FinGaz
Rangarirai Mberi News
Editor
LANDING a consignment of arms stranded on a Chinese ship might end
up
costing more than what the Zimbabwe Defence Forces (ZDF) actually paid
for
the arms themselves, military sources and experts have said.
A
Chinese ship, the An Yue Jiang, has been drifting in international waters
off South Africa for over a week, bearing 77-tonnes of arms imported by
Zimbabwe from China.
The ship fled Durban last week after a court there
issued an order barring
it from offloading its cargo, and after a German
bank also won an order
allowing it to seize part of the cargo as part
payment for US$40 million it
is reportedly owed by Zimbabwe.
The
Financial Gazette has seen copies of signed contracts between
representatives of the ZDF and China’s Poly Technologies.
Correspondence
between the Zimbabwean government and the Chinese firm show
that Poly
Technologies was awarded the contract to supply three million
rounds of
AK-47 ammunition, 1 500 rocket-propelled grenades and 3 000 mortar
rounds
and mortar tubes. The documents show part of the consignment is
valued at
US$1.27 million.
Contrary to widespread media suggestions that the arms were
ordered after
elections, the documents show that the contract was actually
issued in
September last year.
The agreement is confirmed in a September
7 letter written by P. Muchakazi,
for the Ministry of Defence, to Zi
Dongfang, a representative of the Chinese
firm.
Southern Africa’s other
maritime nations, Mozambique, Namibia and Angola,
have declined to allow the
ship to berth at their ports, under pressure from
western governments and
activists who fear the arms could be used against
civilians.
Chinese
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said the arms shipment was
“perfectly
normal trade in military goods between China and Zimbabwe”, but
because it
was impossible for Zimbabwe to receive the goods, the cargo could
be shipped
back to China.
But should Zimbabwe insist on transporting the arms into the
country, it
would have to incur huge costs that would make the deal
commercially
unviable.
The ZDF had already paid clearance fees to South
African authorities, which
cannot be recovered now even though the arms will
no longer go through South
Africa.
Zimbabwe also faces substantial
freight costs arising from the fact that the
ship has been carrying its
cargo for longer than anticipated under the terms
of the original
agreement.
And even if the ship eventually found somewhere to dock, bringing
the arms
into Zimbabwe would be almost impossible. If, for instance, the
ship berthed
in Luanda, bringing the 77-tonne cargo to Zimbabwe would only
have to be by
air, as there is no rail link from Angola. An airlift would
require at least
two flights on the Russian-made cargo plane, an Illyushin
II-76, which has a
payload of 44 tonnes.
The Air Force of Zimbabwe has an
Illyushin, but the cost could be
prohibitive.
Military officials have
also discussed the possibility of hiring a private
operator, Avient
Aviation, a British cargo charter airline that has
previously flown into
Zimbabwe. However, this is unlikely, a source said.
People familiar with the
China deal dispute charges that the arms are to be
used for
repression.
“(Ammunition) stocks go down. You need to continuously replenish
them. Once
you have expended certain stocks, for instance in practice, you
need to take
a fresh inventory of your ‘first line’ and ‘second line’
stock,” a source
said this week.
The source explained that “first line”
arms are the basic weapons that would
be required to go to war, while the
“second line” ones are reserves.
Ammunition is run down in practice
exercises conducted by the defence
forces.
“This was a normal business
transaction with nothing to do with elections.”
The China shipment should
have been delivered months ago, but “there was a
lot of bureaucracy to get
over”, other sources said.
Such a shipment would need transit permits from
the arms control boards of
the countries through which it would be
transported. However, such boards do
not sit regularly, resulting in delays
in the issuance of permits.
In South Africa, such permits are issued by the
National Conventional Arms
Control Committee (NCACC), allowing the weapons
to be shipped through South
African territory.
But it was possible the
ship could have set sail before all requisite
paperwork was in place, said
the sources.
The An Yue Jiang raised anchor and fled Durban last week after a
court
suspended the cargo’s conveyance permit allowing the weapons transit
through
South African territory.
Provincial and Local Government Minister
Sydney Mufamadi, President Thabo
Mbeki’s top mediator in Zimbabwe, chairs
the NCACC.
Defence Secretary January Masilela has defended the decision,
saying that in
the absence of an international arms embargo on Zimbabwe,
South Africa was
acting within the law.
Poly Technologies is an arms
trader owned by a commercial subsidiary of the
People’s Liberation Army
(PLA), the Chinese defence force. The ship carrying
the arms is operated by
COSCO, the China Ocean Shipping Co, also a PLA
subsidiary.
The Zimbabwe
deal is not the first controversy to hit Poly Technologies. The
company has
a 1996 indictment in the United States after it tried to ship 2
000 AK-47s
into the United States.
Western critics have also targeted the company for
allegedly selling arms to
so-called “rogue states”. It has been criticised
for allegedly selling
cruise missiles to Iran, and for reportedly trading
weapons for heroin in
Myanmar.
Zimbabwe has also had previous dealings
with arms supplier Norinco (China
North Industries Group Corporation), also
state owned.
FinGaz
Clemence
Manyukwe and Njabulo Ncube Staff Reporter
CHURCHES have issued their
strongest criticism yet of the political violence
sweeping the country,
calling for international intervention to prevent
Zimbabwe from sliding into
anarchy.
Church leaders spoke as soldiers imposed an unofficial curfew in
urban areas
and a post-election crackdown continued in the countryside.
A
joint statement from Zimbabwe’s main church groups deplored what it called
“organised violence” and demanded the immediate release of presidential
election results held four weeks ago to ease rising tensions.
The delays
in the release of the results came after the Zimbabwe Electoral
Commission
(ZEC) gave in to pressure from ZANU-PF by accepting partial
recounts in 23
constituencies, which might overturn the Movement for
Democratic Change
(MDC) victory in the House of Assembly.
Since then, political temperatures
have heated up amid reports of violence,
torture and intimidation in some
parts of the country.
Feeling insecure about the sudden turn of events, MDC
leader Morgan
Tsvangirai has shifted his base to Botswana where he is
aggressively pushing
regional and international leaders to take stern action
against President
Robert Mugabe’s government, which has ruled Zimbabwe since
independence in
1980.
A strongly worded statement issued by the churches
this week is likely to
pile pressure on ZEC, whose autonomy is now under
serious test.
The Zimbabwe Council of Churches, the Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops
Conference
and the Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe said their members had
reported
the setting up of bases by war veterans and ZANU-PF youths from
where acts
of violence are being committed.
In a statement, the church
leaders urged the Southern African Development
Community (SADC), the African
Union (AU) and the United Nations (UN) to
intervene to avoid what they
called “genocide”.
“People are being abducted, tortured and humiliated by
being asked to repeat
slogans of the political party they are alleged not to
support, ordered to
attend mass meetings where they are told they voted for
the wrong candidate
and (that they) should never repeat it in the run-off
election for
president, and in some cases people are being murdered,” the
church leaders
said.
The churches said the delay in the release of the
results had created
“uncertainty, anxiety and frustration”. They want the
ZEC to “release the
true results of the presidential poll without further
delay”.
Leaders have appealed to SADC, the AU and the UN “to work towards
arresting
the deteriorating political and security situation in
Zimbabwe”.
And they issued a stark warning: “We warn the world that if
nothing is done
to help the people of Zimbabwe from their predicament, we
shall soon be
witnessing genocide…”
Responding to the church’s call for
international intervention, Deputy
Information Minister Bright Matonga told
The Financial Gazette there was no
crisis in the country to warrant any
multilateral action.
Despite government denials, reports of violence are
increasing.
Speaking on the delay in the release of full election results,
Zuma told
Reuters: “It’s not acceptable. It’s not helping the Zimbabwean
people who
have gone out to elect the kind of party and presidential
candidate they
want, exercising their constitutional right.”
Zuma added:
“I imagine that the leaders in Africa should really move in to
unlock this
logjam.
“Concretely, this means African countries should identify some people
to go
in there, probably talk to both parties, call them and ask them what
the
problem is, as well as the electoral commission”.
Yesterday, he was
quoted by the BBC as saying the results delay was not
President Robert
Mugabe’s fault, but ZEC’s.
Both ZANU-PF and MDC said yesterday they would
welcome the proposed new ANC
initiative.
“If the ANC makes an initiative,
we will talk to them as a liberation
movement,” said Bright Matonga, deputy
information minister. “The ANC,
including President Mbeki, are our brothers
and sisters in the liberation
movement. We have no problem in talking to the
ANC.”
Nelson Chamisa, spokesman for the Morgan Tsvangirai camp of the MDC,
said
his party was open to any effort to convince President Mugabe and
ZANU-PF to
relinquish power.
“Any effort is welcome. If the ANC now
suggests a parallel process, it might
mean that they are not happy with the
way President Mbeki is mediating in
the Zimbabwean crisis,” said Chamisa.
“We do appreciate the seriousness the
members of the ANC are putting into
the crisis, which is now beyond SADC
alone.”
Last week, Tsvangirai caused
a stir when he said “Mbeki should be relieved
of his duties” as mediator.
But SADC this week endorsed Mbeki’s mediation
effort in the face of mounting
criticism of his role from Western
governments, the opposition and from his
own party.
Meanwhile, Tsvangirai yesterday took his diplomatic offensive to
Mozambique,
where he was to meet President Armando Guebuza.
Tsvangirai
has insisted that he won the presidential election, and his
on-going
campaign is designed to convince African leaders to recognise him
as the
legitimate leader of Zimbabwe, and to persuade President Mugabe to
step
aside and allow the MDC to form a new government.
Tsvangirai has also
demanded that President Mugabe remove ZANU-PF militia
and state security
agents he says are beating up opposition supporters, and
allow humanitarian
agencies to provide medicine, food, clothing and shelter
to hundreds of
people his party says have been displaced as a result of the
violence.
Party officials say Tsvangirai has taken up temporary residence
in
neighbouring Botswana, because of security concerns.
