," said Sibanda.
"We have between 100 000 and 120 000
people in Zimbabwe with cataracts
and each year the figure
increases."
Church Leaders Charged Again
Zimbabwe Standard
(Harare)
September 23, 2002
Posted to the web September 23,
2002
Cynthia Mahwite
Ten Bulawayo church leaders who were
arrested while praying for their
detained colleague, Father Noel Scott, of
the Anglican church, on the
pavement of the central Police station in
February, are to be charged again
under the infamous Public Order and
Security Act (POSA), it has emerged
The ten-Graham Shaw, Kevin O'Doherty,
Peter Botright, Ron Marillier, Trevor
Leonard, Palany Rojah, Davi Marolong,
Barry Dickenson, John Stakesby Lewis
and his wife Joan- had their charges
earlier dismissed due to the
prosecution's failure to build a case against
them
However, last week, they received fresh summons last week ordering
them to
appear in court on Wednesday. Shaw, who is a pastor with the
Methodist
church, confirmed to The Standard that they were set to face
charges under
POSA
"We have been issued with fresh summons and are
required to appear in court
on 25 September this year," he said
If
convicted of the alleged offence, the church leaders face a maximum
sentence
of 10 years imprisonment or $50 000 fine, or both
A month before the
hotly disputed presidential elections, police using the
discredited POSA,
denied Christians permission to hold a traditional prayer
procession in the
city
Police also arrested Father Scott who was organising the prayer
session and
detained him at the central police station. Worried about his
safety, 10
church leaders from the Catholic, Methodist, Anglican and
Presbyterian
congregations went to the police station but were denied
permission to see
him
They were then arrested while praying for Scott
and charged with
contravening a section of POSA. They were alleged to have
"in concert
unlawfully and intentionally contravened the POSA by blocking the
movement
of traffic in and out of the Bulawayo central charge office and
disturbing
the free movement of the public outside the charge office, thereby
causing
disorder and disturbing the public peace." The church leaders were
arrested
and remanded out of custody but their case was later dismissed in
court
President Mugabe has repeatedly attacked the churches, in
particular the
Catholic Church, accusing its Archbishop Pius Ncube of taking
MDC party
politics to the pulpit
Christians who spoke to The Standard
expressed outrage and disgust at the
charges saying church leaders were being
persecuted
"It seems we no longer have freedom of worship. How can people
be arrested
for praying?" asked a Roman Catholic church member who declined
to give his
name
Others pointed out there was nothing sinister about
Christians holding
prayer meetings in Bulawayo and Mugabe was on a collision
course with church
leaders in the region
"Every year, we hold a major
prayer procession starting at the Catholic
church. After service, the
procession heads to the next church which has
always been the Anglican
Church. This procession is normally attended by
hundreds of people and is
something we do every year, with an escort from
the same ZRP," said another
Christian.
Zim Standard
Smuggling spawns fuel crisis in Vic falls
By
Kumbirai Mafunda
THE resort town of Victoria Falls is facing an
acute shortage of fuel
amid reports that the precious commodity is being
smuggled into neighbouring
Zambia where it is in great demand in nearby
Livingstone town.
A visit by Standard Business to the
border town last week revealed
that cars with Zambian registration were
constantly coming in and out of
Zimbabwe. These vehicles were seen dominating
the winding queues at the town
's two service stations
"After
filling their vehicles' tanks, these guys will then later drain
and resell
the fuel on the black market in their country. Some of them are
going to the
extent of making artificial tanks under their vehicles to
accommodate more
fuel," said one disgruntled Zimbabwean motorist who stays
in the
town.
Some motorists who were interviewed said they were getting a
raw deal
from the Zambians as they were buying scarce fuel in Zim dollars
before
selling it in US dollars in their own country.
A source
in the ministry of energy and power development confirmed
that the new
ministry was aware of the practice.
"The ministry is aware of this
and is deploying a team to investigate
the problem in all border towns. We
are told that some Zambians are getting
the most of our precious commodity,"
the source said.
Philip Chiyangwa, the chairman of the
parliamentary portfolio
committee on foreign affairs, international relations
and trade, said
smuggling of fuel into Zambia had to stop.
"We
have to undertake investigations together with customs officials
and the
police so that these vehicles are impounded. There is no way we can
allow
that to happen," he said.
Zimbabwe has been paralysed by fuel
shortages since 1999 as a result
of foreign currency shortages caused by a
slump in exports and aid cuts by
international financial institutions,
outraged by the Zanu PF government's
self serving policies.
The
fuel crisis is threatening tourism activities in the resort town
of Victoria
Falls which is endowed with rich tourist attractions
whichinclude game
drives, canoeing and boat cruises and the world's
wonder -the falls
themselves.
The imposition of price controls on basic foodstuffs
and other
products has resulted in increased regional demand for Zimbabwean
consumer
goods which are seen as cheap.
The tourist resort of
Victoria Falls is close to Zambia's Livingstone
town where the smuggled fuel
is in demand.
Dear
Readers,
Try and imagine
going through this and being told to "get out". Where on earth do these people
go, they have invested their whole lives on these properties - and what about
all their employees, many of whom have been with these farmers for years and
years. This is indeed a great tragedy.
John
Dear John
When I last wrote I said that the weekend prisoners
had no charges to answer. This was from the prosecutor's point of view. The
cynics said this was because he did not want to lose all the cases in court -
which would not do much for his success rate. The zrp (Police) were a different matter. They refused to release
them as they had not been discharged! In fact this was more about not having
seen them in court, and they evidently felt they were losing face. Much
wrangling and hot words between the defence lawyer, the prosecutor, and the zrp.
