Petina Gappah's much-praised first book is a rare chance for British readers to read a Zimbabwean author. But as she tells Richard Lea, she speaks for herself, not her country
Written by CZ Correspondent | |
Thursday, 11 June 2009 | |
Sekai Holland - Minister of State - Healing and Reconciliation Organ, has refuted a story published by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) which alleged that she said Zanu (PF) was planning another assault on the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leaders. Mrs Holland, herself a victim of Zanu (PF) violence, said some British non-governmental organisation representative who she had spoken to in general three months ago about Zanu (PF)'s violent disposition, may have been responsible for the story, according to Sandra Nyaira of the Voice of America (VOA). Nyaira said Mrs Holland denied to her that that she ever spoke with anyone from the BBC. “No-one asked her for an interview, but three months ago a team that claimed to work for a children's NGO in the UK approached her about what they could do to help the situation,” said Nyaira. Reading from her notes, Nyaira told changezimbabwe that Mrs Holland had told her: "I'm really quite surprised by this story. These people came here three months ago and said they are with an NGO in the UK and they were looking to fundraise for children, so we were talking as if we were talking with an NGO for children. “We explained the things which were going well and the things which we have achieved so they (asked) what we thought needed to be improved on, and we just started talking about the rumors that were current at that time. “The story, as far as I can see, is about the negative things which we said and nothing about the good things which we said, nothing,” said Mrs Holland, adding that if the media decided to be irresponsible and publish the general talk there was nothing she could do. “I think that people who wish Zimbabwe well are going to pick up the story of what is going on well, but there are these residual elements also. "I have not given an interview to any journalists of the BBC at all, but I hear that I was in the BBC and I have seen it on the Internet. “If they did this interview several months ago, which they did, they should have come back to me for an update because the situatiion in Zimbabwe is changing all the time; we now factor in the setting up of the Organ on Peace and Reconciliation,” she said referring to her department. The department had now come up with a methodology that is going to be followed for the next six months to get Zimbabweans inside Zimbabwe and in the diaspora to help them by giving their views on setting up a mechanism that can brings peace to Zimbabwe, she said. “This week we are organising for the actual programme, so things are slow but you can actually see where things are getting better and where they are not,” said the Minister of State. | |
Last Updated ( Thursday, 11 June 2009 ) |
Originally Aired: June 11, 2009 |
Margaret Warner talks with Zimbabwe's prime minister and opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, about the shifting political landscape in the country, and his Friday meeting with President Barack Obama. | ||
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Zimbabwe's economy could grow by between 4% and 6% this year,
according to the country's finance minister. Tendai Biti said steps would be taken to restrict central bank activities
such as borrowing, and Zimbabwe was coping with the lack of foreign aid. The Zimbabwean economy has been battered by years of hyperinflation and
economic contraction. Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai is on a tour of Europe and the US trying to
drum up financial support. Mr Biti was speaking at the World Economic Forum on Africa in Cape Town. "I think we will be able to achieve a growth rate of at least 6%, although
conservatively it will be 4% in 2009," he told journalists. The fact that the government was able to address Zimbabwe's economic problems
"without any cent from anyone", he added, showed that "we can do it with or
without huge financial resources". Zimbabwe's economy has been shrinking for years. It contracted by 6.1% in
2007, according to the International Monetary Fund. The power-sharing government of President Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister
Tsvangirai - sworn in in February - has said the country needs about $10bn
(£6bn) to stabilise its economy. Prime Minister Tsvangirai is due to meet US President Barack Obama later.
Foreign donors have said they will only consider aid once Zimbabwe's
government creates a democracy.
http://news.yahoo.com
Fri Jun 12, 12:54 pm ET
BRUSSELS
(AFP) - Zimbabwean groups on Friday called on the European Union to
unblock
"massive aid" to their devastated country, days ahead of the first
visit to
Brussels by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.
"Tsvangirai will be
travelling to Europe next week to request much-needed
funding," NGO and
union representatives said in a statement.
So far western donors "have
provided humanitarian aid including salaries for
health workers but withhold
billions of euros in development aid," due to
reluctance to deal with
President Robert Mugabe, they noted
"After years of maladministration,
the country now needs a massive injection
of aid," said Fambai Ngirande of
the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
during a trip to Brussels.
He
and his fellow lobbyists insisted that such aid should go not through
Mugabe
but agencies working on the ground.
Mugabe and his rival Tsvangirai on
February 11 formed a power-sharing
government tasked with steering Zimbabwe
back to stability after disputed
elections last year plunged the country
into crisis.
Tsvangirai is on an international tour looking for
assistance as his country
seeks to emerge from years of economic chaos,
which has seen rampant
inflation and forced many Zimbabweans to flee the
country.
His welcome abroad contrasts with the international chill
towards Mugabe.
Both the EU and the United States maintain a travel ban
and asset freeze on
Mugabe, his wife and inner circle in protest at
controversial elections and
alleged human rights abuses by his
government.
Tsvangirai visited the United States this week and will
travel to several
European capitals in the coming days in an attempt to
demonstrate the
progress the unity government has made and to convince the
EU to unblock the
long-frozen development aid.
However a European
source said that he should not expect a change in EU
policy until there was
"significant progress" in Zimbabwe.
If the aid is resumed too soon "we
relieve the pressure" on the government,
she added, stressing that the
European Commission was nonetheless the main
donor to Zimbabwe with offering
100 million euros in humanitarian aid
annually.
US Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton told Tsvangirai in Washington Thursday
that the United
States would like to resume development aid to his
poverty-stricken
country.
But Clinton also said US support had to be appropriate as
Washington seeks
to bolster reform rather than corruption in the tense unity
government.
Aid groups like Oxfam are urging US and other donors to go
beyond emergency
relief and send development aid that would allow Zimbabwe
to repair broken
water and sanitation systems responsible for a deadly
cholera outbreak.