FinGaz
Njabulo Ncube Political
Editor
THE two main protagonists in Zimbabwe’s political stalemate say
they would
welcome the proposed parallel mediation effort led by South
Africa’s ruling
African National Congress (ANC).
ANC president Jacob
Zuma has called the situation in Zimbabwe “unacceptable”,
and his party has
said it would seek direct contact with both ZANU-PF and
the opposition
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) to help end the crisis.
On Tuesday,
Zuma, in an interview with Reuters, proposed even broader
intervention,
involving more African leaders.
But he later told the BBC that the Thabo
Mbeki mediation effort should be
supported.
In an interview on Tuesday,
Zimbabwe Union of Journalists president Mathew
Takaona said a group of
soldiers had ordered him and a relative out of their
vehicle near a shopping
centre in Chitungwiza shortly after 8pm on Thursday
last week.
Takaona
and his relative sustained injuries and were treated at a clinic.
“They
ordered us to lie down and assaulted us using sjamboks. They also used
a log
to assault my cousin,” said Takaona.
In Kuwadzana 5, residents reported
beatings of bar patrons. Nightclubs were
forced to close early.
A family
in the suburb said to support the MDC was assaulted in their home.
Police
spokesperson Wayne Bvudzijena however, insisted that no such reports
had yet
been made to the police.
“So far I have not come across that. People can
write letters of
condemnation, but it does not help. People should be
advised to report all
cases to the police,” he said.
On Monday, Justice
Minister Patrick Chinamasa told journalists that reports
of violence were
exaggerated.
The MDC had a tendency to claim any person who has died as its
member, he
charged. However, a report by the Zimbabwe Doctors For Human
Rights says
between election day, March 29, and April 14, members of the
organisation
had attended to 157 cases of injury resulting from organised
violence and
torture.
“The provinces where the injuries were sustained
include Manicaland,
Mashonaland East and West, and Masvingo. Of the 30
hospitalised patients, 15
are from Mudzi,” the doctors said.
“One third
of the patients are women, including a 15 year old girl who was
abducted
together with her mother from her home, made to lie on her front
and beaten
on her buttocks. Her mother, who is pregnant, was similarly
beaten. Both
mother and daughter required hospital admission.”
The doctors said the most
common injury observed was extensive soft tissue
injury on the
buttocks.
“Some of the individuals sustained injuries that can lead to severe
permanent disability,” the report says.
Meanwhile, reacting to
Chinamasa’s challenge for evidence of the violence,
civic groups have handed
SADC’s organ on politics, defence and security what
they say is documentary
proof of state-sponsored violence.
A delegation of the National Association
Of Non-Governmental Organisations
(NANGO) on Tuesday met diplomats from
Angola, head of the organ, and Tomaz
Salomao, SADC executive
secretary.
Civil society groups themselves are facing worsening intimidation,
the
meeting heard.
A director with the Zimbabwe Electoral Support Network
(ZESN), the largest
local observer group to the elections, was briefly
detained at the Harare
International Airport last week.
The outcome of a
ZESN parallel voting process had shown Tsvangirai beating
President Mugabe,
but not winning enough to avoid a runoff.
Fambai Ngirande, spokesman for
NANGO, confirmed the meetings. “Medical,
photographic and legal evidence
were produced during the meeting, which
point that the country has a
mounting security crisis, which now requires
urgent SADC intervention going
beyond the mandate of the Mbeki initiative
and the SADC observer mission,”
he said.
FinGaz
Shame Makoshori
Staff Reporter
LOCAL companies are taking their hunt for skills into
South Africa, the
region’s economic powerhouse, which is wooing the
country’s fleeing
professional and skilled workers, The Financial Gazette
can reveal.
The move follows permission granted to foreign
currency-earning companies to
pay salaries and allowances in foreign
currency in a bid to retain critical
skills, sources said this week.
The
majority of the firms granted the permission to pay salaries in foreign
currency are in the mining sector.
This week Anglo Platinum launched its
offshore recruitment for technical
staff for its platinum operation at Unki
Mine.
It placed advertisements in mainstream South African newspapers,
believed to
have a wide readership among Zimbabweans.
“We…. are
encouraging Zimbabwean citizens to join us,” Anglo Platinum said
in a job
advertisement in one of South Africa’s leading Sunday newspapers.
Anglo
Platinum said it was looking for people to fill vacancies at its
operation
in Shurugwi, scheduled to start platinum mining this year.
Among the skills
the mining giant was looking for were mine technical
services professionals,
managers for concentrators, mine overseers,
engineering managers and other
technical staff.
Air Zimbabwe also recently went to South Africa in search of
pilots and
captains. The airline has also been granted the authority to
remunerate part
of its workforce in foreign currency.
Investigations
indicate that South Africa has experienced a flood of local
companies trying
to lure Zimbabwean engineers, electricians, civil engineers
and other
artisans back into the country, with United States dollar
packages.
Zimbabwe has lost skills in the construction, mining and
teaching
professions, mainly to South Africa, currently enjoying a healthy
economic
growth rate that has even put pressure on demand for domestic power
supplies.
Massive construction projects ahead of the 2010 soccer World
Cup have also
lured Zimbabweans into South Africa, which won the bid to host
the
tournament.
Human resources experts this week told The Financial
Gazette that the level
of skilled manpower shortages in Zimbabwe has reached
alarming levels and
the low number of technical students in the country’s
universities and
colleges has compounded the situation.
A recent private
study carried out by a local human resources consultancy
firm revealed that
the total number of technical students currently enrolled
in tertiary
institutions did not meet the manpower requirements of the
country’s leading
mining companies.
An estimated 3,1 million Zimbabweans are believed to be
working in other
countries with 37 percent of them in the United Kingdom, 35
percent in
Botswana, five percent in South Africa while 3,4 percent are
estimated to be
residing in Canada.
A recent report by the Zimbabwe
Council for Nurses said more than 3 500
nurses and 969 doctors had fled from
government health institutions as at
September 2007 after the health
professionals intensified their hunt for
better opportunities in the region
and abroad.
FinGaz
Clemence
Manyukwe Staff Reporter
ELECTORAL petitions filed by the Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) in 60
constituencies, reveal campaigns marred by
violence, threats of war and the
use of food as a political
weapon.
In one petition brought by the MDC’s Kizito Mbiriza, who lost in
Gokwe
Nembudziya to government minister Flora Buka, it is alleged the land
reform
minister told farmers in the area to feign illiteracy so that they
would be
assisted to vote.
They were allegedly warned that failure to
comply would result in their land
being seized.
Buka is also alleged to
have ignored a warning by the Zimbabwe Electoral
Commission to stop using
food aid as a campaign tool.
On voting day, Headman Nembudziya is said to
have moved up and down polling
queues telling villagers that anyone who
voted for the MDC would also have
their land taken away.
There was more
pronounced violence in Zvimba North, where local government
minister
Ignatius Chombo won against MDC candidate Earnest Mudimu.
Passmore
Machingauta of Perth farm had his homestead torched. The matter was
reported
to the police (RRB 024486), but no arrests were made, said Mudimu
in his
report.
The court has also heard that: “On March 29 2008, Philemon Manengwa
of
Landfall Farm compound was stabbed several times with a knife and is
recovering at Banket Hospital. He was attacked by ZANU-PF youths.”
The
MDC candidate had been barred from certain areas by youths claiming that
“these are ZANU-PF areas”.
At ARDA Assisi Farm in the constituency, a
group of youths forced Manengwa’s
campaign team to leave. After they left,
residents of the compound were
beaten up, accused of being sell-outs.
Reports were also made to Raffingora
police.
However, no arrests were
made, after Chombo allegedly ordered the
complainants to withdraw the
charges.
Mudimu also reports: “On March 5, Tongesai Chako of Muriel Mine was
assaulted by ruling party youths and his truck was looted for wearing an MDC
T-shirt.
“On The same day, Herbert Masango and Owen Chigwayo were
assaulted for
campaigning for the opposition. The cases were reported to
Mutorashanga
Police Station CR No 22/03/08 00/03/08, but no arrests were
made.”
In Chegutu East, a supporter of eventual winner Webster Shamu is
accused of
using a rifle to intimidate voters.
The MDC’s losing candidate
Gift Konjana said in his petition: “On 25 March
2008, I witnessed Stanley
Goredema moving around menacingly with an AK47
rifle and threatening that
should the opposition win in that constituency,
war was going to return
immediately.
“On 21 March, the same person had pointed the same rifle at an
MDC council
candidate for Ward 19, Paulson Mutatabikwa. A report was made to
the police
(but) the police did not respond.”
ZANU-PF candidates cited in
the various electoral petitions are yet to
respond to the allegations.
FinGaz
Njabulo Ncube Political
Editor
THE United Nations secretary general Ban Ki-moon is to discuss the
alleged
violence against opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)
with
leaders of the African Union and the African Commission on Human and
Peoples
Rights (ACHPR), as the world struggles to resolve Zimbabwe’s
political
impasse.
Ban, who met opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai
on Monday in the Ghanaian
capital Accra, assured the MDC he would hold
meetings with AU president
Jakaya Kikwete and African Commission chairman
Alpha Oumar Konare as soon as
he returned to New York.
“This afternoon
(Monday), upon the request of Mr Morgan Tsvangirai, MDC
leader of Zimbabwe,
I met him for about half-an-hour. He complained about
the current political
situation after the Presidential elections, where the
results have not been
released, even after three weeks.
“He briefed me on the current political,
social and humanitarian situation.
“He told me that the military had been
deployed around the country
terrorising people, and therefore many people
had been running away from
their homes and hiding somewhere, which had in
turn created a very serious
humanitarian situation,” said Ban.
“He said
that this situation is not acceptable and since the situation is
now beyond
the capacity of SADC, the Southern African Development Community,
he asked
that the Secretary-General of the United Nations, in close
coordination with
the African Union, should intervene and provide the
necessary humanitarian
assistance and also prevent this violence that is
taking place, so that they
can restore peace and stability in their
country,” he said.
Ban
expressed concern at the post-electoral situation where the results of
the
Presidential elections have not been officially announced a month after
voting.