Each with his own agenda, but essentially the latter two were at eachother's
throats. Eventually they were released reluctantantly in the late afternoon, but
it was touch and go or they would have spent another night in chookie. Despite
the high spirits I wrote you about, there is no doubt that the experience has
made a deep impression on everyone - both by those who went inside and those who
remained out. In the end it is a matter of the extreme injustice of it all, and
so little with which to defend oneself. The whole community feels intimudated
and defiled.
This is a situation which has now become pervasive
throughout the country. You must have read about the farmer Bezuidenhout who
accidently drove into a squatter and killed him when he fled the mob in his
vehicle. A young white mother spent last night in Triangle jail on a trumped up
charge of crimen injuria. Touch and go or she would have spent another night.
You will recall that GH was severely assaulted ( the first time ) at the ranch a
couple of months ago by a mob of 20 assailants. He is now the one being charged
- with illegally pointing a firearm - which he never did - and is to appear at
short notice. No subpoena or charge sheet have been served on him; he was merely
informed by phone. False evidence by witnesses is the danger. Especially when
there is a biased court. Of course his assailants ( who also stole the rifle )
have had nothing to answer for. Both GH (Peter's son) and I have been
warned by staff that the stated intention is to get whitey every Friday and see
that he spends the weekend locked up, and to first single out those who have not
yet been arrested. Probably just shaking the tree to see who falls out. The
stated intention is to cause harassment until the farmer abandons his land.
Essentially it is all a state-sponsored assault on
whites and their property. Farms for now, but if the regime survives they will
not hesitate to seize urman businesses and homes. Nonetheless, as you have
written before, the land exercise, apart from its perceived benifits to the
plunderer, is a smokescreen to disguise the real goal of permanently taking
control of the population by violence and intimidation. The whites are indeed a
high-profile diversion of attention. Unofficial opinion is that starvation,
assaults, murder and rape on blacks are far worse and widespread than the media
is able to report. We have a classic case of what your friend Jean Franscois
Mercier writes of Africa, where the leaders have blended the corruption example
they have observed in the west and Marxist population manipulation methods to
concoct a heady elixir of profit and suppression in order to remain in power
permanently.
Thank you for all your e-mails; sorry I have taken
time to respond. Not only are they very informative, but I continue to take
great courage from your support.
The Eddie Cross response to the Patrice Lumumba
Coalition group is well put. The inference is very disturbing. Anti-white racism
is obviously deeply entrenched in the Afro-American lobby. I would imagine that
this is a fringe group. Nontheless it would have the ear of many eager listeners
dying to hear of the excesses of a tiny white tyrant group hogging all the best
land in Zim at the expense of the desperately poor and deprived black peasants.
You have been so right when you say that the farm seizures are depicted as a
white problem, with no mention of the plight of the huge labour force and their
extended families, who are in the end the real victims. Robert Hood taking from
the rich and giving it to the poor.
The horse
torture on eviction farms. Yes, I agree this is just a shrewd way of
intimidating westerners, abhorrent as it is. It serves the same kind of purpose
for blacks as the rape camps in Chipinge. I share your enjoyment of Mr Mercier's
thoughts; please keep sending them on. I get an occasional e-mail fom Ralph
Langemann. Very informative when I receive one, and much head-scratching to
compose an adequate reply.
19th September: If I had completed this e-mail
yesterday, I was going to write that we are all O.K. for the present. That has
now changed, of course, as you must have learned from the media. The acquisition
"law" was amended an rushed through parliament yesterday, which effectively
removes all our legal protection. It seems that the a new Sec 8 would also serve
as an eviction order, and give one 7 days to vacate the property. If Bob has not
yet signed it into law, then I suspect he may keep it up his sleeve for his
confrontation next week with the Commonwealth "Troika".
News24
'Troika did not invite Mugabe'
Harare - Zimbabwe's
President Robert Mugabe is not attending a special
Commonwealth meeting in
Nigeria to discuss his country's status with the
body because he was not
officially invited, a newspaper said on Monday.
The state-controlled
Herald quoted unnamed officials at the Commonwealth
headquarters in London as
saying: "President Mugabe is not attending the
meeting because the bottom
line is that he was not invited."
They cited a "diplomatic foul-up" for
the oversight.
Earlier reports said Mugabe had snubbed the meeting and
risked full
suspension from the 57-nation body over alleged human rights and
democratic
abuses in the southern African country.
Monday's "troika"
meeting in Abuja, comprising President Thabo Mbeki, Prime
Minister John
Howard of Australia and Nigeria's President Olusegun Obasanjo
is due to
examine those issues.
"Mr Howard, with the apparent connivance of the
Commonwealth Secretariat in
London, put an unsigned invitation on the
internet," The Herald quoted
diplomats as saying.
Unnamed government
officials told the paper that Howard's unsigned
invitation was "arrogant,
racist, undiplomatic, crude and rude".
'Circus'
Zimbabwe's
information minister, Jonathan Moyo described the troika meeting
as "a
circus".
"John Howard should disabuse himself of the folly that he can
treat Africans
the same way he treats Aborigines," Moyo told The
Herald.
"The whole thing stinks of an orchestrated media event designed
to insult
the president and demonise Zimbabwe at the behest of Britain with
Australia
playing the role of a cheer leader," Moyo added.