In Brussels the Zimbabwe NGOs stressed that the travel
ban on Mugabe and his
coterie should remain "until Mugabe, his party and the
military abide by the
rule of law and show tangible commitments to the unity
government."
http://af.reuters.com
Fri Jun 12, 2009 12:20pm
GMT
*Zimbabwe public hearings on constitutions
*Obstacle to
implementing power sharing removed
(Recasts with hearings to
proceed)
By Nelson Banya
HARARE, June 12 (Reuters) - Zimbabwe will
go ahead with its public hearings
on a new constitution, set for later this
month, parliamentary officials
said on Friday, removing a major obstacle to
fully implementing a
power-sharing deal.
Zimbabwe's new unity
government, formed by Mugabe and rival Prime Minister
Morgan Tsvangirai last
February, had appeared headed for a clash after
lawmakers from Mugabe's
ZANU-PF party indicated they would seek to delay the
hearings, citing lack
of preparedness.
A new constitution was a key demand by Tsvangirai's
Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) during negotiations leading to the
formation of the
power-sharing government.
The MDC has accused Mugabe
and ZANU-PF of failing to fully implement the
political agreement and the
move to delay constitutional reforms could
further upset the stability of
the unity government.
Mugabe and Tsvangirai agreed on an 18-month
timetable for constitutional
reforms, with a referendum on the new
constitution expected to be held in a
little over a year's time.
MDC
lawmaker Douglas Mwonzora, joint chairperson of a 25-member
parliamentary
committee steering the constitutional reform process, told a
news conference
that all parties in the unity government had agreed to start
public hearings
in all the 10 provinces between June 24 and June 27.
That would lead to a
national conference on constitutional reforms from July
9 to July 12,
Mwonzora said.
"The days we have announced are by consensus. We all
agreed that they are
final," he said.
The ZANU-PF chief whip, Joram
Gumbo, said his party's earlier concerns on
the process had been
misunderstood.
"To clear the air, all we said is that ZANU-PF MPs were
requesting, if
possible, for the co-chairpersons to postpone the hearings,"
Gumbo said.
"We did not try to stall the process."
The
state-controlled Herald newspaper had on Friday reported that ZANU-PF
MPs
would seek to postpone provincial hearings.
The unity government, which
says it needs up to $10 billion to fix an
economy battered by
hyperinflation, has been struggling to get aid,
especially from Western
donors who have demanded broad economic and
political reforms before
providing support.
Tsvangirai is currently on a trip to Europe and the
United States seeking to
lure Western donors. He is expected to meet U.S.
President Barack Obama in
Washington on Friday to drum up support for the
unity government.
(Spokesman Ian Kelly briefs reporters June 11)
(begin excerpt of transcript)
U.S. Department of State
Daily Press Briefing Index
Thursday, June 11, 2009
12:46 p.m. EDT
Briefer: Ian Kelly, Spokesman
ZIMBABWE
-- Secretary Had Productive Meeting with Prime Minister/U.S. to Support Efforts of Government of Zimbabwe towards Full Implementation of Global Political Agreement/Finding Ways to Ease Suffering of Zimbabwean People Without Bolstering Forces Clinging to Corruption and Oppression/Focus on Rebuilding Zimbabwe and Providing Better Future for Its People
-- U.S. Wants to Set Benchmarks for Governments Receiving Taxpayer Funds/Looking at Ways to Make sure Zimbabwe Continues on Democratic Path
-- Concerns About Mugabe and Examples of Misrule and Corruption/Future of Government a Matter for Zimbabwean People to Decide
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
DAILY PRESS BRIEFING
THURSDAY, JUNE 11, 2009
(ON THE RECORD UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED)
12:46 p.m. EDT
QUESTION: Zimbabwe.
MR. KELLY: Oh, Zimbabwe, sorry. A read-out of the Secretary's meeting, just hold on a second.
We had a very productive meeting with the prime minister. We're looking to support the efforts of the Zimbabwean Government towards the full implementation of the global political agreement and find ways to ease suffering of the Zimbabwean people without bolstering those forces that are clinging to corruption and oppression. With the prime minister and reform-minded members of his government, we desire to focus on rebuilding Zimbabwe and providing a better future for its people.
QUESTION: Does that mean that you're prepared or you're considering restoring development aid?
MR. KELLY: We look forward to working with the Zimbabwean Government on a bilateral basis, also a multilateral basis, to see how they can move towards a better, more democratic future.
QUESTION: Right. But are you considering restoring development aid?
MR. KELLY: We're looking at ways that we can help Zimbabwe on that path.
QUESTION: How?
MR. KELLY: Including development aid if it's appropriate.
QUESTION: And --
QUESTION: Earlier this week, Assistant Secretary for African Affairs Carson said that the United States was very concerned by the lack of reforms undertaken by the Zimbabwean Government and that any substantial increases in assistance - obviously, we're talking not humanitarian assistance --
MR. KELLY: Yeah.
QUESTION: -- were not going to be possible until there were such reforms. Is that still the position of the U.S. Government, that you need to see much more in terms of broad Zimbabwean reform before you can restore things like substantial development aid?
MR. KELLY: Well, I mean, we're very hopeful about the direction that Zimbabwe is taking under the Global Political Agreement. I think that in general, worldwide, we want to make sure that we have set benchmarks for governments that are receiving U.S. taxpayer funds, that we get the most out of every taxpayer dollar. So yes, I think it's fair to say that we're looking at ways to make sure that Zimbabwe stays on a - or continues on a democratic path.
QUESTION: Ian, what's the U.S. Government's view on the continuing role of President Robert Mugabe as head of state?
MR. KELLY: Regarding President Mugabe, I think that we've had concerns about examples of misrule and corruption. But I think that in terms of the future of the Zimbabwean Government, I think that's really a matter for the Zimbabwean people to decide.
(End Excerpt)
(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://www.america.gov)
http://www.swradioafrica.com
By Alex Bell
12
June 2009
A ruling by the human rights court of the Southern African
Development
Community (SADC), which was hoped would put a stop to the
current wave of
farm attacks, is being openly ignored once again and farmers
are still
fighting to keep their land.