“I also expressed my deep concern about this continuing
situation, where
violence and polarisation have now been prevalent, and I
asked him to resort
to peaceful means to resolve this issue, through
dialogue. I told him that
since the African Union has mandated the situation
to SADC, and upon
reflecting on his request, I told him that I will be
discussing the issue
with leaders of the African Union.
“Upon my return
to New York, I’m going to discuss this matter so that the
international
community will be able to facilitate, so that this situation
could be
resolved through peaceful means.
“Again, at this time, I would like to urge
the authorities of the Zimbabwean
government to release officially the
results of the Presidential elections
and resolve this political deadlock
through peaceful means, so that the
people of Zimbabwe should not be made to
pay for their choice, which they
have exercised in the polling
stations.”
Asked whether he would make any contact with African leaders, he
said: “I’m
going to discuss this matter with the President of the African
Union,
President Kikwete, and the African Commission Chairman, (Alpha Oumar
Konare).”
FinGaz
Rangarirai Mberi News
Editor
THERE was a lot strange about last Friday, and it was best
illustrated by
the sight of Headman Chigwedere handing Shooting Stars the
Independence Cup.
An ecstatic moment for Shooting Stars, but a sad
reflection of the
intransigence of President Robert Mugabe and
ZANU–PF.
Hours before the nation's newest headman handed Stars the "Uhuru
Trophy",
President Mugabe had delivered what should have been one of his
most
important Independence Day speeches in recent years.
The nation had
eagerly anticipated the speech, hoping it would give some
direction to a
country that has drifted rudderless for weeks.
It must be said that very few
knew exactly what it was they wanted to hear
President Mugabe say.
But it
must have been something to reassure them their country was not
sliding into
the anarchic, tin–pot dictatorship the harshest critics believe
ZANU–PF has
reduced the country to since March 29.
In short, there were millions of
desperate Zimbabweans out there aching for
answers.
From the
businessperson who has had a lifeblood order cancelled, "until
things clear
up", to the ordinary Zimbabwean wondering how long this can
surely continue,
they all tuned in on Friday to a speech that had long lost
much of its
former weight.
But after berating musicians and athletes who use drugs,
proposing
castration as punishment for perverts, and weighing in on the
great debate
on female fashion, President Mugabe capped his speech with this
clincher:
"Things will never change in this country."
To illustrate he
was serious about this, he gave long–term instructions to
his
ministers.
Munacho Mutezo, for instance, was to repair the water and sewerage
systems
across the country, even after his defeat at the polls, at least
before the
recount.
"We know you have grievances against us," President
Mugabe said, addressing
his Highfields audience directly. "But we too have
grievances against you."
What were these? Firstly, that city folks bend over
for imperialists because
of the minor inconvenience of being short of bread
and sugar. And, the
second grievance, that these same city folk allow their
children to expose
their bellybuttons.
In a nutshell, President Mugabe
spent over an hour doing what he could have
done in a second – pull the
finger at everyone listening to him.
So what's to be done? What is to break
this stalemate between a President
and his fellow countrymen? Nothing,
especially if one side swears "things
will never change in this
country".
What does this mean, exactly?
Apart, of course, from the fact
that Chigwedere is allowed to continue his
government duties, saved from a
life of presiding over village courts,
handing down punishment to goat
thieves, husband –beaters and the local
hooligan who won't stop fouling the
village well.
Does this "things will never change" mean that inflation,
currently measured
at 165 000 percent officially, will continue to rise,
perhaps the only
change being how larger the leaps become from here on end?
Or that the
Zimbabwe dollar continues to plummet, ever the butt of jokes
worldwide?
Does it mean that the country's infrastructure continues to
crumble, such
that the people of Highfield and other urban areas continue to
wade through
sewage each time they leave their homes?
Or that, in a
supposedly modern city such as Harare, water is collected from
shallow wells
and petrol stations sell firewood? Or that Zesa is merely
backup for
generators, when it really must be the reverse?
And this present business of
dumping the nation at the mercy of all sorts of
self–righteous twats and
commentators from all corners of the earth.
Will even countries that really
would be the world's armpits continue to
look down upon once proud
Zimbabweans with both pity and derision, lecturing
them at every
turn?
Will ZANU–PF, by its actions, continue to so easily open Zimbabwe's
defences
to foreign intrusion? Reducing this once influential world player
to a mere
pawn on a chessboard for the cleverer, stronger
players?
Clearly, there are people in government who enjoy all this ongoing
diplomatic back–and–forth. It keeps them occupied, since they abandoned
their real duties years go.
If, really, "things will never change in this
country", how long can the
current state of affairs continue before even its
authors admit it is
getting a bit ridiculous?
When will the line back to
normalcy be crossed?
When can things become normal again? Remember normal?
Books in schools,
water from taps, grain in fields, drugs in clinics, power
at a switch, cash
in banks, common sense in government?
Even if ZANU–PF
was to regain its parliamentary majority after this recount
and President
Mugabe himself was returned to power in a second round vote,
even then, some
change – in whatever form–would have to be instituted.
Unless, of course,
President Mugabe has no interest in solving his
"grievances" with his own
people, for which he must indeed continue to try
and make sure things never
change.
FinGaz
Charles Rukuni Bureau
Chief
BULAWAYO — The Zimbabwe International Trade Fair (ZITF), which
opened in
Bulawayo on Tuesday, is providing a stark contrast between the
Zimbabwe we
have today and the one that we ought to have.
A tour of
the fair shows that stands are packed with goods that are not
available in
shops, giving the impression that production at most factories
has not
stopped, making one wonder where the goods are going.
Up to last week, there
had been wide speculation that the country’s premier
trade show would be a
flop because of the current political impasse. There
were even suggestions
that the fair should be postponed but the organisers
insisted it would go on
because they had already invested too much into the
showcase.
They seem
to have been vindicated as there has been a fairly good turnout
considering
the current political and economic environment.
There are more than 500
exhibitors, including seven foreign countries.
Only three foreign countries
cancelled their bookings.
It is not yet clear how many local companies failed
to pitch up but one
exhibitor who has been handling bookings for 14
companies, said three firms
from Harare failed to turn up owing to the fuel
crisis.
ZITF normally makes fuel arrangements for exhibitors with the
National Oil
Company of Zimbabwe but exhibitors said yesterday they had not
been
allocated any.
ZITF general manager Daniel Chigaru could not be
reached for comment on what
had become of the facility.
Zimbabwe has been
under siege for the past decade but things seem to have
worsened over the
past 18 months as demands for a change of government
mounted in the face of
continued economic decline and ever increasing
inflation.
Things came to
a head after the March 29 harmonised elections when the
ruling ZANU-PF
party, which enjoyed a two-thirds majority in parliament
following the 2005
elections, only won 97 out of the 210 House of Assembly
seats.
The Morgan
Tsvangirai faction of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)
won 99 seats,
up from 41 in 2005.
ZANU-PF, however, fared better in the senate elections
where it won 30 seats
against the MDC Tsvangirai’s 24.
But the Zimbabwe
Electoral Commission, which is responsible for conducting
elections in the
country, failed to release results of the crucial
presidential elections
though there was wide speculation that Tsvangirai had
beaten President
Robert Mugabe. The issue was, however, the margin by which
he had
won.
The MDC claimed it had won an outright victory but ZANU-PF pressed for a
recount of votes in 23 constituencies before the release of the presidential
election results, sparking fears that they wanted to rig. The party has also
been talking about a re-run of the presidential poll, implying that
President Mugabe is not likely to score more than 50 percent even after the
recount.
The delay in the release of the results is playing havoc in the
market with
the Zimbabwean dollar plunging from $5 million to the South
African rand
just before the elections to $10 million this week. It was
trading at $40
million to the greenback and is now down to $85
million.
The price of petrol on the parallel market has also shot to $130
million per
litre. The few goods that are still available in shops are now
beyond the
reach of most people with inflation now officially put at 165 000
percent.
Observers say the March 29 election results were a vote for change
because
Zimbabweans, including rural voters who have been the backbone of
ZANU-PF,
were suffering.
Voters were convinced that only a change of
leadership could extricate them
from their present woes.
ZANU-PF seems,
however, to have dug in its heels and is seeking to reverse
the outcome
through a recount and a re-run of the presidential elections
even though the
initial results have never been announced.
A war veteran said the ruling
party was in a fix because the defeat of
President Mugabe meant the death of
ZANU-PF as a party.
“These are all delaying tactics to enable the party to
reorganise because if
ZANU-PF is defeated it is dead,” the war veteran
said.
But while the ruling party toys around with ways to survive, the
average
Zimbabwean continues to suffer. This is not likely to endear him or
her to
the ruling party.
FinGaz
James Maridadi
WHEN news
of the prospects of an emergency Southern African Development
Community
(SADC) Heads of State and Government Summit meeting in Lusaka
Zambia started
filtering through, there was joy and jubilation among
progressive optimistic
forces who felt the Zimbabwean question would be
dealt a bodily punch and
solved once and for all by a team of elected
statesmen who represent the
future of Africa.
In contrast I withdrew into my shell and cried myself
to sleep. SADC like
the African Union (AU) has no record of dealing with
problems in the region
and Africa respectively.
They simply do not have
the capacity to do so. In my humble view, which
turned out to be correct,
the summit meeting in Lusaka was only but a
ritual, a farce, a face saving
exercise for SADC in a world that is getting
increasingly uncomfortable with
the awkward and politically untenable
situation in Zimbabwe.
Knowing very
well that they lacked both the capacity and will, SADC leaders
went ahead to
make noise and convene a meeting in Zambia. They came, they
wined, dined and
returned to their respective countries.
The outcome of their meeting is a
zero out of zero. Zimbabwe is in a worse
off position after some of those
leaders made politically unpalatable
innuendos. (President) Mugabe relishes
this scenario as it enables him to
buy time. Like Kenya, the Zimbabwe case
will soon be forgotten and left to
Zimbabwe to find an internal settlement.
This is the sort of matrix that
(President) Mugabe is trying to
create.