The meeting
takes place six months after Zimbabwe was suspended from
Commonwealth
diplomatic committees following reports that a March
presidential poll did
not reflect the will of voters.
The main political opposition in Zimbabwe
claims that electoral violence and
fraud is continuing.
A government
land reform programme that aims to resettle white-owned farms
with new black
farmers is forging ahead despite international warnings it
will aggravate a
famine facing more than half the country's 12 million
people.
The
Zimbabwe government accuses white Commonwealth countries such as
Britain,
Australia, Canada and New Zealand of trying to undermine its
national
sovereignty. - AFP
IOL
Zim courting disaster as Mugabe snubs troika
September 23 2002 at 06:34AM
Abuja, Zimbabwe - Zimbabwe faces the
prospect of greater international
isolation after President Robert Mugabe
refused to attend a meeting of
Commonwealth leaders on
Monday.
Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, South African President
Thabo Mbeki
and Australian Prime Minister John Howard - the Commonwealth
"troika" on
Zimbabwe - are expected to have harsh words about Mugabe's regime
and could
strengthen sanctions on his troubled country.
They are
frustrated that since the 57-nation body suspended Zimbabwe's
membership of
its diplomatic committees in March this year, there has been
no sign that
Mugabe is ready to address concerns about human rights
and
democracy.
Mugabe's domestic opposition still faces oppression and
violence, and a
campaign to forcibly evict white farmers and seize their land
has continued
and gathered pace, despite international
criticism.
'The situation cannot be allowed to continue
indefinitely'
In a further sign of defiance, Mugabe made a last-minute
decision to snub
the three leaders, whose invitation to the Abuja meeting he
had previously
accepted.
"I think it reinforces the fact that he's
indifferent to the views of
Australia, South Africa and Nigeria and that's
relevant in our
considerations," Howard said.
The meeting will,
however, go ahead as planned, and Commonwealth officials
said that the
prospect of tougher sanctions - perhaps a full suspension of
Zimbabwe's
membership - was on the table.
All the delegations were careful, however,
to insist that no decisions had
been taken in advance of the meeting, which
will examine the situation in
Zimbabwe six months after Commonwealth
sanctions were imposed.
"The situation in Zimbabwe is very important. The
situation cannot be
allowed to continue indefinitely," Obasanjo said after a
meeting with Howard
at his official Abuja residence, Aso
Rock.
Obasanjo said the troika was most concerned about the "humanitarian
issues"
arising from Mugabe's policy of throwing white farmers off their land
and
from his handling of a catastrophic drought that has brought millions to
the
brink of starvation.
In Harare, officials were unrepentant, and
claimed that Howard's letter of
invitation to Mugabe had been an
inappropriate message to a head of state.
In a newspaper interview
Jonathan Moyo, Zimbabwe's Minister of State for
Information and Publicity,
derided the meeting as "a monumental waste of
time".
The troika
suspended Zimbabwe's membership of the organisation's ruling
structures in
March after a violent, disputed election and amid a violent
campaign to evict
commercial farmers, mainly whites, and seize their land.
"You've got to
remember what this all goes back to. It goes back to a rorted
(sic) election
and that's what people are concerned about," Howard said,
using an Australian
term for badly fouled up.
"It was a perfectly normal and formal and
courteous invitation."
Under the current suspension, Zimbabwe is barred
from Commonwealth heads of
government meetings and ministerial meetings such
as the foreign ministers'
meeting at the United Nations earlier this
month.
Now it could face full suspension from the body: missing out on
Commonwealth
technical assistance for its development, losing its officials
at the
Commonwealth secretariat and missing the next Commonwealth
Games.
"He wanted to talk about the background to the farm invasions, to
explain
himself," said one Commonwealth official. "But when he saw what we
planned
to talk about he realised that wasn't going to be it." - Sapa-AFP
Business Day
Tougher curb on Zimbabwe ruled
out
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
South
Africa yesterday ruled out tougher measures by the Commonwealth to
curb
political violence and restore the rule of law in Zimbabwe.
The leaders of
South Africa, Nigeria and Australia are meeting today in
Abuja to review the
Commonwealth's approach to the political and economic
crisis in
Zimbabwe.
Earlier this year, the Commonwealth suspended Zimbabwe for a
year after it
judged President Robert Mugabe's bid to extend his 22-year rule
in
presidential elections as neither free nor fair. But Mr Mugabe has
continued
undeterred with a controversial land reform programme and the
repression of
political opposition.
South Africa's President Thabo
Mbeki, Nigeria's Olusegun Obasanjo and John
Howard, Australian prime
minister, are expected to consider today Zimbabwe's
indefinite suspension
from the Commonwealth and setting Mr Mugabe specific
governance
targets.
Australia, alongside the UK, New Zealand and other Pacific
states, have
called for greater isolation of Mugabe's regime in response to
his "total
defiance" of world opinion. They believe stronger condemnation of
seizures
of white-owned farm land and repression of political opposition
needs to be
made, particularly by their African counterparts.
But Aziz
Pahad, deputy foreign minister, said an indefinite suspension or
expulsion
from the organisation were unlikely.
''We are not at a point where
African and Asian countries have reached a
stage where they think (these
options) are a solution to the problem,'' he
said.
South Africa is
widely considered as the country that can do most to assist
in bringing
stability to Zimbabwe and reversing economic collapse. But it
has opposed
public condemnation of Mr Mugabe and sanctions.
President Thabo Mbeki is
expected to argue at the meeting for renewed
efforts to promote stalled
negotiations between the ruling Zanu-PF and the
Opposition Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC).