The SADC Tribunal last week ruled
that the Zimbabwe government had refused
to comply with the regional court's
order to allow 78 commercial farmers to
keep their land. The Tribunal last
year ruled that the farmers could remain
on their land, which was targeted
for resettlement under Robert Mugabe's
land reform scheme. The order was
meant to offer legal protection against
future land invasions and the
government was also supposed to protect the
farmers from future land
attacks.
But Mugabe unsurprisingly, openly and publicly dismissed the
November
verdict and condoned the renewed offensive against the remaining
commercial
farmers. The physical attacks and fast track prosecution of
farmers
intensified in the weeks that followed the dictator's speech earlier
this
year, and even Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai went as far as to
downplay
the severity of the ongoing land invasions. The farmers were forced
to
return to the SADC court last Friday to seek further action to enforce
the
court's original ruling, walking away victorious with a new ruling in
their
favour.
But the ruling is again being flouted and ignored, and
Chegutu's beleaguered
farming community, which has been hardest hit by the
land attacks, is still
fighting against an onslaught of invasions. Mount
Carmel farm owner, Ben
Freeth, whose land has been overrun by invaders
working for ZANU PF top
official Nathan Shamuyarira, expressed his
frustration and anger to SW Radio
Africa on Friday. The farm has been almost
completely taken over by hired
thugs, who are openly stealing and looting
the property. The farm's entire
mango crop worth tens of thousands of US
dollars was either sold off or left
to rot recently, and invaders are now
reaping the maize growing on the land.
"Our maize is being stolen by the
lorry-load, and the police are still not
reacting in any way," Freeth
explained. "The police just tell us that the
theft is a civil matter and not
a criminal matter, as an excuse to not act."
Freeth, his family and his
workers, have been repeatedly harassed and
violently intimidated by the
thugs, who are now living in the home that
until recently belonged to his
parents-in-law. Mike and Angela Campbell left
the farm in April because of
the stress of the attacks, as Mike is still
recovering from brutal injuries
he received when he was abducted and beaten
last year.
With numerous High
Court orders in his favour, as well as two SADC Tribunal
rulings meant to
offer protection, Freeth said he is living in a "surreal
world of
lawlessness because no one, not even the government, is respecting
the rule
of law."
http://www.swradioafrica.com
By Violet Gonda
12 June
2009
The Cremer family has categorically denied allegations that they
used
racially abusive words against the family of the woman attempting to
take
their farm.
On Wednesday Dr Arikana Chihombori, who said she is
Prime Minister
Tsvangirai's niece, said her sister and a lands officer were
extremely
abused by the Cremer family when they went to the farm with an
'offer'
letter. She said the farmer and his son in law set a dog on her
sister and
called her a derogatory word.
But on Friday the Cremer family
spoke out for the first time since the
accusations were made and said the
allegations are totally false. One of the
co-accused Dirk Visagie, the
son-in-law, told SW Radio Africa: "We find it
very disappointing that a
woman of Dr Chihombori's standing resorts to
blatant lies in order to divert
attention from her actions. Accusations of
the K word are the oldest
diversionary tactics in Africa."
He said in November last year Dr
Chihombori's sister, Mrs. Kanyanda, arrived
at the farm with the Chegutu
lands officer, with an offer letter dated 27
August 2007, to claim the
remaining 60ha of farm. 700 ha had been taken for
resettlement several years
back.
Visagie said: "We explained to her that we should be evicted through
due
process by a court of law before she can take possession of our business
and
our homes. They conferred and left." The Cremers said they were legally
allowed to continue farming on their land.
But according to the Cremers,
Mrs. Kanyanda returned to the farm in December
and was seen planting maize
on their tomato land. The Cremers said they told
her that they were entitled
to farm on their land and that she was breaking
the law. They reported the
matter to the police.
They didn't hear from Dr. Chihombori's representative
again until April this
year, when four youths arrived on the farm and set up
camp. They youths said
they were taking over the farm and business on behalf
of the US based
medical doctor. "They left after three days complaining
that she was not
paying them," said Visagie.
A Deputy Sheriff
returned the same month with a court order evicting the
Cremers from their
property, with a second offer letter attached dated 15
December 2008.
The
Cremers appeared in court and Mrs. Kanyanda is said to have asked for
the
case to be postponed as she had not come with a legal representative.
The
case was postponed to June 2nd.
Visagie said on 22nd May the Chegutu Lands
Officer returned to the farm but
this time to introduce Dr Chihombori
herself, to give her a tour of the
farm. "We said we had nothing to say as
we were due to appear in court in
days."
They said anyone could speak to
their farm employees who could confirm that
they never used the abuse words
they stand accused of. Visagie said; "We
consider her accusations
'libelous.'
Chihombori said she had applied for land and was allocated an A1
farm, which
she turned down, preferring instead to have the 60ha of the De
Rus Farm,
owned by the Cremer family. Dr Chihombori said she would be
suspending her
interest in the farm now, but only "for the time
being".
The Cremers say they have been making a significant contribution
to the
development of Zimbabwe and uplifting the standard of living in the
community. "Dr Chihombori justifies herself by referring to historical
imbalance' but the farm in question was purchased and built up from a cattle
trough to its present state."
They say their remaining 60 ha is
protected by an investment licence and
managed by six family members, all
graduates with degrees and diplomas.
http://www.swradioafrica.com
By Lance Guma
12 June
2009
Cabinet this week approved a new policy that will see loans and
financial
aid to Zimbabwe NOT going through the Reserve Bank. The MDC has
argued long
and hard that central bank governor Gideon Gono's quasi-fiscal
activities
and raiding of private foreign currency accounts have irreparably
damaged
the reputation of the bank. They also argue that this is hampering
efforts
to get aid.
