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Talk of new
leadership a smokescreen in upcoming poll
Dingilizwe
Ntuli
Around of Zanu-PF district and
provincial elections at the end of the month
will give Zimbabwean President
Robert Mugabe's potential successor an
opportunity to consolidate his
position.
Zanu-PF will be holding district and provincial elections from
the end of
this month to revamp its structures ahead of its final conference
in
December, and before next year's crucial congress where a new leader
is
likely to emerge.
Congress is held once after every five years
and elects a new leadership,
while conference is an annual non-voting
gathering. Zanu-PF's last congress
was in December
1999.
Parliamentary Speaker Emerson Mnangagwa, Special Affairs
Minister and
Zanu-PF National Chairman John Nkomo, Defence Minister Sydney
Sekeramayi and
former Finance Minister Simba Makoni are known to covet
Mugabe's job.
However, Mugabe is widely believed to prefer Mnangagwa
as his successor. As
the party's administration chief, Mnangagwa has been
presented with an
opportunity to influence the election of supporters who
will back him in the
leadership race at next year's
congress.
Zanu-PF's head of international affairs Didymus Mutasa said
his party's
elections had nothing to do with positioning anyone in the
succession line.
He said Zanu-PF's constitution states that all
district and provincial
structures be dissolved and elections for new office
bearers be held one
year before congress.
"The provinces nominate
their preferred candidates, and delegates to the
congress will then vote for
a person of their choice.
"The one elected president is responsible
for appointing members of the
politburo in accordance with the party's
constitution," he said.
Political commentator and head of the
National Constitutional Assembly,
Lovemore Madhuku, said while speculation
was high that Mugabe would stand
down in December, the revamping of party
structures indicate otherwise.
"Although Mugabe has called for open
talks on succession, there will be no
such discussion at the December
conference," said Madhuku.
The constitution requires an election to
be held within 90 days if the
president leaves office. Madhuku said Mugabe
did not want his successor to
face an early election but to complete his
term.
"Mugabe's succession plan is for Zanu-PF to win an outright two
thirds
majority in the 2005 parliamentary elections.
"The earliest
we can expect Mugabe to go is after the 2005 elections. These
elections are
meant to revamp the party and point the way to a chosen
successor," he
said.
He said people must not read too much into the elections as
Mugabe would
choose his successor.
Madhuku said the decision to
hold elections now was a snub to the resumption
of inter-party
dialogue.
He said Zanu-PF had realised that the MDC was weak and
opted to consolidate
its power by restructuring.
Head of the
Southern African Institute for Democracy and Good governance,
William Nhara,
said the elections were not linked to succession in any
way.
"Succession is discussed at politburo level, so these elections
will not
have a major bearing," said Nhara.
He said Zanu-PF knew
that it was headed for a decisive battle and needed to
put capable people in
the right positions.
Business Day
Zimbabwe's interest rates nearing
100%
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
HARARE
- Nominal interest rates in Zimbabwe this week sharply shot up to
close to
100 percent but they remained negative in real terms as they are
still less
than a quarter of the rate of inflation.
Banks announced adjustments in
minimum lending rates with the highest figure
being 98 percent.
The
latest figures show that interest rates have almost trebled in nine
months
from about 35 percent at the start of the year.
But economists say the
new rates are "steeply negative" as they still fall
far short of the rate of
inflation which soared to 426.6 percent last month.
Independent economist
John Robertson said ideally the lending rate should be
around 400 percent,
but the country's economy is characterised by too
many
distortions.
Last week the government tried to force interest
rates lower with the
central bank exerting pressure on commercial banks to
reduce their lending
rates to around 75 percent.
"It is further
evidence that the government has no qualms about imposing
more distortions on
distortions," Robertson said.
James Jowah, economist with the Zimbabwe
National Chamber of Commerce (ZNCC)
said as long as real interest rates
remain negative people will not save but
spend on assets that appreciate in
value "because the money loses value
every day".