South Africa's insistence on engagement rather
than increased international
pressure is likely to draw criticism from the
MDC.
''The objective of the leaders of the (Commonwealth) Troika should
be to
pressurise Mugabe to step down so that we can start to create a
framework
which will ensure that a re-run of the presidential election can
take place
under free and fair conditions and under the auspices of
international
observers,'' said Morgan Tsvangirai, the MDC's
leader.
Mugabe will not attend the Abuja meeting. The Zimbabwean leader
"said the
invitation (from Mr Howard) gave the impression that he was going
to be
court-martialled,'' said a Nigerian official.
Financial
Times
Business Day
'Throw the book at Mugabe' says
Leon
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The
Democratic Alliance called for the full suspension of Zimbabwe from
the
Commonwealth.
The DA's statement came as the Commonwealth troika,
comprising President
Thabo Mbeki, Australian Prime Minister John Howard and
President Olusegun
Obasanjo of Nigeria, was meeting in Abuja, Nigeria today
to discuss the
Zimbabwean land crisis.
The Commonwealth Chairperson's
Committee on Zimbabwe should "throw the book"
at President Robert Mugabe, DA
leader Tony Leon said in a statement.
"The troika should instate a full
suspension of Zimbabwe from the
Commonwealth," he said.
Deputy Foreign
Affairs Minister Aziz Pahad said yesterday that the three
leaders needed to
review developments in Zimbabwe after its suspension from
the Commonwealth at
a meeting at Malborough House in London six months ago.
The three would
be joined by the Commonwealth secretary general, Don
McKinnon, although
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe declined Howard's
invitation to
attend.
In his statement, Leon said Mugabe "has done nothing but thumb
his nose at
the Commonwealth and its principles", to which the Zimbabwean
government
committed itself as recently as in the 1991 Harare Commonwealth
Declaration.
Furthermore, at a meeting of the Commonwealth in Abuja just
over a year ago,
the Zimbabwean delegation gave a number of
"assurances".
These included that there would be no further occupations
of farm lands, the
process whereby farms not meeting set criteria were
de-listed would be
accelerated, occupiers of farms that were not designated
would be moved to
legally acquired lands, and the rule of law would be
restored to the process
of land reform.
"Each and every one of these
undertakings has been observed only in the
breach. The Abuja agreement seems
to have as much effect as a sneeze in a
thunderstorm," Leon said.
"It
is clear that the partial one-year suspension has had absolutely no
influence
on the Mugabe regime's rights-delinquent behaviour.
"A stronger message
is called for. Zimbabwe should be completely suspended
from the Commonwealth,
only to be re-admitted once democracy and the rule of
law have been
restored," Leon said.
Other measures that could be considered were
limitation of
government-to-government contacts, people-to-people measures
and trade
restrictions.
Sapa
MSNBC
Commonwealth group split over Zimbabwe
sanctions
ABUJA, Sept. 23 - A three-nation Commonwealth group
ended talks on Monday
split over whether to toughen sanctions on Zimbabwe for
its land policies
and political violence, an official communique
said.
Commonwealth officials said privately the inconclusive talks
in the
Nigerian capital marked a major setback for the group of largely
former
British colonies. The Zimbabwe crisis has driven a wedge between the
group's
poorer African members and their white colleagues.
The
''troika'' of the presidents of South Africa, Nigeria and the
prime minister
of Australia was meeting to review what steps Zimbabwe had
taken to avert
further sanctions after it was suspended from the
Commonwealth in March
following Mugabe's controversial re-election.
The Commonwealth and
Zimbabwe's opposition said those polls were
rigged.
But the troika
failed to reach agreement because of objections from
South African President
Thabo Mbeki and Nigeria's Olusegun Obasanjo, the
communique said.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard, the committee's chairman, was
isolated
in pushing for tougher sanctions.
Mbeki and Obasanjo are longtime
allies of Mugabe.
Diplomats say Mbeki's hands appeared tied by the
uncompromising
opposition of his ruling African National Congress (ANC) to
sanctions
against Mugabe.
''The ANC is due to hold its annual
congress in December and Mbeki
dare not agree to sanctions,'' an African
diplomat said.
''The ANC regards sanctions against Zimbabwe as a white
plot,'' added
the diplomat, asking not to be named.
Both the ANC
and Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF came to power after battling
white minority rule
in their neighbouring states.
''Whilst all members of the troika
strongly believe that efforts to
engage the government of Zimbabwe should
continue, one member, Australia,
supported the full suspension with immediate
effect,'' the committee's
communique said.
Diplomats at the talks
had earlier said the Commonwealth, a 54-nation
group of mainly former British
colonies, was left with little choice but to
toughen the symbolic
sanctions.
Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe boycotted the talks,
with Nigerian
officials saying Mugabe complained of being made to feel he was
going to be
''court martialled.''
MUGABE WINS BREATHING
SPACE
The statement said Nigeria and South Africa wished to see
how
Zimbabwe responded over the next six months to the measures imposed
in
March, ''at which point stronger measures might need to be
considered.''
The troika has the Commonwealth's mandate to recommend
sanctions and
suspension, and could make such a move in March 2003 when
current measures
against Zimbabwe run out.
Full suspension would
cut off Commonwealth development aid at a
critical time for the southern
African nation in the throes of economic
crisis.
Diplomats
described the atmosphere at the talks, overshadowed by a
war of words between
Zimbabwe and Australia, as tense.
''It was hot in there. The jackets
were off,'' said one diplomat.