When crunch time comes, which it soon will, (President) Mugabe will
not mind
littering the streets of Harare with a few lifeless bodies in the
name of
upholding the rule of law and maintaining peace and
tranquility.
This I am certain is how the immediate future will unfold unless
those given
the mandate to rule by the people have some other strategy up
their sleeve.
It is high time that SADC leaders wake up and smell the coffee,
discard this
camaraderie nonsense and start responding to the dynamics of
today’s
politics with honor and honesty.
The contempt with which
(President) Mugabe treats SADC was visible in the
way he snubbed an invite
and instead dispatched his cronies, Simbarashe
Mumbengegwi, a man who has
never won a popular vote ever since he was born,
Patrick Chinamasa who was
rejected by his own kith in Manicaland and
Emmerson Mnangagwa who ran for
dear life from male nurse Blessing Chebundo
who had made it a habit to drub
him in all elections since 2000.
To borrow from the late Simon Muzenda kana
gudo (even a baboon) would have
been equal to this Lusaka no-job.
The
Economic Community of Western African States (ECOWAS) as a regional
block of
African States fares far better. They have Ecomog, which has proved
quite
useful in handling explosive situations.
Apart from lauding Zimbabweans for
the peaceful manner in which elections
were held, what else of substance
came out of Lusaka?
Did the Heads of State and Government have to overwhelm
an already
over-burdened tax payer in one of the world’s most afflicted and
poverty
stricken regions by funding that good-for-nothing gathering whose
purpose as
it turned out was to tell the world that elections in Zimbabwean
were
peaceful? Who does not know that by now?
As soon as (President)
Mugabe’s emissaries condescendingly read the riot act
at the meeting, the
Heads of State and Government shamelessly withdrew to
their bases. How
shameless and wrong. Imagine if all those billions of
dollars spent on this
misadventure had been put towards the purchase of
anti-retroviral drugs in a
region with the highest HIV prevalence rates in
the whole world.
The
impact would have been far-reaching and refreshing. The problem in
Africa is
that our leaders are accountable only to themselves and their
immediate
families otherwise how would Khama for example account for his
trip to
Lusaka if taxpayers in Botswana demanded to know.
What will Guebuza report
back to parliament in Maputo? That (President)
Mugabe refused to attend due
to some pressing business in Harare and that in
a statement read on his
behalf, he (President Mugabe) warned SADC to guard
against being agents of
imperialism?
Then there is this gentleman called Thabo Mbeki. He needs a pair
of
spectacles and hearing aids as a mater of urgency lest he becomes a
danger
even to himself. How else can we explain his utterances that there is
no
crisis in Zimbabwe?
An entire nation of 15 million people is crying
out for help and mercy so
loud are their screams that even those long dead
and buried can hear. The
rate of exchange is at US$ 1 to Z$ 90 million. A
standard loaf of bread, a
staple necessity for the masses costs a whooping
Z$ 40 million if available.
Not a single filling station has petrol or
diesel. Inflation is upwards of
150 000 percent, a world record for a
country not at war. Results of an
election held four weeks ago have not been
announced.
There is no parliament and a dissolved cabinet is squeezing itself
into
office through the back door even after most of them overwhelmingly
lost the
elections. The country is on auto cruise. This is what is called a
crisis in
capital letters. Period.
Is it not amazing how (President)
Mugabe outwits his colleagues? He seems to
have a way to talk them into
submission and cow them like schoolboys.
He rides roughshod over them and
they do not seem to mind. Remember
Mwanawasa’s regrets in a subsequent
face-to-face encounter with the great
leader after he had earlier referred
to Zimbabwe as a sinking titanic.
None at SADC, do they lack memory or is it
guts to remind President Mugabe
that he remains the only leader on the
African continent in recent years to
have twice intervened militarily in the
internal affairs of other states in
nonchalant disregard of those countries
sovereignty and total disregard of
their ability to employ home grown
methods to solve their internal disputes.
Mozambique and the DRC. How so
hypocritical? In both cases Zimbabwe as an
economy emerged poorer and
totally lost the diplomatic affection of future
leaders of those same states
who accused some sections of the Zimbabwe
military of plundering their
wealth. Diamonds in the DRC is a case in point.
Those praying for Zimbabwe
must not only pray for peace but must also pray
for our political leaders to
have shame, humility and common sense. They
must also remind leaders that
they were made in exactly the same image of
the Lord as the afflicted and
down trodden.
James Maridadi is a freelance journalist and political
analyst
FinGaz
Megan Lindow
PRESIDENT
Robert Mugabe appears increasingly unlikely to allow the election
he appears
to have lost to end his 28-year tenure.
The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission
officials on Sunday announced a new delay
in the recounting of votes from 23
of the 210 constituencies in an election
held four weeks ago.
Opposition
leaders believe the results are being rigged to deny them
victory, but the
growing campaign of violent intimidation against opposition
supporters makes
it unlikely that the opposition will take matters to the
streets. So the
search for a resolution to the crisis has increasingly
shifted the spotlight
to the landlocked country’s neighbours, and the extent
to which they might
pressure President Mugabe to respect the electorate’s
verdict.
Opposition
presidential candidate Morgan Tsvangirai has fled the country,
while 10
opposition activists have been killed and hundreds more injured in
post-election violence — and refugees continue to stream across the border
into South Africa. Despite growing calls from around the region and the
world for the immediate release of the election results, President Mugabe
appears unmoved.
Last Friday he celebrated the 28th anniversary of the
country’s independence
by aiming his wrath against Britain, the former
colonial power, whose
bidding he accuses the opposition of doing.
“Down
with thieves who want to steal our country,” he thundered, in his
first
speech since the elections, calling on Zimbabweans to be vigilant “in
the
face of vicious British machinations and the machinations of our other
detractors, who are the allies of Britain”.
While Britain bluntly accuses
President Mugabe of “stealing” the election,
reactions from African leaders
have been more restrained. On Sunday the
African Union joined the chorus of
calls for the immediate release of poll
results. Former United Nations
Secretary General Kofi Annan also weighed in,
calling on African leaders to
find a solution to the situation, which he
called “a serious crisis with
impact beyond Zimbabwe”.
But leaders of the Southern African Development
Community (SADC) kept
noticeably quiet on Zimbabwe at a summit on poverty
and development in
Mauritius —except to ask South African President Thabo
Mbeki to continue to
lead mediation efforts on their behalf.
South Africa
is the neighbour with the most leverage over Zimbabwe because
of economic
ties, but Mbeki has stuck fast to his policy of “quiet
diplomacy”, refusing
to apply visible pressure on President Mugabe.
Still, Mbeki’s political
marginalisation within his own party, which made
him a lame duck when it
chose his arch-rival Jacob Zuma as ANC president
last December, has
emboldened critics of his Zimbabwe policy.
Trade union members in the South
African port of Durban refused to offload a
Chinese ship carrying armaments
for the Zimbabwean government. The vessel,
having also been denied entry to
Mozambique and Tanzania, had to leave the
port and may be recalled to China,
according to news agencies.
And Zambia’s President Levy Mwanawasa took the
unprecedented step of urging
surrounding countries not to allow the cargo of
weapons to reach Zimbabwe
for fear of escalating the crisis.
Analysts
believe that only Zimbabwe’s neighbours, particularly South Africa,
have the
leverage to force President Mugabe to resolve the crisis. But
Zimbabwe’s
neighbours are divided over how to respond, and all are wary of
an anarchic
breakdown that brings thousands more refugees streaming across
the
border.
Although President Mugabe has long traded on his credentials as an
anti-imperialist liberation hero, younger leaders in the region are
exasperated by his behaviour.
Last Friday, Botswana’s foreign minister,
Phandu Skelemani, broke ranks with
his SADC peers to publicly criticise
Mbeki’s handling of the crisis and
admit that leaders are more concerned
about the situation than is reflected
in their public
statements.
Referring to the extraordinary SADC summit called the previous
weekend to
discuss Zimbabwe, he said: “Everyone agreed that things are not
normal,
except Mbeki... But now he understands that the rest of SADC feels
this is a
matter of urgency and we are risking lives and limbs being lost.
He got that
message clearly.”
Still, President Mugabe can count on a more
ssympathetic hearing from such
liberation-era stalwarts as Angola’s
President Eduardo Dos Santos.
Although President Mugabe may be vulnerable to
pressure from his neighbours,
analysts doubt that member states of the SADC
will agree on any decisive
action that could force him to go. Mbeki and
other leaders have previously
given President Mugabe political cover by
endorsing the results of previous
elections that have looked questionable to
international observers.
“The one thing (President) Mugabe has been able to
do is rely on the support
of the region,” said Elizabeth Sidiropoulos,
national director of the South
African Institute for International
Affairs.
“So, the question is, at what point do (President) Mugabe and the
(Zimbabwean) security forces think that the tide has changed?”
South
Africa holds the ultimate leverage over Zimbabwe, because, as the
country’s
electricity supplier, it could simply turn out the lights. But
shutting down
Zimbabwe would be considerably more painful for President
Mugabe’s
long-suffering people than for the aging Zimbabwean himself, and
the
resulting refugee crisis would put a destabilising strain on both South
Africa and other neighbours.
Yet Chris Maroleng, a Zimbabwe expert at the
Institute for Security Studies
in Pretoria, expects that regional leaders
will toughen their stance in
time.
“Following the recount (of votes in
Zimbabwe), we will probably see some
kind of cohesive strategy to deal with
Zimbabwe,” he said.
“As the situation worsens in Zimbabwe, (regional leaders)
will increasingly
see (President) Mugabe as a liability,” he added.
That,
and the precarious state of Zimbabwe’s finances, may yet change the
country’s political calculus.
FinGaz
Stanley Kwenda Staff
Reporter
ZIMBABWE is headed for another poor winter wheat farming season
as
post-election farm violence and labour unrest is delaying preparations,
farmer groups said this week.
Farmers said the electoral stalemate
has overshadowed preparations for the
new season, while renewed farm
evictions and violence have laid the ground
for disaster in the upcoming
winter farming season.