Jowah said to correct
the distorted interest rates the country needed to
reduce inflation, but that
was not possible unless the foreign exchange rate
was
stabilised.
"What needs to be done is to stabilise the foreign exchange
rate through
support from outside for the balance of payments," said
Jowah.
For the country to get foreign support for the balance of
payments, Jowah
said the government would need to review its attitude and
resume relations
with international financial
institutions.
"Government's attitude has to change so that the
International Monetary Fund
(IMF) and World Bank can come back," he
said.
The two multilateral lenders froze aid to Zimbabwe in the late
1990s due to
disagreements with the government over certain economic
policies.
Zimbabwe has faced a severe shortage of foreign exchange
reserves in recent
years leading to the proliferation of a parallel market as
the government
insists on fixing the foreign exchange rate.
While the
official exchange rate of the US dollar is one to 824 Zimbabwe
dollars, the
greenback can fetch up to 6,000 Zimbabwe dollars on the
parallel
market.
Economic analyst Robertson said the interest rates are a
"reflection of
instability" of the economy.
"It is extremely unstable
because of the perpetuation of distorted
policies," he said.
The
country, which has been hit by famine since last year, has also
experienced
shortages of most basic goods and services including a scarcity
of local bank
notes.
Economists meantime forecast a further rise in inflation to around
1,000
percent against government's predictions of a 96-percent annual
inflation
rate by year end.
AFP
Fundamental Freedoms.
If I was to ask someone on the street what he/she
regarded as the most
fundamental freedoms that we should have and defend, we
could all agree on
the following: -
1. Freedom of association.
2.
Freedom of speech.
Zimbabwe has both freedoms enshrined in its
Constitution; it is a signatory
to the United Nations declaration on Human
Rights and has over the past 23
years signed numerous other agreements, which
seek to entrench basic human,
political and legal rights. They all stand null
and void in Zimbabwe today.
We have no freedom of association - if I
choose to join the MDC I risk
losing my job,
any contracts I might have
with government and any chance of access to any
of the resources controlled
by the State. If we as an opposition Party want
to hold a meeting we must
seek state approval for such gatherings and this
is not given as a routine,
every application we submit runs the risk that it
will be denied and the
majority are denied. I have sat in secret gatherings
of peasant farmers and
their families, acutely aware at any moment that we
may be raided and have to
flee or face arrest. It is not a pleasant
experience.
We have no
freedom of speech. Many would argue that we can say what we want
to in
public, but everything we do is watched and recorded. Our telephones
are
taped (without our permission and without legal authority) on a
regular
basis. We are constantly prosecuted under laws which conflict with
our
Constitution but which the Courts refuse to either have examined in
open
Court or challenged in any other way.
The decision on Friday by
the Supreme Court (in the form of our Chief
Justice) to declare that the only
independent daily newspaper was operating
"illegally" when he had just ruled
that they were obliged to register under
a new set of laws that are blatantly
in conflict with the Constitution is
simply legal nonsense. It would not
stand scrutiny anywhere else in the
world where there is a half-decent legal
system and judiciary.
But the State then acted immediately and closed
down the only local means
whereby the opposition can communicate with the
people on a daily basis. The
Daily news has been bombed twice and its editors
and senior staff harassed
on many occasions since it was launched. Despite
all the obstacles it was
selling more copies throughout the country than the
state-controlled
dailies. This was despite the fact that its cover price was
twice that of
the loss making state newspapers.
This represents the
most recent and most blatant attack on our basic
freedoms by a rogue regime.
I hope it is enough to cause outrage in the rest
of the continent and in the
international community. These are not the acts
of a regime that is sincere
about seeking solutions to our current economic
and political
crisis.
Eddie Cross
Bulawayo, 14th September 2003.
EU Denies Harming Zimbabwean Population
Agencia de Informacao de
Mocambique (Maputo)
September 14, 2003
Posted to the web September 14,
2003
Maputo
The European Union has denied that its targeted
sanctions against Zimbabwean
leaders can possibly have caused suffering to
the Zimbabwean population.