Earlier, Zimbabwe launched a scorching
attack on Howard, with
Information Minister Jonathan Moyo quoted as saying:
''John Howard should
disabuse himself of the folly that he can treat Africans
the same way he
treats Aborigines.''
Australia's 400,000 Aborigines
want a formal apology from the
government for past injustices.
Howard told a news briefing he pushed for a tougher line against
Zimbabwe
because Mugabe had shunned all Commonwealth efforts to resolve the
issue of
forceful seizure of white farms by landless blacks and to end
political
violence between government and opposition supporters.
Obasanjo said
he and Mbeki asked for more time because the
reconciliation process had
already begun with the opposition freely
challenging the disputed elections
in court.
Mugabe had pledged to respect the court verdict, he added
Independent (UK)
Mugabe escapes new sanctions
By Basildon Peta in
Johannesburg
24 September 2002
A Commonwealth meeting to review the crisis
in Zimbabwe decided against
tightening sanctions on President Robert Mugabe's
government after South
Africa and Nigeria opposed such a move.
The
South African and Nigerian presidents want to see how Zimbabwe responds
over
the next six months to limited measures imposed in March, after
which
"stronger measures might need to be considered", a statement said after
the
meeting of the Commonwealth "troika" in the Nigerian capital,
Abuja.
The Mugabe government accused the Australian Prime Minister, John
Howard,
who was the third leader at the meeting, of trying to turn the
Commonwealth
into a "kangaroo court" by pressing for Zimbabwe's expulsion
from the group.
Mr Mugabe boycotted the summit, saying that he feared a
"court martial".
The decision on sanctions enraged Zimbabwean civic
groups, which accused the
Commonwealth of abdicating on its responsibility to
uphold democratic
standards. Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the opposition
MDC, accused the
Commonwealth of giving Mr Mugabe a "blank cheque".
The Australian
Hal G. P. Colebatch: Monster of Malcolm's making
23
September 2002
MOVING the Commonwealth to clean up the mess in Zimbabwe
is like moving a
boulder with a papier-mache crowbar. But John Howard just
might do it. After
all, his leadership role in liberating East Timor three
years ago
demonstrated the Prime Minister's ability to get the best
reasonably
possible outcome from an apparently hopeless
situation.
Howard, remember, has already organised the support of
South Africa and
Nigeria to have Zimbabwe suspended from the Commonwealth. It
wasn't much,
but it told Zimbabwe's people the world is not entirely
indifferent to their
fate, and was a little encouragement to Robert Mugabe's
brave opponents.
Howard has also secured some Pacific states' support for
tougher action,
though he is opposed to sanctions on the grounds that they
would hurt the
wrong people. There is a lot riding on the Prime Minister's
mission to
Nigeria and London this week. The task is
herculean.
Ironically, the mess Howard must clean up can be seen as being
partly of his
old boss Malcolm Fraser's making. Fraser's 1987 biographer
Philip Ayres has
written: "The centrality of Fraser's part in the processes
leading to
Zimbabwe's independence is indisputable. All the major African
figures
involved affirm it." Tanzania's president Julius Nyerere considered
Fraser's
role "crucial in many parts", while Zambia's president Kenneth
Kaunda, whose
own achievements included making his country a one-party state,
called it
"vital".
Mugabe is quoted by Ayres: "I got enchanted by
[Fraser], we became friends,
personal friends . . . he's really motivated by
a liberal philosophy."
Duncan Campbell, former deputy secretary of the
Department of Foreign
Affairs and Trade, has claimed Fraser was a "principal
architect" of the
agreement that installed Mugabe and that "he was largely
responsible for
pressing Margaret Thatcher to accept it". Former Australian
diplomat and
Commonwealth specialist Tony Kevin has also claimed that Fraser
"challenged
Margaret Thatcher's efforts to stage-manage a moderate political
solution".
Veteran British Tory politician Julian Amery also commented on
Fraser's
activities, though in less favourable terms.
When Fraser was
working to install Mugabe, Rhodesia actually had a black
majority government
of sorts under Bishop Abel Muzorewa, a moderate without
Mugabe's Marxism or
association with atrocities. He was also prepared to
work closely with
whites, and he was apparently favoured by Thatcher. There
had already been
considerable changes late in the Smith regime, with, for
example, the armed
forces taking black officers. Rhodesia was committed to
universal adult
suffrage and a parliament with 72 black and 28 white seats.
Muzorewa
might have failed, but it is hard to imagine that a Muzorewa-led
Zimbabwe,
retaining the whites' agricultural expertise, would have been a
worse outcome
for Zimbabwe's people than what actually transpired, despite
Kevin's claim
that "however much Mugabe may be guilty of, Zimbabwe has
enjoyed peace and
security for more than 20 years". Mugabe, before turning
on the white
farmers, thus threatening national starvation, waged a
quasi-genocidal war on
the Ndebele, with an estimated 20,000 murdered. He
later committed thousands
of Zimbabwean troops to a vicious, largely
pointless war in the
Congo.
Mugabe was put into power tainted with atrocity. Members of the
Patriotic
Front, of which he led the biggest faction, cut noses and lips
off
unco-operative blacks and shot down civilian airliners - in one
case
massacring the dazed and injured survivors, men and women, as they
escaped
from the crash site. Naturally no one was prosecuted for these major
war
crimes.
There seems to be no record of Fraser protesting about
this or Mugabe's
persecution of political opposition or the recent corrupt
and fraudulent
election, despite his membership of the Commonwealth Group of
Eminent
Persons focused on African affairs and chairmanship of a UN committee
on
African commodity problems in 1989-90.