The militant agriculture group, Justice for
Agriculture (JAG), said the next
winter farming season would be yet another
“absolute disaster” due to a
plethora of problems in the aftermath of the
March 29 elections.
“It is going to be an absolute disaster from a commercial
point of view.
There are no preparations taking place on the farms as a
result of violence
taking place. No one is planning to do anything at the
moment,” JAG chief
executive officer, John Werswick said.
“To make
matters worse, we hear that at some farms owned by new farmers,
workers are
on strike disputing the paltry wages of $30 million a month,”
said
Werswick.
Farmers also face serious problems in accessing required inputs
such as
fuel, seed and implements.
Farmers fear that a run-off in the
presidential election would worsen the
input shortage, as resources, such as
fuel, would be channelled towards
political campaigning at the expense of
production.
Despite this pessimism on the part of JAG, the largely black
Zimbabwe
Farmers’ Union (ZFU) remains optimistic.
“Farmers are already at
an advanced stage of preparations. The only problem
we have at the moment is
that of fertiliser.
“We haven’t received anything although we have been
assured that it will be
made available in time for the farming season,” said
ZFU vice-president
Edward Raradza.
FinGaz
Shame Makoshori Staff
Reporter
THE country is facing another potentially devastating food
crisis amid
indications that agricultural input shortages, as well as
excessive rains,
which ravaged the country this year, had significantly
reduced yields.
The situation has the potential to plunge the country
further down the
economic abyss, as government would be forced to buy scarce
foreign currency
from the parallel market to mobilise resources for imports
to meet
production shortfalls.
The shortages could also plunge close to
three million people into
starvation should donors fail to intensify their
relief programmes in the
country.
The United Nations’ World Food
Programme (WFP) has already indicated that it
could scale down supplies into
the country, although a senior official with
the Programme’s Johannesburg
office said this week the agency hoped that
harvests would start trickling
into the market this month and ameliorate the
current food deficit.
An
assessment made by The Financial Gazette indicates that the country’s
food
situation remains precarious although the government has said it would
continue to import food to avert a major famine after heavy rains and,
later, high temperatures, destroyed crops in a season that was also dealt a
heavy blow by poor preparations.
Zimbabwe requires about 1,8 million
tonnes of maize to meet its national
food requirement.
Sweden last month
described the “food situation” in Zimbabwe as
catastrophic.
“The
humanitarian situation is still very serious and there are few signs of
an
improvement in the near future,” said Swedish ambassador to Zimbabwe Sten
Rylander.
With Zimbabwe’s economic crisis deepening following disputed
polls, there
are no signs that the government would be able to raise the
foreign currency
to import enough food, fuel, medicine and other key
requirements.
South Africa’s Business Report this week quoted WFP regional
manager for
east and southern Africa Marcus Prior saying early indications
were that
this year’s harvest might be lower than expected due to
insufficient inputs,
in particular fertiliser, and floods.
However, Prior
said it was too early to give an accurate assessment of the
harvest, and far
too early to say whether WFP would have to scale up its
operations later in
the year.
During a countrywide tour of farming communities by The Financial
Gazette’s
news crews, it was clear that food aid was critical to avert
another crisis
after the bulk of the current crop failed.
In Mashonaland
West, Zvimba communal lands was in a dire situation, with
villagers saying
they were haunted by the prospects of another famine at a
time when their
meager earnings were fast depreciating due to galloping
inflation, now at
165 000 percent.
They blamed shoddy preparations for the poor crop
yields.
Too much rain during the first half of the season, and a severe dry
spell
towards the end of the season, were the major drivers of the crop
failures,
the villagers told The Financial Gazette.
In Manicaland
province, our news crew witnessed vast areas of
under-cultivated land and
crop failures on land that had been planted due to
lack of fertiliser and
other inputs.
Here, villagers had already started resorting to gold panning
to eke out a
living.
In Mhondoro in Mashonaland West, villagers told The
Financial Gazette they
were facing starvation.
Erratic rain patterns had
militated against their labour on the fields, they
said.
The Financial
Gazette’s Political Editor Njabulo Ncube, who assessed the
food situation in
Masvingo, said along the Harare-Masvingo road, the farms
were derelict, with
little sign of activity last month.
“With the country approaching the winter,
one would expect farmers to be
preparing for the winter wheat but there is
no activity,” said Ncube.
A Financial Gazette crew that visited Chipinge,
also came back with a grim
report of the situation.
Chipinge is an arid
region where communities had traditionally depended on
food aid.
Last
month, maize fields were dominated by tall grass instead of food crops.
The
villagers had turned to sorghum, which grows well under dry conditions,
but
quealea birds had destroyed the crop.
The WFP official told Business Report
that about 300 000 Zimbabweans would
be supported this month, compared to
about 2,4 million who received WFP
support in the last few months. From next
month, through the programme’s
relief and recovery operation, WFP expected
to raise this figure again to
825 000 people each year for the next two
years, but the operation would
“seasonally expand its assistance” to cover
as many as one million highly
vulnerable people “if they are affected by
crop failure”, said Prior.
Business Report said the programme had reported
that despite political
tension in Zimbabwe, supply routes had not been
disrupted.
Food was procured from Zambia, Malawi, South Africa and Mozambique
for the
WFP operation in Zimbabwe “and moved into the country by road”. He
said:
“There have not been any problems moving food into Zimbabwe,” the
report
indicated.
The WFP had no reports of any of its distributions
being disrupted over the
past few weeks. Richard Lee, of the WFP information
office in Johannesburg,
said in a statement that the UN agency had completed
food distributions last
month, earlier than usual, to avoid any overlap with
the final run-up to the
presidential and parliamentary poll on March
29.
The current crisis emerged even after government and the Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe declared the last farming season “the mother of all agricultural
season” under which they had hoped to embarrass critics of the controversial
land reform programme under which experienced white farmers were replaced by
black farmers with a predominantly peasant farming background.
The
Reserve Bank had tried to bolster the farmers’ capacity through the farm
mechanisation programme under which farm equipment was disbursed to the new
farmers.
FinGaz
Shame Makoshori Staff
Reporter
ZIMBABWE’S foreign owned commercial banks have indicated that
they are ready
to embrace the controversial empowerment programme under
President Robert
Mugabe’s government, a departure from an initial warning
this could cause
disaster in the sector.
Stanbic Bank, owned by South
Africa’s Standard Bank Group, and British-owned
Standard Chartered Bank, had
warned the planned economic empowerment
programme under which they are
expected to give up control to locals would
have dire consequences on the
beleaguered economy.
But in statements to shareholders accompanying their
financial results, the
two banks expressed support for the programme, saying
they were ready to
comply with the empowerment legislation.
Parliament
passed the controversial Economic Empowerment and Indigenisation
Bill last
year but it received presidential assent late February as the
ruling ZANU-PF
party pressed ahead with its electoral campaign under the
economic
empowerment theme.
In its financial results for the year ending December 31
2007, Standard
Chartered Bank, the biggest of the three, did not
specifically refer to the
Empowerment Act but said it would comply with
Zimbabwe’s laws.
“The bank remains committed to ensuring compliance with all
regulatory
requirements and statutes as given and amended from time to
time,” said
Standard Chartered Bank chairman Honour Mkushi in the
statement.
Stanbic said it was “committed to advancing the principles and
practice of
sustainable development and to adherence to the law of the
country”.
British-owned Barclays Bank (Zimbabwe), the only foreign owned
commercial
bank that had not publicly commented on the law, has maintained
its
expansion programme, unperturbed by the legislation.
“Like any other
business we continue to review our strategies,” Barclay Bank
managing
director George Guvamatanga said during a presentation of the 2007
annual
results in February.
“We will consolidate what we achieved in 2007 and ensure
that we preserve
value. To date we have opened two branches and will
continue to look at this
strategy. We have increased attention in the SMEs
(small to medium scale
enterprises) sector. We are also looking at options
to enhance non-funded
income streams,” Guvamatanga said.
A bank
spokesperson had earlier told The Financial Gazette: “Barclays is
assessing
the potential implications of the Zimbabwean Indigenisation and
Empowerment
Act. It is still early days and implementation details and
timescales remain
unclear. Once further information is available Barclays
will assess the
situation further.”
Barclays Bank is part of the global Barclays Group, which
holds a 68 percent
stake in the local operation listed on the Zimbabwe Stock
Exchange. At least
32 percent of the shareholding is already
localised.
Indegenisation Minister Paul Mangwana last year said Zimbabwe was
prepared
to let the banks “go” if they were not prepared to comply with
regulations
requiring them to relinquish 51 percent of their stakes to
locals.
This was after Standard Chartered Bank and Stanbic told a
parliamentary
committee during a public hearing that if foreign-owned banks
were
localised, they would lose critical international synergies needed for
their
growth.
FinGaz
Staff Reporter
AIR Zimbabwe
last week more than trebled airfares as it battles to stay
afloat and
mitigate a debilitating crisis that could ground operations.
An airline
spokesperson said the increases were due to escalating
operational
costs.
“We have increased our fares with immediate effect, with an average
increase
of 350 percent,” the spokesperson told The Financial Gazette.
A
Harare/Bulawayo return air ticket now costs $5 689 500 000, up from $1 281
800 000.
The Harare/Johannesburg return air ticket went up to $14 138 200
000 from $2
844 000 000, while a return ticket for the Harare/Beijing route,
which was
$19 364 900 000, now costs $81 735 000 000.
Air Zimbabwe is
battling a staff flight and operational constraints caused
mainly by
uneconomic fares imposed by the government on the state-owned
national
airline.
Recently, the national flag carrier introduced a foreign-currency
denominated fuel levy under which customers are compelled to pay additional
foreign currency on their departure tickets to cushion the ailing
parastatal.
A passenger flying to China is paying US$110 for the fuel
levy on top of the
departure tax of US$12, while a traveller to the United
Kingdom pays US$111
for the fuel levy in addition to the US$179 departure
tax for business
class.