The claim that EU sanctions worsen the
Zimbabwean economic crisis and damage
the Zimbabwean people comes from
Zimbabwean officials and has been echoed in
some of the Zimbabwean
press.
An EU statement received by AIM roundly denies such
allegations and points
out that the EU is not imposing any economic or
commercial sanctions against
Zimbabwe.
"The measures adopted by the
EU", it says, "as a result of the collapse of
the rule of law, and the
violations of human rights, are the freezing of
assets of the main members of
the government and of other high ranking
officials, a ban on them traveling
to EU member states and an arms embargo".
"None of these measures", the
statement points out, "can affect or cause
difficulties to the population of
Zimbabwe".
Certain financial and development cooperation programmes with
the Zimbabwean
government have been suspended, the statement adds, "mainly
because the
government has not respected the provisions of the pertinent
bilateral
agreements, and because of the political and economic environment
which is
not conducive to development cooperation with government
structures".
Humanitarian aid continues to flow from Europe to Zimbabwe,
and the EU
statement puts this aid at 300 million euros (about 330 million US
dollars)
over the past two years. "Apart from this", it adds, "the EU and
its
member-states are financing programmes of direct support to the
population
of Zimbabwe in poverty reduction, education, health,
infrastructures, human
rights and democratisation".
The statement
concludes with the claim that the EU remains committed to
holding "a wide
ranging dialogue with the government of Zimbabwe on the
current difficulties
facing the country, in order to restore political,
social and economic
stability".
news.com.au
PM tough on Mugabe ban
By Steve Lewis
September 15,
2003
AUSTRALIA has headed off a push by African nations to allow
dictatorial
Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe to attend this year's meeting
of
Commonwealth leaders in Nigeria.
In a diplomatic coup, John Howard
has received assurances that Nigerian
President Olusegun Obasanjo will ban Mr
Mugabe from attending December's
Commonwealth Heads of Government
Meeting.
The move to bar Mr Mugabe from the CHOGM talks in the Nigerian
capital of
Abuja is likely to cause unrest among some of the 54 Commonwealth
countries.
African countries, led by South African President Thabo Mbeki,
have been
urging the Commonwealth to relax the sanctions that have sidelined
Zimbabwe
for the past 18 months.
But the Prime Minister is determined
the Commonwealth will maintain a hard
line on Zimbabwe, amid reports that
human rights and economic conditions
there are deteriorating.
SABC
Zimbabwe officials force 300 farmers off their land
September 14,
2003, 06:09 PM
Over 300 white commercial farmers that had been spared
evictions by the
government are being forced off their properties by
individual government
officials as the planting season begins.
The
Commercial farmers unions says the new wave of invasions and evictions
will
plunge the farming sector into uncertainty.
On the other hand the
government claims the land reform programme is not
completed
yet.
Farmers claim equipment to the value of $23 billion has been seized,
looted
or vandalised. Insurance companies are not paying out for it and as a
result
production is likely to drop by 60%.
The Commercial Farmer's
union expressed it's concern to the land review
commission of the remaining
white farmers.
Business Day
'Mugabe is making a fool of
Mbeki'
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----
Zimbabwean
president Robert Mugabe was making a fool of South African
President Thabo
Mbeki and other African leaders to whom he had promised he
would revoke laws
violating human rights, the Democratic Alliance said on
Sunday.
Spokesman
Graham McIntosh said in a statement that Mugabe's regime has
applied the
controversial laws with renewed vigour, instead of revoking
them.
"It
has closed down the independent Daily News after the latter lost its
High
Court challenge of the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy
Act
(AIPPA), under which President Mugabe is seeking to register
newspapers,"
McIntosh said.
"This legislation is iniquitous, inquisitorial and an
invasion of privacy.