But in a move signaling a looming compromise, the
coalition government has
now approved the establishment of a 'Multi-Donor
Trust Fund' within the
Ministry of Finance. This is being seen as an attempt
to placate donors who
are reluctant to put money into a system controlled by
Mugabe's money man.
The trust fund we are told will be co-chaired by Tendai
Biti's Finance
Ministry and other 'developmental partners'. Two other
ministries, Local
Government and Regional Integration and International
Cooperation, will be
part of a 'core group' administering the
fund.
Speaking during his tour of the United States, Prime Minister
Morgan
Tsvangirai said the Multi-Donor Trust Fund, will be administered by
international donors. He said the fund met the donor's criteria for
accountability and this will help support the country's economic recovery
programme. Biti tried to be diplomatic about the fund being a means to
bypass Gono. On Thursday he told us it was 'a stop gap measure' for
receiving donor aid 'during this situation of fragility'. He reiterated that
Gono's presence at the RBZ remained an outstanding issue for the
coalition.
Meanwhile the weekly Zimbabwe Independent newspaper reports
that Biti has
won his battle for 'control' of Treasury and that Gono was now
keen on
improving relations with his boss. Biti has been fighting the battle
mainly
in cabinet and has got support for far reaching reforms via the
Reserve Bank
of Zimbabwe Act. The paper says the two held a private meeting
on Monday in
an effort to improve their working relationship. Gono is also
said to have
apologized for an acrimonious letter he wrote to the Prime
Minister, which
was published by several media outlets.
http://www.herald.co.zw/
12 June 2009
Harare - THE trial of Chegutu
commercial farmer Bryan Bron-khorst, who is
accused of refusing to vacate a
farm acquired by the Government under the
land reform programme, has been
further deferred to June 29.
This is the second time the case has been
postponed this month.
Chief law officer Mr Tawanda Zvekare sought the
postponement saying three
State witnesses were not available this
week.
"Three witnesses, including the key witness Mr Morris Dakarai
the chief
lands officer, are away attending a workshop in Kariba for the
whole week,"
said Mr Zvekare.
The defence did not oppose the State's
request.
Bronkhorst is being charged with occupying State-acquired land
without
authority.
But the defence team has indicated its intention
to block the trial as they
seek to apply to the court to refer the case to
the Supreme Court.
They are challenging the legality of the prosecution,
which they argue is
unlawful and infringes upon the fundamental rights of
commercial farmers as
enshrined in the Constitution.
http://www.voanews.com
By Ish Mafundikwa
Harare
12 June 2009
Zimbabwe faces a serious wheat shortage
next year as farmers have once again
failed to meet the production targets
for the crop.
With the wheat planting season practically over, Zimbabwean
farmers have
managed to plant less than ten percent of the projected goal of
100,000
hectares, down 60 percent from last year. Observers say this could
mean the
return of bread shortages that Zimbabweans have experienced over
the past
several years.
Zimbabwe Farmers' Union executive director,
Paul Zakariya, put down the
failure to the same old problem that has dogged
Zimbabwe's agricultural
sector for years; a lack of resources.
"It
has to do [with] non-availability of working capital, banks are not
financing, government has no capacity to finance at the moment and we still
have serious problems in terms of availability of seeds and affordability
thereof," Zakariya said. "We also have problems with our electricity supply,
constant and very, very frequent power cuts, fertilizers are not readily
available and if they are available affordability is an
issue."
Zakariya said Zimbabwe needs about 350,000 to 400,000 metric tons
every year
but even at its most productive, the country has never grown
enough to meet
its needs.
Spokesman for the Commercial Grain
Producers Association, Clive Levy, said
while Zimbabwe has never produced
enough to meet its needs, it did come
close in the 1990s. Also, he added,
Zimbabwe grows a soft variety of wheat,
which on its own is not good enough
to make bread. So in addition to the
supplementary soft wheat the country
imported, it had to import a hard
variety which cannot be grown in
Zimbabwe.
Levy echoed Zakariya by saying lack of access to finance and an
assured
supply of electricity are some of the reasons farmers have decided
not to
bother growing wheat. He also said when farmers produced wheat under
ideal
conditions they'd harvest eight to nine tons per hectare but average
production is now down to less than five tons.
Critics of Zimbabwe's
land reform program, launched by President Robert
Mugabe in 2000, blame it
for the plummeting of agricultural production in
Zimbabwe. The program saw
white farmers losing their farms for the
resettlement of landless blacks
whom some say do not have the skills. But
Zakariya said even with the best
skills in the world, without the money,
nobody could produce anything. He
added that agriculture, like all sectors
of Zimbabwe's economy, needs
massive re-capitalization.
"What we need is to build the confidence of
investors in Zimbabwe. The whole
question of non-productivity in Zimbabwe
borders around the issues of
investor confidence," he said.
Zakariya
said a change of policies and full implementation of the agreement
that
brought about Zimbabwe's unity government could lead to a change in the
country's fortunes for the better.
http://www.radiovop.com
HARARE, June 12 2009 - Zimbabwe's tobacco prices
have failed to rise
to the USd 3.20 a kilogram offered last year, with
prices now pegged at
USd2.92 owing to the impact of the global financial
crisis and economic
recession that has already resulted in lower demand for
Africa's exports and
a sharp decline in commodity
prices.
In an interview with RadioVOP, the Tobacco
Industry Marketing Board
(TIMB)'s chief executive oficer Dr Andrew Matibiri,
said farmers have so far
sold 20,9 million kilograms of the leaf at
USd2.92.The tobacco is valued
USd61.15 million.
Dr Matibiri
said the shortage of inputs, especially fertiliser had
negatively impacted
on the tobacco sales with farmers this year expected to
sell only 42 million
kilograms, down from last year's 70 million.
"Most farmers
failed to access the necessary inputs especially
fertiliser, resulting in
lower yields," he said.
He indicated that the selling of the
leaf on the black market by
farmers, which had posed a challenge to the
organisation early this year,
had since stopped following the opening of the
auction floors.