Those flying to the UK in the economy class have
to part with US$110 on top
of the US$100 departure fee.
A person flying
to South Africa is paying a fuel levy of US$90 in addition
to the US$41 for
both the economy and business classes.
FinGaz
Staff Reporter
Gold output
at Falcon Gold Zimbabwe (Falgold) plummeted to 419 kilograms
during the year
to December 31, 2007, from 511 kilograms achieved the
previous year, the
company reported.
The 419 kilograms had been produced from 908 000 tonnes
treated, a yield of
0.46 grams per ton.
“The lower gold production is a
result of a combination of factors, which
include the disruption of
operations due to ZESA power outages,
unavailability of essential stores and
the lower grade of ore mined,” said
board chairman Greg Hunter in a
statement accompanying financial results.
He said a planned exploration and
development program to expand mining
operations had been limited after most
of the capital earmarked for the
projects was diverted towards sustaining
operations.
This had been caused by the non–payment of US dollars earned from
gold
lodged with Fidelity Refineries, a wholly owned Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe
company that is the sole buyer of gold in Zimbabwe.
However, a
dedicated exploration and new business department had been
established to
evaluate and retain growth opportunities in the group, Hunter
said.
“This
new business function will also evaluate the non-gold assets that the
group
holds. Work has been conducted during 2007 in the Dalny and Camperdown
areas
in particular,” said Hunter.
He said operations had come under severe assault
from economic conditions
prevailing in the country that had been exacerbated
by hyperinflation, which
closed the reporting period at 66 213.3
percent.
“The shortage of foreign currency to import critical spares and
mining
consumables, incessant ZESA power cuts and a support price that
lagged and
did not reflect the value of the commodity we produce made it
very difficult
to sustain mining operations on a continuous basis,” he
said.
He indicated that Falgold had been able to sustain productions due to
an
offshore loan from parent company, Central African Gold Plc, which at the
end of the reporting period had injected a total of US$1.3
million.
Central African Gold acquired an 85 percent stake in Falgold in
March 2007.
FinGaz
Staff
Reporter
A JUNIOR medical doctor recently said at a hospital ward at
Parirenyatwa
Group of Hospitals that he was packing his bags to leave for
South Africa.
The economy was crumbling and there was no hope things
would improve under
President Robert Mugabe’s government, he said. “Things
are tough and I don’t
see any improvement here,” said the young doctor who
is in his late 20s.
His exasperation underscored deep fears for an
accelerated economic meltdown
after the March 29 harmonised elections, in
which President Robert Mugabe
stood against opposition leader Morgan
Tsvangirai and his former finance
minister Simba Makoni for the country’s
top job.
It is widely expected that a run–off between President Mugabe and
Tsvangirai
could be ordered by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) after
none of
the two secured a 50.1 percent majority votes to be declared the
winner,
although Tsvangirai last week declared himself a winner and said
there was
no need for a re–run.
The crisis over the presidential vote,
which has taken an inordinately long
time to be announced, has heightened
fears among professionals of an
accelerating economic decline that will
continue to erode incomes and
condemn them into poverty.
News agency
reports suggested that there was a surge in the volume of people
crossing
into South Africa through the Beitbridge border.
A number of Zimbabweans
feared the Zimbabwe situation could “snowball into
anarchy and at that time
it might be difficult to run away, the borders
might be closed,” AFP quoted
a teacher fleeing into South Africa saying.
Analysts say the exodus of both
professionals and non–professional workers
is likely to increase this year,
with the majority of Zimbabweans heading
for South Africa.
These are
likely to join millions of others who have fled the country due to
an
economic decline that has resulted in company closures and massive job
losses.
“Many people had been waiting for the elections, but there’s a
lot of
uncertainty now,” said Witness Chinyama, an economist with a local
banking
group.
“There’s going to be an increase in brain drain due to the
harsh economic
conditions,” said Chinyama.
He said the new tax levels
were going to force even unwilling professionals
to join the exodus.
The
government, early this month increased tax on income from a maximum of
45
percent to 60 percent.
“This is a thorny issue; it took workers by surprise,”
said Chinyama,
adding: “Professionals will look for countries that will tax
them less.”
He said the new tax levels were put in place by the government
because it
was trying to find non–inflationary ways of financing its budget.
However,
workers are unlikely to be happy taking 40 percent of their incomes
home,
with the rest going into government coffers.
Besides, there were
other taxes on individual incomes, and these were likely
to further reduce
net incomes.
Zimbabwean workers pay an HIV/Aids levy of three percent and
contribute an
additional three percent to a compulsory pension scheme run by
the National
Social Security Authority.
Most also contribute towards
voluntary pension schemes as well as towards
medical aid.
Considering
that the majority of the country’s workers take care of extended
families,
made jobless by the economic malaise, the situation for most is
likely to be
dire.
Economists estimate unemployment to be at about 80 percent.
South
African media reports last week quoted the Johannesburg–based Centre
for
Development and Enterprise saying Zimbabwe’s brain drain would
intensify,
indicating that the flight of skills from the country from both
the private
and public sectors to South Africa, Botswana, UK and Australia
was already
unprecedented.
Ravaging inflation has significantly eroded disposable
incomes, resulting in
falling standards of living among the country’s
estimated 13 million people.
Inflation currently tops 165 000 percent year on
year.
FinGaz
Shame Makoshori
Staff Reporter
ZIMBABWE’S political crisis has triggered a flurry of
travel warnings from
the country’s key markets, a development likely to
negatively affect the
tourism industry’s growth this year.
The United
Kingdom’s Foreign Office cautioned its citizens against traveling
to
Zimbabwe unless for pressing commitments “due to the continuing tension
surrounding the election and the deployment of uniformed forces and war
veterans across the country”.
“The current situation is unpredictable,
volatile and could deteriorate
quickly, without warning,” the office
said.
The US also issued a travel warning against Zimbabwe, saying the
country’s
political environment was now volatile.
International pressure
groups, including Human Rights Watch, claimed at the
weekend that supporters
of President Robert Mugabe’s ruling Zanu–PF party
had set up torture camps
“to systematically target, beat, and torture
people” suspected of voting
for the Movement for Democratic Change in last
month’s
elections.
However, no incidents of torture against foreign tourists have
been
reported, but several international journalists have been arrested
during
the past two weeks, only to be released after being found innocent by
the
courts of law.
The Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA) figures indicate
that although tourist
arrivals from the United Kingdom remained subdued, the
numbers had increased
by one percent in 2007 to 22 295, signaling a rebound
for the sector
desperately trying to court the high spenders from the
European market.
The ZTA, desperate to dispel reports of increasing lack of
safety in the
country, is hosting a tourism conference at the Zimbabwe
International Trade
Fair (ZITF), which kicked off in Bulawayo on
Tuesday.
The conference, dubbed A’Sambeni, would be running concurrently with
the
ZITF.
International buyers from some western countries jetted into
the country on
Sunday.
“A total of 42 tourism exhibitors including
Limpopo Tourist Board and
Tourism Investment Centre will be participating at
this year’s A’Sambeni
compared to 38 exhibitors in 2007,” said ZTA public
relations manager Anna
Moyo in a statement.
A’Sambeni has become a key
player in the ZTA’s Perception Management
Programme started last year. But
with the political tensions rising due to
poll results standoff, analysts
say it would be difficult to convince the
west to withdraw the travel
warnings.
FinGaz
Matters Legal with Vote
Muza
A few months ago, I decried the prevalence of political debauchery
and the
absence of a sense of trepidation, factors that have over the years
been
perpetuated by our government with dire consequences on the well being
of a
majority of citizens.
Then, I had hoped that the recent March 29
elections would usher in a new
era, no matter which political party won. An
opportunity was beckoning then
to allow Zimbabweans of all political
formations to cross the Rubicon, to
rally together as a collective unit and
join hands in reasserting Zimbabwe's
dominance as an economic force not only
of the region but of the entire
continent.
Alas! One month down the line,
an election fiasco of epic proportions has
unfolded, with it emerging a
scandalous campaign of violence, anarchy and
mischievous propaganda that has
rendered the partial achievements of the
recent SADC negotiation process a
worthless exercise.
Whereas a good number of citizens had been optimistic
about these elections,
believing that the spirit of co–operation, exhibited
during the SADC
negotiation would continue to prevail, their hope has been
shattered as
fear, alarm, despondency and utter hopelessness have become
common place.
In the process, all prospects for a positive future look
uncertain as the
effects of the political impasse will certainly reinforce
further economic
ruin, social decadence and other ills.
The question
lingering in many people's minds is why the electoral process
has since the
year 2000 failed to provide positive political and other
concomitant
results?
Why has some of our political leadership failed to rise to the
occasion by
demonstrating political maturity and tolerance in the national
interest and
for the sake of prosperity by promoting national unity and
political
inclusiveness?
In interrogating the subject of elections and in
our quest to find answers,
one needs to further examine the psyches of some
members of the Zanu–PF's
leadership in order to unpack their desires, fears
and other interests that
have become central to their personal and political
well–being.
Before that, let us briefly look at the whole concept of
elections,
electoral laws and their true purpose. My understanding, which I
believe is
shared by many right thinking individuals out there is that
elections serve
the primary purpose of ensuring that there is change of
leadership.
This happens everywhere, be it at the social level in churches,
clubs,
societies, or even at the political level. The rationale for this
change of
leadership being that those who are led are by and large entitled
to
exercise the right to elect people who they believe can articulate their
concerns competently, civilly and with dedication.
This is one simple
tenet of modern democracy. In the same analysis, one also
need to add that
those who lead have power thrust on them by the majority
who elect them;
thus they lead on behalf of the people–winners and losers
without regard to
political affiliation. In other words, real power lies in
the people, and we
entrust leaders with this power because, by the dictates
of logic and the
natural order of things, we cannot all rule ourselves.
It therefore becomes
worrisome, and an affront to true principles of
constitutionalism when those
who lose free and fair elections swear in the
names of their departed that
they will never relinquish power in favour of
those elected by popular
will.