"To register, Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe
(ANZ) is required to
disclose its private business operations and financial
details. ANZ is also
required to submit the curriculum vitae of all its
managers and directors,
and to disclose the political affiliations of all its
directors.
"It is the kind of law that characterises fascist and
communist regimes."
McIntosh said it was high time for the African Union
to step in to prevent
it to become just a "toothless talk shop for liberation
struggle
brothers-in-arms."
"As the former chairperson of the AU and
(Mugabe's) most powerful neighbour,
President Mbeki has a key role to play in
this regard."
Earlier the New National Party also condemned the closing
of the Daily News.
NNP media director Carol Johnson said in a statement
that freedom of speech
was a fundamental right.
"Press freedom and
freedom of speech are fundamental rights; all the more
so in Zimbabwe where
newspapers are supposed to be registered with the media
commission, which is
government-run," she said in a statement.
She said the NNP believed that
the forced closure of the newspaper was a
contravention of many international
instruments which guarenteed freedom of
speech and of the press.
"It
contravenes the African Union's founding Act, it flies in the face of
Nepad
(the New Partnership for African Development) and makes a mockery of
the
African Charter of Human Rights."
The NNP called on the signatories of
these international instruments to urge
for the Daily News'
reopening.
Sapa
news.com.au
Sex for groceries in Zimbabwe
From correspondents in
Harare
14sep03
UNDER-AGE teenagers were prostituting themselves for
groceries in Zimbabwe's
second city, Bulawayo, amid food shortages and high
prices, the Standard
newspaper reported today.
It said desperate girls
were offering sex in exchange for "groceries and
other basic commodities that
are in short supply".
Fifteen-year old Zandile Nyoni told the paper: "One
of my regulars is a
company executive, and he even buys groceries for me.".
Zimbabwe is in the
throes of severe economic difficulties, with cash and food
shortages, and
inflation running at more than 426 per cent, making it
difficult for most of
the population to survive.
There were fears the
young women were making themselves vulnerable to
HIV/AIDS infection, which
affects at least one in four people here.
As many as 4000 people die from
AIDS-related illnesses a week, according to
official estimates.
Reuters
Zimbabwe treason trial postponed to October 28
HARARE,
Sept. 14 — The resumption of the treason trial of Zimbabwe
opposition leader
Morgan Tsvangirai, accused of plotting to assassinate
President Robert
Mugabe, has been postponed from Monday to October 28, his
lawyer said on
Sunday.
Tsvangirai, who heads the opposition Movement for Democratic
Change
(MDC), has been on trial since February with two senior party
officials. If
convicted, the 51-year-old former trade unionist could face the
death
sentence.
Treason charges against his colleagues were dropped
by the High Court
last month.
But the court rejected the defence's
application to also dismiss
charges against Tsvangirai, saying the
prosecution had put up a strong prima
facie case. The court has been on a
summer break of more than a month.
The case had been scheduled to
start on Monday, September 15 but on
Sunday, one of Tsvangirai's defence
lawyers, Eric Matinenga, told Reuters it
had been postponed due to
''administrative issues'' and would only resume on
October 28.
Tsvangirai, who has emerged in the last three years as the greatest
threat to
Mugabe's rule, says the assassination charges are an attempt to
crush his
political challenge.
He faces an additional treason charge after he
tried to organise
street protests against Mugabe in June which the government
said constituted
an attempted coup d'etat. He is free on bail on both charges
but cannot
travel abroad.
The MDC leader has mounted a court
challenge against Mugabe's victory
in last year's elections, which the
opposition and Western governments
condemned as fraudulent.
Mugabe,
sole ruler since the former Rhodesia gained independence from
Britain in
1980, maintains he won fairly and accuses Western powers of
forcing the
economy into its worst crisis since independence as part of a
plan to impose
Tsvangirai as leader.