He was also chairman of CARE
Australia in 1987 and president of CARE
International in 1990. Early last
year, Mugabe thugs raided the Zimbabwe
offices of CARE International and
abducted the Canadian director. According
to London's Daily Telegraph, police
called by Canadian officials did
nothing.
The head of a German aid
agency was also abducted and held hostage. Both
incidents appear to be part
of Mugabe's terror campaign to destroy
infrastructure that might aid his
political opponents. Again, despite
Fraser's intimate connections with CARE,
there seems no record of him
protesting.
Fraser's silence on Zimbabwe
gets louder every day and is becoming
significant in itself. On April 20,
2000, a letter-writer in The Australian
asked Fraser to comment on Mugabe's
behaviour.
The editor wrote: "Malcolm Fraser has been recovering from
surgery. He will
write on this subject for The Australian next week." To the
best of my
knowledge he never did, either then or after many subsequent
challenges to
do so.
His latest and loudest non-mention of it was his
2002 Walter Murdoch Lecture
last Wednesday. He produced more-or-less snide
attacks on the Howard
Government's alleged lack of respect for human rights,
and the memorable
injunction that "we should not seek to live in a state of
denial concerning
our past". Human rights in Zimbabwe didn't get a mention,
though a word from
Fraser with his laboriously cultivated "African"
credentials might have
meant a lot.
Fraser suggested in the Murdoch
Lecture that Australia was deficient in
respecting the "rule of law". The
fact Mugabe had just arrested a retired
High Court judge, Fergus Blackie -
who was brought into court manacled and
who had previously dared to find a
Mugabe minister guilty of contempt of
court - apparently escaped his
notice.
Fraser has often invoked our "national pride" and "important
Australian
values", which on this page on February 12, 1997, he identified as
funding
Radio Australia, the Institute of Sport and the National Institute
of
Dramatic Arts.
On Zimbabwe, however, he simply can't abdicate
responsibility, especially
since he is so ready to criticise Australia and in
a sense undermine
Howard's international position. As chairman of the
committee of
Commonwealth leaders, Howard has responsibility for action. It
is a matter
not only of his own pride but, more importantly, of Australia's
national
honour.
Hal G.P. Colebatch, a regular contributor to
Quadrant, is author of Blair's
Britain (Claridge, 1999).
Daily News
Musekiwa accuses Jonathan Moyo of telling lies in
court
9/23/02 8:19:09 AM (GMT +2)
Staff
Reporter
Tafadzwa Musekiwa, the Member of Parliament for Zengeza,
last Friday
accused Jonathan Moyo, the Minister of Sate for Information and
Publicity,
of lying when he gave evidence in Musekiwa's trial on a charge of
breaching
a section of Posts and Telecommunications Act in the Harare
Magistrates'
Court on Friday last week.
Musekiwa is charged with
threatening Moyo with death in telephone
calls to the junior minister on 10
September last year.
He is denying the charge. Moyo was not in
court on Friday.
Musekiwa told regional magistrate Virginia Sithole
that he was
"shocked to see a man of Moyo's stature stand in front of this
court of law
and lie".
He said: "He is the Minister of
Information and Publicity and people
are supposed to believe him. He was
lying with his eyes so wide open. I
wonder where our country is
going."
Musekiwa said he could not threaten a minister in the
President's
Office who had himself threatened senior police officers, judges
and others.
After Never Katiyo, the prosecutor, protested, Sithole told
Musekiwa to
confine his testimony to issues concerning the case.
Asked by Simbarashe Muzenda, his lawyer, why Moyo would lie in
court,
Musekiwa said Moyo, a former fierce critic of President Mugabe and
his
government, wanted to show the Zanu PF government that he was now one
of
them.
In his testimony about two weeks ago, Moyo alleged that
he was
threatened by an unknown caller and investigations had led to the
opposition
MP.
But Musekiwa on Friday said he had identified
himself on all three
occasions. He said he was trying to get the results of
the Bulawayo mayoral
and council elections after failing to get them from two
senior members of
his own party.
Musekiwa said: "Moyo knew who
he was talking to when he said that one
of the voices was Sikhala's, but when
he reported to the police he did not
say so."
Job Sikhala, the
MP for St Mary's, who with others was with Musekiwa
when the alleged offence
was committed, was acquitted of a similar charge to
Musekiwa's on 2
August.
The trial continues on Friday.
Daily News
MDC petitions C'wealth troika
9/23/02
8:26:11 AM (GMT +2)
By Pedzisai Ruhanya Chief
Reporter
MDC MPs have written a petition to the leaders of South
Africa,
Nigeria and Australia, urging them to tell President Mugabe to step
down to
allow for a fresh election, when they meet him in Abuja, Nigeria, on
Monday.
President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, Nigerian President
Olusegun
Obasanjo and Australian Premier John Howard, who comprise the
Commonwealth
troika handling the Zimbabwe crisis, are expected to meet Mugabe
to review
the situation after the country's suspension from the
Commonwealth.
The three leaders, on behalf of the 54-nation group,
declared the
March presidential election, won controversially by Mugabe, not
free and
fair.
Mugabe, who was invited to Abuja, has not yet
indicated whether he
will go to Nigeria. The MPs, led by Fidelis Mhashu
(Chitungwiza), the shadow
minister for education, delivered their petition to
the High Commissions of
South Africa, Nigeria and Australia in Harare on
Friday.