If this happens, as is presently being witnessed through the conduct of
Zanu–PF, that has begun to use controversial means to retain power, then
people begin to witness a clear case of constitutional subversion. At the
risk of offending other people out there, I will not hesitate to call the
present shenanigans of some Zanu–PF functionaries treasonous, and tantamount
to a smart coup.
At this critical hour of our history, the country is
desperately in need of
leadership as opposed to power seeking individuals.
For indeed, the two
concepts of "leadership" and "power" though at times
complementary may under
our circumstances be seen to be clearly
distinguishable.
Leadership is about respecting the constitution, the laws
and promoting the
wishes of the people. A true leader will heed the people's
voices, such that
when people say they want to be governed by A, A will be
given to people to
govern them. True leadership does not govern through
coercion. It does not
promote hatred, among the governed and is there to
ensure peace, and an
enabling environment for people to pursue their
endeavors to the best of
their abilities.
To the contrary those in hungry
pursuit of power will do anything to remain
in power. Power as opposed to
leadership is about dominance, repression,
oppression, exploitation and
pilferage. It has nothing to do with the values
of constitutionalism or the
rule of law. Thus those that seek power will at
times torture, kill, or
commit genocide in the quest to cling on to
dominance. Thus the stage at
which our country is delicately hanging calls
for whoever is lawfully
elected to be a leader, rather than a power seeking
individual.
How about
this piece of advice to any future peace broker between the two
main
political belligerents as a means of unlocking the political log gem? A
reference to history might assist. Rewind back to the year 1979 when the
settler, Rhodesian Front was in power fighting a bitter war with the two
liberation movements, Zanla and Zipra. The positions of the two sides were
so far apart. There was deep mistrust, fear of the other, suspicion and
outright hatred.
These factors made the direct transfer of power an
extreme impossibility.
Thus to assure both sides that their interests would
be safeguarded in the
interim, a transitional authority under Lord
Carrington was established. For
a period of four months, it governed,
ensured that elections were held and
passed on power to the winning
political party that was then Zanu–PF.
Presently, the psyche of a small
clique of radical Zanu–PF leaders is one of
fear, suspicion, and hatred and
for this reason they would rather cling on
to power at whatever cost. They
would rather abandon true leadership
principles and tenets of the rule of
law to perpetuate a legacy of failure
and an aggressive pursuit of power
that betrays the guiding principles that
sustained the liberation
struggle.
Obviously this is what has led to the present deadlock. It is this
deadlock
that has led Zimbabweans to endure a vicious circle, of agony and
more agony
in the past eight years. We as a nation face the grim prospect of
perpetuating this vicious circle if no political tolerance and maturity is
practiced.
In my view, the ultimate panacea for the present impasse is
for both parties
to act responsibly by meeting and agreeing on safe
modalities of power
transfer. I believe some in Zanu–PF want to be convinced
that their future
will be safe and thus may want to extract
guarantees.
Whoever will be the winner will, in the letter and spirit of
promoting and
ensuring national reconciliation and reconstruction have to
agree to the
setting up of an inclusive government where losers will have a
role to play.
Email:muzalaw@yahoo.co.uk
FinGaz
Mavis Makuni Own
Correspondent
THE decision of the African National Congress of South
Africa (ANC) to go
over the ineffectual Thabo Mbeki’s head to embark on a
parallel mediation
initiative in Zimbabwe, finally exposes the South African
president for the
imposter he is .
South African newspapers reported
at the weekend details of a plan by the
South African ruling party to
intervene directly in the Zimbabwean crisis
following Mbeki’s roundly
condemned utterances in the face of the almost
month-long electoral
stalemate in which the outcome of the voting that took
place in Zimbabwe on
March 29 has been withheld from the electorate.
Mbeki stirred a global
hornet’s nest when he declared following the Southern
African Development
Community (SADC) emergency summit in Lusaka, that there
was no crisis in
Zimbabwe.
His subsequent attempts to claim that he had been misquoted only
served to
dent his credibility further because the withholding of election
results
from voters for any reason whatsoever constitutes a crisis. The
situation
was exacerbated by Mbeki’s clumsy and amateurish attempts to sweep
the
Zimbabwean problem under the carpet during a meeting of the United
Nations
Security Council in New York, which he chaired.
The world press
reported on how Mbeki had been isolated when other leaders
insisted that the
Zimbabwean situation constituted a crisis and should be
put on the agenda.
Although a banner headline, “Hands of Zim, UN told”
appeared on the front
page of the state broadsheet, The Herald, at this
time, UN general secretary
Ban Ki-Moon insisted that there was a crisis in
Zimbabwe, which the world
could no longer ignore.
However, the most damaging sentiments to Mbeki’s
reputation and credibility
are those that have been expressed in his own
country by various
stakeholders.. Writing in the Sunday Times issue of April
20, the paper’s
Editor, Mondli Makhanya, lamented the lack of political will
on Mbeki’s part
with regard to his handling of the Zimbabwean
issue.
Makhanya said if the South African government had the political will
to
resolve the crisis, it would have diagnosed it correctly eight years
ago.
“The diagnosis would have shown that the problem lay with a dirty
ZANU-PF
hierarchy bent on plundering the country. It would have shown the
remedy lay
elsewhere — in the nergy that resides in business, trade unions
and other
civil society formations.”
The Sunday Times Editor added that
if there had been political will and
principled leadership on Mbeki’s part,
South Africa would not have “looked
away as journalists, cleargy, judges,
doctors and activists were hounded, We
would not have stymied Commonwealth
leaders, including Olusegun Obasanjo,
who were appalled by the oppression of
Zimbabweans.”
A contributor to the Sunday Times, Mpumelelo Mkhabela, deplored
in the same
issue, Mbeki’s “tacit support for his Zimbabwean counterpart”
which he said
has cost South Africa dearly.
He asserted that what at
first seemed to be Mbeki’s sophistication in
handling the Zimbabwean problem
had “turned out to be nothing but sophistry”.
He said: “If anything, Mbeki
has given (President) Mugabe what he lacked:
credibility in the face of
defeat. And thus what appeared to be Mbeki’s
sophistication in handling the
Zimbabwean situation turned out to be nothing
but pure
sophistry.”
Mkhabela wrote that as a result of his dithering and
equivocation, “Mbeki
now seems to stand alone against the whole world on
(President) Mugabe and
in this manner he is destroying the little legacy he
had left After
Polokwane.”
Apart from being side-stepped by the ANC,
Mbeki’s own cabinet is reported to
have contradicted him in his absence by
declaring the electoral impasse in
Zimbabwe is a crisis and calling on the
Zimbabwe Electoral Commission to
announce the results of the presidential
election.
These developments unfold against the backdrop of a raging debate
among
ordinary Zimbabweans about Mbeki’s motives for his perceived collusion
with
their government over the last eight years of “quiet diplomacy” at the
expense of the suffering populace.
One popular joke, made in exasperation
that the head of state of Africa’s
powerhouse would behave in such an
amateurish and dishonourable manner, is
to ask whether the South African
President has been offered a farm in
Zimbabwe.
This is an allusion to
ZANU-PF’s vast political patronage system under which
farms seized from
whites have been allocated to undeserving recipients as a
way to buy their
loyalty and support.
Another theory bandied about is that Mbeki has been
deliberately prolonging
the political stalemate in Zimbabwe because of the
economic benefits
accruing to South Africa.
Mbeki’s perverse conduct has
been criticised in the past both at home and
internationally.
In 2004
Mbeki clashed with retired Archbishop Desmond Tutu after the
respected
cleric had questioned his failure to adopt a more robust stance on
Zimbabwe.
The South African president accused the Archbishop of speaking out
of turn
and resorting to empty rhetoric.
Four years later, Mbeki is no nearer to a
resolution of the Zimbabwean
problem but still pointing accusing fingers at
anyone who questions his
ineffectual mediation.
In 2004, Mbeki’s younger
brother, Moeletsi, slammed the South African
government for failing to come
out clearly in support of justice and
democratic governance in Zimbabwe. The
older Mbeki turned a deaf ear to all
this.
He was even less prepared to
listen as long as expressions of outrage and
discontent came from quarters
such as the MDC in Zimbabwe, the Democratic
Alliance and the Congress of
South African Trade Unions in South Africa,
churches and civil
society.
Most of these stakeholders were dismissed as not having the right
liberation
struggle credentials. Now, however, Mbeki’s duplicitous conduct
and failure
to deliver is being questioned by his colleagues in the ANC and
his Cabinet.
Email feedback to:
mmakuni@fingaz.co.zw
FinGaz
Mavis Makuni
In the
build-up to the March 29 elections, there was much police ado about
the fact
that there would be zero tolerance to political violence.
Speaking at a
belated Christmas party in Matabeleland South in January,
Deputy
Commissioner Levy Sibanda was quoted as saying the police would
ensure that
the elections were held in a peaceful atmosphere. “It is the ZRP’s
obligation as an institution constitutionally mandated to maintain law and
order in the country. To ensure the elections are held in a tranquil and
peaceful environment.” These sentiments were echoed by other police
officials, including Sibanda’s boss, Police Commissioner General Augustine
Chihuri.
Chihuri warned in a statement quoted in a state daily on
February 1 that
police were geared for the elections and had put in place
adequate measures
to keep things under control. But oddly, now that
post-election violence is
being reported in many parts of the country,
police are no longer saying why
it cannot be quelled. A clue perhaps lies in
Chihuri’s utterances on
February 22 when he was quoted in the state press
saying police would not
hesitate to use “full force, including firearms
during and after” the
harmonized elections.
Chihuri who significantly
spoke of the use of firearms before and after the
elections, said “The use
of force by the police the world over has always
attracted criticism and is
deliberately exaggerated most of the times for a
purpose. This is a sticky
point so designed to undermine and discredit the
entire electoral process.”
He stressed that police were empowered to use
“full force” and would not
hesitate to do so. He made it clear law
enforcement agents would not treat
perpetrators of violence with kid gloves.