"The practice was prevalent before the floors
opened as some farmers,
whose tobacco matured earlier were selling it to
middlemen out of
desperation as they needed instant cash to make ends meet,"
he said.
Tobacco can only be sold on auction floors or to
licensed merchants in
Zimbabwe.
Farmers were selling
tobacco for as little as USd1 a kilogram when the
season
opened.
Tobacco production in Zimbabwe has plummeted since
2000, when the ZANU
PF led government authorized the often-violent seizure
of most white-owned
farms. That year, the country produced 236 million
kilograms of tobacco,
making it the world's second-largest exporter after
Brazil.
Since then Zimbabwe has slumped to the world's
sixth-largest exporter
after Brazil, India, the U.S., the European Union and
Argentina.
Last month, supporters of Mugabe invaded at least 77
white- owned
commercial farms and threatened other landowners, according to
Doug
Taylor-Freeme, president of the Commercial Farmers Union. The eviction
campaign threatened the livelihoods of about 100 farmers along with about
$140 million worth of crops, he said in an interview Feb.
24.
Zimbabwe's tobacco selling season began in May and
traditionally runs
until mid-October.
http://www.radiovop.com
HARARE, June 12 2009 - The Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe
(PTUZ) is
alarmed that schools have registered failed A Level Students, a
situation
which will seriously compromise Zimbabwe's education
standards.
The government early this year gave schools the
go ahead to enrol A
Level students, using mid term results.
In an interview with RadioVOP, PTUZ President, Takavafira Zhou
said:
"Most of the students who proceeded to A level have a
chain of U's and
surely what are their parents toiling for? We do not want
the quality of
education in the country to be compromised."
"Last year's end of year national Ordinary Level results are dismal,
apparently the majority of kids who registered for 'A' level using their mid
term results performed poorly. As the PTUZ we had made our position very
clear with regards to the enrolment of Lower Sixth students and clearly told
the government that its policy was flawed and ill
conceived."
"Of course most people would ask why parents who
clearly knew their
child's poor track record would go ahead and enrol them
for Advanced level
education - but the truth is that most parents did not
know how their kids
were performing owing to the absence of end of term
reports as teachers had
been striking for a long time," said
Zhou.
"Parents who took the permanent secretary's advice to go
ahead and
enrol their kids before end of year exam results were released
must now
clean their mess and I can clearly see confrontation between the
ministry
and parents in the near future," he said.
He said
parents had been duped by the ministry into using mid year
results, a
situation which led to further chaos as students went on to forge
reports to
gain entry.
"Some headmasters made a killing during that
enrolment period by
selling reports to students who were desperate to be
enrolled. This is a sad
scenario," he said.
When contacted
for comment, Minister of Education, David Coltart, said
he was yet to
analyse the results while the Zimbabwe School Examinations
Council (ZIMSEC)
spokesperson Ezekiel Pasipamire, said his organisation was
still to come up
with a report detailing the outcome of the results.
The
Zimbabwe Teachers Union President Tendai Chikowore, also said she
was yet to
go through the results.
I-Net
Bridge
11
June 2009
Zimbabweans
don't blame anyone else for their problems, but they do need support from other
Africans right now, as they rebuild their economy and their
society.
“Yes,”
agreed Arthur Mutambara, the deputy prime minister, “the past is a bad place.
But the future is glamorous.”
Speaking
in a debate on vestment risk in Africa at the World Economic Forum on Africa on
Thursday, Mutambara insisted that although his country is asking for aid at
present, what Zimbabwe really wants is investment. “The future of our country
doesn't depend on aid,” he said. “The future of our country belongs to
investments. We look to develop through profits.”
Mutambara,
who leads one of the three political parties in the government of national unity
complained to delegates at the WEF that although the present financial crisis is
a global crisis, the solution is not, so far, global.
He
said however that within the Southern African Development Community, there may
be a more positive attitude to multilateral actions to fight the
recession.
Pravin
Gordhan, South Africa's finance minister, told the audience at the debate that
South Africa stands ready in solidarity with its neighbours as it always
has.
Challenged
over a possible leftward tilt in the new government in this country, Gordhan
said that there has been a 15-year record of demonstrated fiscal responsibility,
and though there has been a 6.4% decline in the economy, the country has
demonstrated resilience and will do so again.
“We
will try to defend as many employees as possible (from retrenchment),” he said.
But he suggested that even while they were on short-time working, they were
being trained for further employment.
He
said that risk in the economy is being shared with business. “President Zuma has
sent a clear message that we want to work in partnership with business,” he
said.
Michael
Hamlyn, I-Net Bridge
Growing numbers of children in Zimbabwe are turning to
prostitution to survive, the charity Save the Children says. The aid agency says increasing poverty is leading girls as young as 12 to
sell their bodies for as little as a packet of biscuits. It also claims that the coming football World Cup in neighbouring South
Africa could soon make things worse. Unemployment in Zimbabwe is thought to top 90% and many cannot afford to pay
for food, medical care or school fees. The deputy head teacher of a large school with 1,500 pupils east of Victoria
Falls told the BBC that hundreds of her female students are now selling their
bodies for whatever they can get. "It could be books, it could be biscuits, chips, some even just to be given a
hug." Throughout my conversation with the deputy head, two small teenage girls in
threadbare school uniforms sat watching from a brick wall by the playground.
Both are orphans. The older one, who is 14, said she knows many girls here who have become
prostitutes. "I don't want to do that but life is so difficult, so very difficult. Both my
parents are dead and I rarely see my two sisters. Recently I stood by the river
and I thought about throwing myself in but I didn't. I don't know why." There is also evidence that many girls are being targeted by child
traffickers, Save the Children's country director Rachel Pounds says. They are thought to have plans to send young Zimbabwean girls to South Africa
to work as prostitutes during next year's football World Cup finals.