Mandela, Mbeki and the future
Allister Sparks's forensic study of South
Africa today, Beyond the Miracle,
is compelling, says Anthony
Sampson
Sunday September 14, 2003
The Observer
Beyond the
Miracle
by Allister Sparks
Profile Books £14.99, pp288
'You poor
fellow, after all you have done, it must be terrible to see what
is happening
to your country.' Allister Sparks recalls hearing that often
when he
travelled abroad. And he quotes his fellow South African writer,
Nadine
Gordimer, who kept being asked in Europe and America: 'What is
happening to
whites?' 'They identify only with whites whether consciously
or
unconsciously,' Gordimer protested. 'Because I am white, they assume I
do
the same.'
Sparks is a doyen of South African journalism, the
author of one of the best
histories of his country and a former correspondent
for The Observer. But he
does not automatically identify with whites: he
worked closely with black
writers and broadcasters before and after the
Mandela government came to
power in 1994, and he is well-placed to assess
what has happened to his
country since, among all the races.
He has
some unease about calling his book Beyond the Miracle, for the change
that
has taken place in South Africa, he says, was not really a miracle. It
'was
brought about not by some Damascus Road revelation but by ordinary,
fallible
human beings who ultimately recognised that they had been cast
together by
the forces of history'.
But having witnessed the transformation at close
quarters, and having lived
in the midst of it, he has no doubts about the
extent of the achievement. As
he writes: 'An equivalent settlement in the
Middle East would see Israel,
the West Bank and the Gaza Strip consolidated
into a single secular state
which, before long, would be ruled over by a
Palestinian majority government
and in which Jews could live in peace and
security as a minority group.'
He provides vivid accounts of different
aspects of the reconciliation
process, most notably the Truth and
Reconciliation Commission, which was
able to put the truth of past atrocities
on record 'to a degree unequalled
by any post-conflict inquiry'. And he
describes how South Africa has
survived the extraordinary economic problems,
including the dwindling of
gold production on which much of its wealth was
based.
He is fiercely critical of sectarian white politicians and
businessmen who
refuse to adjust to a multiracial country, including Tony
Leon, the leader
of the supposedly liberal Democratic Party who launched a
campaign 'aimed
blatantly at winning over the white conservative vote'. He
points out how
few white businessmen have an understanding of politics: 'The
South African
economy has always been dominated by the English-speaking white
community,
who have been on the political sidelines for a hundred
years.'
He recognises that many of the Ministers in Mandela's government
failed to
grapple with their departments, and he points to the danger of
black racists
who can use the charge of racism to demolish white competitors
for jobs. He
quotes the black political journalist Mondli Makhanya, who
describes how the
new elite 'wield blackness like a weapon as they climb the
ladder of
privilege'.
He describes candidly the shortcomings of
President Mbeki. He analyses his
obdurate denials and fatal delays in facing
up to the menace of Aids, and he
argues vigorously with him about his failure
to confront President Mugabe in
Zimbabwe. Mbeki tells him that whites are
only concerned about Zimbabwe
because some whites are being killed: 'The
extraordinary preoccupation with
what is going on in Zimbabwe,' says Mbeki,
'in reality has got to do with
white fears in South Africa.' Sparks agrees
that whites are too preoccupied
with their fellow-whites, but he insists that
'what is happening in Zimbabwe
is a major African tragedy in the
making'.
What makes this book unusual and important is the wide overview,
across the
different racial communities, against a background of the
author's
international experience. He does not try to ignore the economic
problems of
South Africa, the high unemployment and floods of immigrants, the
harsh
industrial competition from other countries, the lack of necessary
skills.
South Africa, he recognises, faces a double whammy as a country at
the
bottom of the most marginalised continent.
But he has a long
historical perspective, a respect for his own countrymen
and their
resilience. He has watched his country enduring far more
dangerous
predicaments, from which there appeared no way out. 'When you have
just
escaped Armageddon,' he concludes, 'that is no time to become a
pessimist.'
· Anthony Sampson is the author of Mandela: the Authorised
Biography