The petition reads: "We, the MDC MPs, wish to bring to your
attention
the fact that the illegitimate Mugabe government has not moved an
inch to
solve the political crisis in Zimbabwe.
"The MDC urges
the leaders of the troika to make a concerted effort to
encourage Mugabe to
step down so that a fresh presidential election can take
place in Zimbabwe
under free and fair conditions and the rule of law and
democratic legitimacy
can be restored."
They said that if Mugabe rejects the proposals,
then "it is our appeal
that tough action and additional punitive measures
should be taken against
the Mugabe regime well in advance of the March 2003
deadline".
Addressing journalists before handing over the petition
to the three
missions, Mhashu said the Commonwealth could also impose travel
restrictions
against Mugabe and his inner circle.
The MDC said
if the three leaders have any doubts on the seriousness
of the situation in
Zimbabwe, they should visit the country and see the
confusion and human
misery being caused by Mugabe. They said Zanu PF pulled
out of the talks with
the MDC, initiated by South Africa and Nigeria to
provide a possible avenue
for a redress of the fraudulent election result.
"Since being
suspended from the Commonwealth in March, the incumbent
regime has made no
effort to stop electoral violence and fraud, restore the
rule of law, end
State-sponsored political violence and restore democratic
legitimacy to the
country," the petition read.
Daily News
Chinamasa scuttles MDC motion to debate police brutality
in parliament
9/23/02 8:22:57 AM (GMT +2)
By
Columbus Mavhunga
GIBSON Sibanda, the MP for Nkulumane, and the
opposition leader in
Parliament must have left a wounded man on Wednesday
when the House
adjourned before it finished debate on his motion on police
brutality.
Sibanda's motion was initially shelved after he had
agreed with
Patrick Chinamasa, the leader of the House, that the motion would
be debated
after the Land Acquisition Amendment Bill had been
passed.
A number of MDC MPs, notably Gabriel Chaibva (Harare South)
and David
Coltart (Bulawayo South) tried to stop Chinamasa from reading the
Bill until
Sibanda's motion had been exhausted but they were silenced by
Chinamasa who
said he had liaised with Sibanda.
When the Bill
had gone to the Parliamentary Legal Committee, Sibanda
tabled his motion but
when the committee came back, the debate was dropped.
It was
supposed to resume after the Land Bill had been passed but,
Chinamasa
immediately moved for the adjournment of Parliament to 1 October.
Asked when Sibanda's motion would be debated, Chinamasa said:
"In
October".
Introducing the motion, Sibanda said he had been
"alarmed by reports
of people being tortured by the ZRP"
He said
the civilians were being subjected to "inhuman and degrading
treatment" by
the police despite the government's signing of
international
protocols.
"The police are expected to discharge
their duties impartially and
professionally," said Sibanda. "But the ZRP is
far from that."
He said the police had chosen to attack three
people's genitals after
the death of Ali Manjengwa, a senior Zanu PF member
in Mbare last month.
"Members of Parliament, such as Fletcher
Dulini-Ncube, Renson Gasela,
Tafadzwa Musekiwa and Tapiwa Mashakada also
experienced police brutality,"
said Sibanda. "If such brutality can be
perpetrated on MPs, one wonders what
happens to ordinary members of
society."
He said he wanted the police to be probed for their
alleged brutality.
Daily News
Tsvangirai sues Moyo
9/23/02 8:08:01 AM
(GMT +2)
By Sam Munyavi
*Demands a total of $52m
from Moyo, The Herald, ZBC, Mahoso and Hungwe
Morgan
Tsvangirai, the president of the MDC, is suing Jonathan Moyo,
the Minister of
State for Information and Publicity, the State-controlled
media and three
individuals for a total of $52 million for defamation over
their claim that
he called resettled farmers "Stone Age scavengers" when he
addressed a
meeting in Harare on 9 September.
Muzenda and Maganga, Tsvangirai's
lawyers, have written to Moyo, The
Herald and its editor Pikirayi Deketeke,
the Zimbabwe Broadcasting
Corporation (ZBC), Tafataona Mahoso, a government
and Zanu PF apologist, and
Silas Hungwe, the president of the Zimbabwe
Farmers' Union, demanding that
they retract their comments on Tsvangirai's
speech or face lawsuits.
The lawyers said that Moyo, the
State-controlled media, and the
individuals concerned had distorted
Tsvangirai's "Stone Age scavengers"
remarks at the Mass Public Opinion
Institute meeting.
The relevant statement by Tsvangirai, when he
was speaking on the
erosion of the people's basic freedoms by President
Mugabe's government,
reads: "The total emasculation of people's political
power has been
complemented by another strategy to reduce the majority of the
population
economically to the level of Stone Age scavengers available for
manipulation
and abuse by Mugabe and his cronies."
The lawyers'
13 September letter to Moyo reads in part: "The words
that you used to
describe our client in that article are clearly defamatory
of our client and
were calculated to stir resentment of the Movement for
Democratic
Change.
"What is most disturbing is that the words were based on
distorted
information. We submit that it was necessary and prudent for you to
have
perused a copy of the full text of his speech before pouring venom on
our
client."
The lawyers said Tsvangirai was defamed as a result
of Moyo's calling
him a "puppet singing a colonial song for his
puppeteers".
They are demanding damages of $10 million if Moyo does
not retract his
comments and publish in The Herald an "unconditional and
unequivocal"
apology for seven consecutive days from the date he receives the
lawyers'
letter.