BBC
News, Zimbabwe
http://www.swradioafrica.com
By Alex Bell
12 June
2009
A French humanitarian aid group is set to launch a food security
programme
in Zimbabwe next month, in an effort to tackle food shortages in
urban
areas.
The group, Solidarites, will launch its food security
initiative from July
1, targeting people in urban and urban-fringe areas who
don't have access to
land. Solidarites already operates in 13 other
countries, and targets those
countries torn apart by war and natural
disasters, a category into which
Zimbabwe falls after years of misrule and
tyrannical abuse of power.
By supplying tools, technical support and
horticultural training, the aid
group hopes to provide urban dwellers with
'family vegetable plots' that can
be used for food and a source of basic
income. Solidarites will also be
building irrigation wells to serve the
vegetable plots, allowing those
families in urban areas to benefit from
having a means of food subsistence.
The initiative comes as more than
half the population is wholly dependent on
food aid to survive, with
crippling food shortages affecting the majority of
Zimbabweans. With more
than 94% unemployment, most Zimbabweans are not
earning the foreign currency
needed to buy the imported food that is now
available in shops. At the same
time, local food production has reached
critically low levels as a result of
the new wave of farm attacks sweeping
the country, which in turn have left
thousands of farm workers without jobs.
Humanitarian groups last week
issued a revised appeal for aid, requesting
more than US$700 million just to
meet the food requirements of desperate
Zimbabweans. The figure is a jump of
more than US$150 million from the
original appeal launched in November last
year, and is a warning sign of the
humanitarian crisis that is still
gripping the nation.
Petina Gappah's much-praised first
book is a rare chance for British readers to read a Zimbabwean author. But as
she tells Richard Lea, she speaks for herself, not her country Six weeks on from the publication of her first collection of short stories,
An Elegy for Easterly, the Zimbabwean writer Petina Gappah is a little
disappointed. Not because of the reviews, which have glowed, or the readers, who
have told her how they've recognised themselves or others in her characters.
Arriving back in Switzerland, where she has been living for the last 10 years,
following the Harare launch earlier this month, her only regret is that she
wasn't arrested. Gappah says she was surprised to see a few "die-hard" Zanu-PF supporters at
the party, and found herself being congratulated by Mugabe's former information
minister, "so no one will be arresting me, more's the pity. Sales would have
gone through the roof!" Gappah's sense of humour was to the fore when she arrived at the Guardian to
record one of her short stories earlier this year. She speaks with the precision
that comes from a 10-year career in trade law, but is quick to laugh, her short
frame filled with the energy that comes from realising a long-held dream. Her
debut brings together a vibrant cross-section of Zimbabwean life – shanty-town
kids poking fun at the local madwoman, the treasury department official's trophy
wife adrift in a Harare mansion, the rural family waiting for news of a wayward
son over in England – and tells their stories with a simple humanity and wit
that have made her one of this summer's most exciting new voices. She began writing seriously only a couple of years ago after what she calls a
"severe depression". "It was one of those early mid-life crises really," she
continues. "I started asking myself 'What is it that I want from my life?' This
question kept haunting me: 'Do I want to be a lawyer who always wanted to be a
writer, or do I actually want to be a writer?'" She had no confidence in her
writing, partly because of the straighforward directness of her prose, but
summoned up the courage to complete a story in 2006 and submitted it to online
writer's workshop Zoetrope, where it was quickly picked up by an online
magazine. She won the PEN/Africa prize with her next story, and began writing
early in the morning before taking her son to school, getting down a first draft
quickly - like a lawyer working on a contract - and then revising again and
again. "In one year I wrote something like 22 short stories," she says. "I lost
a lot of friends in that year, because I was doing nothing but writing," she
laughs. "Now that I'm about to be famous they've all come back." Born in Zambia in 1971, Gappah grew up in Zimbabwe during the transformation
from Ian Smith's white minority rule to Robert Mugabe's increasingly
authoritarian regime, before moving first to Austria in 1995, then to Geneva,
where she now works for an organisation advising developing countries on the
complexities of World Trade Organisation law. Her upbringing was in two
languages, moving between entirely segregated schools, where classes were only
in Shona, to a Catholic missionary outpost deep in the country, to being one of
the first black children to join a previously all-white, English-speaking
school. Her characters may speak the hybrid Shonglish of the streets of the
Zimbabwean capital, but there was never any question that she would write in
anything other than a Zimbabwean-inflected English. It was a language that was
imposed on her, she says, but it is a language which has become her own.
"There's this conversation that Ngugi wa Thiong'o and others have about whether
English is really our language, and whether we should write in English," she
continues. "But for me it has never been an issue because English is my
language. I speak English, I dream in it. I cannot separate my English from my
Shona, I see the world with those two languages." Gappah places herself within a wider Anglophone tradition, citing authors
such as John Irving, Toni Morrison and Margaret Atwood as inspirations, but also
considers herself part of a new generation of African writers who are building
their own tradition, moving beyond the explicitly political concerns of their
predecessors. "The earlier generation was really concerned with these big ideas about
colonialism," she explains, "about the post-independence state, how to deal with
the negative effects of colonialism. What we are trying to do now, this new
generation of African writers, is to write about what it is to be a human being
living in a particular African country. These are stories that resonate with
anyone, anywhere." So much of the coverage of Africa in the western media is of disaster and
corruption that she finds herself pushing against images of Africans as nothing
more than victims. "This is what I'm desperate to show," she says, "that African
people, Zimbabwean people are the same as people anywhere else. They just happen
to be living in particularly nasty circumstances. They have the same ambitions
... fall in love, get married, get a little house somewhere, that everybody else
has." When she went back to Zimbabwe earlier in the year, the first thing she did
was go to a party. "You don't think about Zimbabweans having parties, because if
you think about Zimbabweans you think about cholera, you think about rigged
elections," she says. "But despite all these awful things that have happened to
the country there is still a life there. People still quarrel, people still have
affairs, people still cheat on each other, cheat each other. They still do
things that people everywhere else do. What is needed is to find some sort of
balance. It's not to say that those terrible headlines about Africa are not
true, it's simply to say that there is more than just the headlines you
see." She's uneasy with the idea that African writers have a duty to portray their
continent in any particular way, as well as the expectation that she should
represent Zimbabwe to the outside world. "There was some copy that went out with 'Petina Gappah is the voice of
Zimbabwe' and I called Faber and I said take it off right away. Not only is the
Voice of Zimbabwe a radio station," she laughs, "which I'm not, but also I'm
very uncomfortable with that, because the only perspective I represent is my
own." There are many people who might share that perspective, she continues, but
she "cannot forget that as much as there are people who suffer from Robert
Mugabe's rule there are also people who benefit from it, and who support his
policies." Given the rarity of books in English from Africa, let alone from Zimbabwe,
she's painfully aware that the role of representative will be thrust upon her.
"It's sort of an occupational hazard, being one of only two Zimbabweans to
publish a book in one year." But it also presents her with a platform to raise
awareness, to draw the world's attention to issues which are important to her.
The laziness she identifies in publishers and newspapers who look for her to
speak for the country of her birth also provides her with opportunities. These opportunities are only magnified by the curious place of Zimbabwe
within the British media, an exceptionalism which irritates Gappah. "You can
sort of understand Mugabe's point of view," she says, "because of the amount of
attention that is given to Zimbabwe in [Britain] considering what's happening in
other parts of Africa, like the Congo. There's a huge disaster happening in the
Congo, but that is not given as much of a high profile as Zimbabwe." It's partly
because of the colonial relationship, as well as the commercial connections
between the UK and Zimbabwe, but the underlying reason, she says, is that "some
of those beaten by Mugabe's thugs are white". Despite the inconvenience of holding a Zimbabwean passport, she still calls
herself a Zimbabwean author, she still feels Zimbabwean - though her connection
to her home country seems to be in the process of shifting. Not that she feels
any more Swiss than when she first arrived in Geneva 10 years ago. "Even if I
wanted to feel Swiss it would be extremely difficult, because they don't like us
very much," she explains. She first came to Europe at a time when Zimbabwe was
thriving, leaving behind a job in a top legal firm for a wider world. But after
almost 15 years away from home, she is beginning to wonder if she could ever go
back to live there permanently, if her affection for Zimbabwe is driven by
nostalgia. "I'm not even sure that I want to go back ... The Zimbabwe that I
really loved, the Zimbabwe that I grew up in just isn't there any more, and I'm
not sure about the country that has replaced it."
Dear Presidents/Prime ministers,
On behalf of the poor people of
Africa, I send you this protest letter. We are angry. Yes we the people are very
angry. We have endured your ill conceived, hash and austere economic and social
policies for quite too long. We have watched silently to see you and your
cronies enjoy while we the masses continue to suffer. We have no jobs, no
income, no savings and have no place to lay our heads while you and your
selected few live in mansions at the expense of the very poor you are refusing
to take care of. You have consistently ignored all our cry for help even though
you know our plights very well.
Are you not appalled by the scale of
poverty and the living condition of the people? Are you not appalled to see
children selling on the street instead of being in the classroom? Are you not
appalled to see children sleeping rough on the streets of our capital cities and
scavenging for food while you and you cronies frequent between five star hotels?
Don't you care about the dignity of the people you claim to be serving? For
years you have asked us to sacrifice and even today we are still sacrificing,
but anytime we look at you and your circle of friends we see that you are in a
different suit, in a different four wheel drive, in a different hotel, and in a
company of ladies, surrounded by bodyguards. How many more years should we
continue to sacrifice and tighten our belts why you and your cronies enjoy from
our sweat? We cannot continue any longer. No we cannot.
We are tired of
all of you who call yourself leaders of the people. We are tired of the
dictatorships, media censorship, torture, force imprisonment, wars and the
instabilities. We are tired of being refugees. We are tired of seeing our
children die of common preventable diseases. We are tired of sharing water from
the same source with animals, water infested with bacteria and viruses. We are
tired of lack of access to education, health, energy, food, medicines, shelter
and clothing. We are tired of having to work with cutlasses and hoes in this
21st century. We are tired of having to rely on nature to plant our crops. We
are tired of having to plant without fertilizers. We are tired of having to use
18th century seeds that yield next to nothing. We are tired of having to endure
poverty, starvation, diseases, humiliation, torture, oppression, in your hands.
Above all, we are tired of your excesses. We are tired of your corrupt
practices and the looting of the treasuries. Your foreign bank accounts are
swollen with hundreds of millions of dollars, pounds and Euros while hundreds of
millions of people live on one dollar a day.
We are tired of you using
our money to procure arms for your own protection while children go to school
barefooted and on empty stomach; while hospitals are without essential
medicines; while factories are folding up for lack of electricity; and while
harvested crops remain in the bush for lack of good roads. We are tired of all
your inactions, the wait and see and the do nothing approaches to problem
solving.
There are many of you that we have not chosen or asked to lead
us yet are carrying themselves as our leaders. Such people we demand should
retire and allow elections to take place. We demand an end to torture in Egypt
and starvation in Ethiopia and Zimbabwe. We demand an end to the dictatorial
rule in Libya, Egypt, Cameroon, Gabon, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Uganda and the Gambia.
We demand an end to the instabilities in DR. Congo, Sudan, Somalia, Northern
Uganda, Chad and Madagascar. We demand an end to the genocide in Darfur and the
killing of innocent children, women and civilians.
We demand an end to
the official corruption and graft in Nigeria, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea,
Cameroon, Angola, DR. Congo, Chad, South Africa and Guinea. We demand an end to
the eroding of democratic values in Ethiopia, Nigeria, Egypt, Mauritania,
Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon and Gabon. We demand an end
to the use of the continent as a hub for cocaine shipment to Europe.