Muzenda and Maganga made the same demands each
on Deketeke and The
Herald.
Gula-Ndebele and Partners, the lawyers
for Deketeke and The Herald,
said in their reply to Tsvangirai's lawyers on
Thursday last week: "We are
in the process of getting full instructions from
client and will revert to
you as soon as we are able to."
Tsvangirai is suing the ZBC for $20 million.
His lawyers wrote on
17 September: "As a result of your publication,
viewed by nearly everyone who
has access to a television, as it is the only
station in the country, our
client suffered defamation in the estimated sum
of $20 million."
They demanded that the ZBC broadcast, during News Hour, a retraction
on the
same conditions as those demanded from Moyo, Deketeke and The
Herald.
In a letter dated 17 September to Mahoso, Muzenda and
Maganga reminded
him that he had claimed in The Herald's story that
Tsvangirai's utterances
were typical of Rhodesian terminology, which
described African life as
primitive.
The lawyers said: "You
further claimed that even our client's audience
was shocked by the utterances
as there was no applause after the utterances.
Nothing could be farther from
the truth."
In their 17 September letter to Hungwe, the lawyers
said he had been
quoted in The Herald as having said, among other things,:
"Tsvangirai has
gone mad, he lacks a deep understanding of the programme,
where does he
himself stand?"
The lawyers said: "You are further
quoted as having said that our
client's reasoning had been so clouded by the
millions of dollars given to
him by his Western backer that he sees fit to
insult his own people."
They said: "We wish to advise that you made
your unfortunate comments
on the basis of a falsehood"
It could
not be readily established whether Moyo, the ZBC, Mahoso and
Hungwe had
responded to Tsvangirai's lawyers.
Business Day
SA being hurt by silence on
Zimbabwe'
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
UK says stance scares investors away
Trade and Industry
Editor
PRETORIA The UK fears that President Thabo Mbeki's failure
to
aggressively condemn events in Zimbabwe is scaring off foreign
investment
into SA.
The warning by the local director of British
Trade and Investment,
Michael Mowlam, was given at a seminar in Pretoria
organised by Trade and
Investment SA, a division of the trade and industry
department.
Mowlam said disquiet over SA's stance on Zimbabwe was
the number one
concern of potential foreign investors in SA. The recent rapid
fall in the
rand, concerns over black economic empowerment and the small size
of the SA
market constituted the other major worries.
Mowlam
said that as long as SA authorities failed to make a noise
about Zimbabwe,
there would be a perception that SA supported the land
seizures and the human
rights abuses in its northern neighbour.
"People say that the fact
that there is very little overt criticism
from SA implies that SA believes
Zimbabwe is doing the right thing and the
same thing could happen in SA,"
Mowlam said.
"This is an important issue, and I am not sure people
here realise how
important it is for investment. People in the UK or in the
US who have money
to invest instinctively link the two
countries."
He said he had no doubt that SA was doing its best
diplomatically, but
argued that the only way to reverse perceptions abroad
would be by "putting
out strong and consistent messages".
The CE
of the SA-German Chamber of Commerce, Matthias Boddenberg,
echoed Mowlam's
message, saying German businessmen in SA had warned that the
situation in
Zimbabwe was eroding their confidence in SA.
And the SA
representative for the Belgian region of Flanders, Mieke
Pynnaert confirmed
that the situation in Zimbabwe was one of the top
concerns of potential
investors from her region of Europe.
Mowlam said the recent decline
in the rand was also a worry to foreign
investors who were seeing the value
of their assets in SA eroded in
sterling, dollars or euros.
Boddenberg agreed that the depreciation of the rand had negatively
affected
the foreign investment community.
Mowlam said there was also a lack
of understanding abroad about black
economic empowerment, with ignorance
about the issue having contributed to
it being seen as negative. "There is a
job to be done in projecting its
positive aspects."
In a rare
display of growing private-sector impatience, Sasol has
warned of the
consequences of the regional governments' failure to tackle
the Zimbabwean
leadership. Sasol chairman Paul Kruger warned in the fuel
group's annual
report last week that the political and economic crisis in
Zimbabwe was
undermining the entire continent's credibility. With Dave Marrs
Sep 23 2002 12:00:00:000AM John Fraser Business Day 1st Edition
Monday
23 September 2002
The Times - letters
September 23, 2002
Zimbabwe pensions
From Mr Hugo Swire, MP for East Devon
(Conservative)
Sir, Mrs Elaine Kriedemann (letter,
September 19) is quite
correct to draw attention to the plight of pensioners
resulting from the
catastrophic state of Zimbabwe's economy. The
Parliamentary Under-Secretary
of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth
Office, Baroness Amos, made it
clear in a letter to me in June
that:
The Lancaster House Agreement ensured that the
Zimbabwe
Constitution would contain provisions relating to pensions payable
in
respect of service of a public officer, and that pension benefits
would
continue to be paid to those no longer resident in Zimbabwe. There was
no
such guarantee for employees of parastatal organisations or other
company
pension funds.
Lady Amos went on to say that there
was never any question of
the British Government assuming responsibility for
the payment of pensions
in the event of non-payment by the Zimbabwean
authorities.
Any British national who has returned to this
country from
Zimbabwe should contact their local benefits agency as they may
be eligible
for certain benefits subject to the normal conditions of
entitlement. Other
than that, those affected must wait until the despotic
Mugabe is removed
from the scene and Zimbabwe is given the chance of
prosperity once more.
Yours faithfully,
HUGO
SWIRE,
House of Commons.
September 19.