We
demand better public services now. We demand better education, health, transport
and telecommunication infrastructures now. We demand affordable housing now. We
demand irrigation facilities, tractors, equipment and improved seeds for our
farmers now. You've asked us to tighten our belts while you have loosened yours.
This cannot go on any more. We are starving to death while you are developing
protruding bellies. You are having lavish birthday parties when cholera and
starvation is threatening us.
We demand a share in the revenue from the
sale of oil, gas, gold, diamond, timber, cocoa, coffee, coltan, manganese,
copper, bauxite and tin ore. We demand a say in the way your governments are
run; a say in the way you and your ministers are selected. We demand a say in
the way you spend our money; and a say in the way contracts are awarded. It is
not going to be business as usual anymore. We demand change now. We demand
probity and accountability now. We demand political action to solve the numerous
problems facing we the people.
Look at the world around you. Don't you
see or hear what is going in Asia, Latin America, Europe and North America?
Can't you see that you and your people are being left behind? When you meet with
your colleagues in Africa or sit in your offices, how many of the things you see
or use are made here in Africa? Aren't you ashamed that after ten, fifteen,
twenty, thirty years in power your people still use hoes and cutlasses for
farming, tools their forefathers used before they were colonised? Aren't you
ashamed that after all these years of independence your people cannot feed
themselves; cannot read and write; rely on handouts from Europe and America; and
the youth are in a hurry to leave the continent for you? Can't you see?
Well, a word to the wise is enough but remember that you can fool some
of the people all the time and all the people some of the time but you cannot
fool all the people all the time. We are watching.
* This article first
appeared in Modern Ghana.
* Lord
Aikins Adusei is an activist and anti-corruption campaigner. He blogs at www.iloveafrica2.blogspot.com.
*
Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at
http://www.pambazuka.org/.
http://www.tnr.com
Can Zimbabwe's charismatic and well-intentioned prime
minister wring any
money out of Obama so long as he's sharing power with
Robert Mugabe?
Post Date Friday, June 12, 2009
As if being the
prime minister of Zimbabwe--a nation wracked by economic
devastation,
starvation, and political oppression for the past decade--was
not a
difficult enough job, Morgan Tsvangirai must also share power with
President
Robert Mugabe. Tsvangirai, who has led the opposition Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) since its inception in 1999, became prime minister
in a power-sharing accord brokered with Mugabe in early February, almost a
year after he and the MDC defeated Mugabe and his ZANU-PF in an election
fraught with irregularities. He is now on a three-week tour of Western
capitals, asking governments that once branded Zimbabwe a pariah state to
funnel much-needed aid to his devastated country. Today, he meets with
President Barack Obama in the Oval Office.
"We have not given
up our fire for a democratic Zimbabwe, even when we share
power with someone
who we believe has never been democratic," Tsvangirai
said firmly at the
Council on Foreign Relations in Washington on Wednesday.
Tsvangirai's
democratic credentials and his commitment to a free Zimbabwe
are not in
doubt. He has been imprisoned and beaten, tried for treason, and
marked for
death. In March, just weeks after the coalition government was
formed, he
buried his wife of 31 years after she died in a mysterious car
crash that
many suspect was the work of Mugabe's henchmen. The man deserves
a Nobel
Peace Prize.
While Tsvangirai is someone the West can trust, there
still remain the
not-so-small problems of Mugabe and his political
apparatus, which, despite
their manifest crimes and ineptitude, can still
claim a significant level of
popular support within the country. Mugabe has
ceded control over some
aspects of the government and appears to have
loosened up the internal
repression, but he maintains complete authority
over the nation's armed
forces, intelligence, and security services. He
continues to operate, in the
words of the UK Indepedent's Daniel Howden, the
"hard power" in the country.
http://www.guardian.co.uk
David Smith
in Johannesburg
guardian.co.uk, Friday 12 June 2009 19.11 BST
Zimbabwe
is hoping to persuade several teams, including England, to base
their
World Cup training camps in the country in an effort to attract
tourism from
neighbouring South Africa.
The unity government has drawn up a shortlist
of Brazil, England and Nigeria
to help improve Zimbabwe's tarnished image.
Its bid raises the prospect,
albeit still distant, of stars such as David
Beckham and Wayne Rooney
warming up in a country still getting over
political, economic and public
health crises.
Zimbabwe believes the
tournament could provide an economic lifeline as it
struggles to rebuild
after last year's collapse. Tourism is seen as a
quicker fix than its ailing
agriculture, mining and manufacturing sectors.
Securing the practice
sessions of international football players would be a
coup which could
attract thousands of travelling supporters. Walter Mzembi,
the tourism
minister, visited Brazil last month but said England, on course
to qualify
for next year's finals, were also a prime target.
"We have put England
and Nigeria on our top three list," he said. "When it
goes to top five, we
have added Cameroon and Egypt. Although we have been
given some targets by
Brazil to meet, we should also look at England and
Nigeria. We are working
towards bringing them here as well, or at least one
of them."
He
added: "Tourism is the only practical gain left for us at the World Cup
after our national team flopped. Soccer tourism is big business all over the
world."
But Zimbabwe faces competition from other southern African
countries aiming
to lure visitors who want to combine football with a
holiday, especially if
the host nation runs short of accommodation. South
Africa's north-western
Rustenburg stadium, where some games will be played,
is 95 miles
from Botswana. Mbombela stadium in Nelspruit lies an hour's
drive from the
Mozambican border.
Meanwhile the World Cup trophy is
being paraded through the continent on
its way to South Africa. Danny
Jordaan, chief executive of the local
organising committee, denied its
arrival in Harare in November would hand
free propaganda to Robert
Mugabe.
"We must not focus on Mugabe to the extent that we forget that
there are
people there with their own ambitions and aspirations," he said.
"We should
help them to resolve their problems. Always there's a question of
whether it
is through the carrot or the stick, but I think most of the world
is now
looking at strengthening the process of change in Zimbabwe and
getting
democracy established. We'd certainly want to be part of that
process."