In view of the controversy
surrounding the Chinese ship laden with 17 tonnes
of fire arms that arrived
in Durban last week and has been refused entry by
a number of African
countries, some uncharitable thoughts have crossed my
mind about Chihuri’s
repeated references to the use of full force, including
firearms, during and
after the elections. Is the arrival of the Chinese
vessel at this tense time
a coincidence? Chihuri made his dire warnings
about the police force’s
determination to use full force after he and other
service chiefs had
declared publicly that they would not salute the leader
of the Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC), Morgan Tsvangirai in the event
that he won the
presidential election.
Now with the presidential poll results still being
withheld a full three
weeks after voting took place, the nation can only
guess who the winner of
those polls was, based on the subsequent strange
developments witnessed
after March 29. These include post-election violence
that has reared its
ugly head reportedly in constituencies that voted
overwhelmingly for MDC
candidates. The victims of the violence say they are
being terrorized by
state agents and militias who accuse them of having
voted the wrong way. The
type of injuries sustained by the victims is indeed
consistent with the use
of “full force” such as Chihuri warned
about.
Police and government officials are, however, disputing accounts
coming from
the horse’s mouth, that is the people subjected to the beatings
and
insisting the violence is being perpetrated by the Morgan Tsvangirai
faction
of the MDC. Another coincidence? Hardly likely. Any remotely
reasonable
person would have to ask whether it would make any sense for the
opposition
party to go back to the constituencies in which its parliamentary
and
senatorial candidates prevailed to unleash violence against its
supporters.
And yet if police claims are to be believed, this is what is
supposed to be
happening.
The problem is that rather than view violence
as an act of barbarism that
should not be associated with any state in the
21st century, the police and
officialdom seem to regard it as a priced
component upon which their
political survival hinges. As a result they are
prepared to go to any length
to befuddle the nation with ridiculous
propaganda whose main purpose is to
score points by casting the MDC as the
perpetrators. This would seem to be
why they stick to the same mantras even
when there is concrete evidence of
who is perpetrating the
violence.
Elsewhere in this issue of The Financial Gazette, for example,
reports are
published about attacks perpetrated by the police against a
group of
Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation employees. In another report, the
President of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists, Matthew Takaona recounts his
ordeal when he and his cousin were beaten up by the police in Chitungwiza.
What do the police have to say about these incidents? Why are innocent
Zimbabweans being randomly attacked?
Another report carried in this issue
pertains to pre-election violence and
intimidation that occurred in Gokwe,
Zvimba North and Chegutu where ZANU-PF
candidates won. The incidents of
violence and intimidation are detailed in
court petitions filed by aggrieved
opposition candidates. In view of these
cases which give all the pertinent
details, it is difficult to accept the
police claim that no incidents have
been reported to them.
At a press conference on Monday, out-going Justice and
Parliamentary Affairs
Minister Patrick Chinamasa challenged anyone with
information about acts of
state violence to furnish the police with such
details. “It is unfortunate
that these reports of violence are only
surfacing on the internet with no
formal reports being made. We respond to
information supplied to us by the
public and we have nothing to
hide.”
Chinamasa said he had personally investigated the 10 deaths reported
by the
MDC. “I have personally investigated these cases. Of those four,
three have
no basis whatsoever while the fourth is still under
investigation.” Even
supposing this were true, why is the minister
unconcerned about the rest of
the cases ? And how exhaustive were his
investigations considering that they
were conducted by someone who lost his
seat in the parliamentary elections
and therefore has a vested interest in
discrediting the opposition? It is
also odd that someone in this position
should usurp the functions of the
police to pose as an investigating
officer.
It is easy for Chinamasa to trivialize attacks against innocent
Zimbabweans
by saying reports of violence have been “exaggerated” but
readers will
recall that numbers were of no import when the full wrath of
the law was
brought to bear on former Chimanimani legislator Roy Bennett
following a
fracas in parliament in which Chinamasa was manhandled. If it
was
intolerable for one minister to suffer “violence”, in this manner, it
should
follow that not a single Zimbabwean should sustain as much as a
scratch at
the hands of state agents for exercising his or her democratic
right to vote
as he or she wishes.
The story about the 10 deaths reported
by the MDC appeared in the April 20
issue of The Standard, identifying some
of the victims by name. Chinamasa
was however cold-hearted enough to say the
MDC had “this macabre tendency to
claim dead bodies”. For his own
information, the victims were flesh and
blood Zimbabweans who were as
entitled to life as he is.On page 3 of the
same issue of The Standard was a
horrific picture of a victim beaten until
he or she was black and blue.
Chinamasa’s heart -of- stone response? “For
your own information some of
those pictures being carried by the media date
back to 2000. At present we
are not aware of any such violence.”
This, at last is an admission that state
violence was unleashed in 2000
although readers will recall that this was as
rigorously denied at the time
as the on-going incidents are being attributed
to the MDC. Does this mean
that an admission that the on-going atrocities
are the handiwork of the
state will also be made some years from
now?
Email feedback to:
mmakuni@fingaz.co.zw
FinGaz
Ken Mufuka
THIRD world
nationalists everywhere make a simple mistake — they
underestimate
imperialists. Imperialists follow well-known rules of
engagement. Like
jackals, they follow the quarry until the tired animal
falls on its hind
legs.
For Zimbabweans, there is no other result acceptable other than
that Mukuru
leaves power.
Mukuru has largely taken a confrontational
approach to imperialism. That is
the worst thing anybody can do. Here is the
reason why.
When Jomo Kenyatta left a colonial prison after seven years, and
the Kenya
African National Union was triumphant everywhere, his first major
speech was
at Nakuru, the heart of the White Highlands and the home of 2 000
unrepentant white supremacist farmers.
He could have told them to go to
hell, but he knew that Britain, a super
power, was behind this motley crew.
He chose reconciliation and peace. That
allowed Kenya 40 years of
unprecedented progress.
Nelson Mandela, after 27 years in prison, visited the
wife of P. W. Botha,
the racist former president of South Africa.
Botha’s
wife lived in a white town, which did not allow blacks even as
maids, for
fear of contamination. She was surprised to find that Mandela had
love
within his heart for her kind of people.
The issue here is that Mandela could
have told Mrs Pee Wee (as she was
known) to go to hell, and all the whites
who felt like her to follow the
same path. The four million whites were
supported by the United States and
Britain. The cost would be worse than the
disease of racism.
Mukuru ignored these lessons of history. But there was a
more poignant
lesson directly taught by Samora Machel of Mozambique. Mukuru
was told
plainly not to chase white people away. It has nothing to do with
whether
they have a long racist past or not.
Cecil Rhodes’ condemnation
sheet is so long that even the devil has refused
him a place in hell. The
issue is that the imperialists control the world,
as we know it. To ignore
that reality, as the Zulus say, is to throw dirty
water (a bad word) against
the wind.
The idea of calling opponents names has always been a bad idea.
Kenneth
Kaunda called Frederick Chiluba a man of no consequence, and he was
right.
Kamuzu Banda called everybody, “my boys” and perhaps he was
right.
But Mukuru has exceeded the rules of fair play. He called Morgan
Tsvangirai
a tea boy. Simba Makoni was called a frog, that wants to be as
big as a cow.
The British leader, Tony Blair, was called a bad name, and his
successor
Gordon Brown, was called a little dot in the world.
Mukuru is
definitely wrong about the British and the Americans. No matter
what we may
feel about them, the US controls the World Bank and the European
Union
controls the International Monetary Fund.
Zimbabwe’s Ambassador to the US,
Boniface Chidyausiku, complained bitterly
that Zimbabwe has not received
balance of payments support from these two
institutions.
Please give us a
break. Does anybody expect Robert Zolleck, a George Bush
appointee at the
Word Bank to read Zimbabwe’s application with any sympathy?
We may not like
Anglo-American policy in Iraq, but we should be at peace
with the US, for
our own sake. It is about the world in which we live.
Brown is not a little
dot on the world map. He presides over the number
three economy in the
world. Courting his enmity is unwise.
I agree with Mukuru, and with
Ambassador Chidyausiku that Zimbabwe has
suffered severely from
Anglo-American sanctions. The death of the Zimbabwean
dollar and the
consequent destruction of life insurance policies is a
chapter in tragedy
never witnessed before in Zimbabwe.
The destruction of the tourist trade is
horrendous. There are thousands of
people who had sunk their life savings
into building chalets, who now watch
owls singing songs under their
eyes.
The unemployment rate of 80 percent and the horrific treatment of
Makwere
Kwere (our people) in Botswana and South Africa and Britain is a
story that
is yet to be told. No government has ever survived on inflation
rate of 300
000 percent.
Zimbabwe followed these policies despite
historical evidence that they cause
nothing but ruin to the country that
practises them.
At the time of writing, reports from Zimbabwe say seven
electoral officers
who counted wrongly have been incarcerated. More than 800
villages have been
burnt down for voting wrongly. Twenty people are in
hospital with broken
legs for encouraging voters to vote wrongly. Ten people
are dead and perhaps
800 families have been internally displaced for voting
wrongly.
Such news lays down the groundwork for foreign intervention.
Intervention
can come through proxies. It is unwise to provoke intervention.
Saddam
Hussein of Iraq thought that he was safe, and so did Manuel Noriega
of
Panama.
Noriega was picked up by 20 000 US marines and is serving his
25-year
sentence in Florida.
The economic hardships alone are enough to
require a change in direction.
When three million people leave their
country, there is something wrong with
the leadership. If Mukuru cannot come
to terms with the tea boy, that
decision will be made for him.
Now, to
make matters worse, Mukuru is refusing to concede defeat to the tea
boy. The
next chapter of this saga is that the imperialists will find a way
of
removing the Zimbabwean government under the guise of liberating the
people.
This has happened in Nicaragua, in Panama and in Iraq. In all three
cases,
the people there are worse off now than they were before imperialist
intervention.
There is no way out of this one.
Ken Mufuka is a
professor at Lander University (USA). He can be reached at:
kenmufuka@yahoo.com
FinGaz
Rangarirai Mberi News
Editor
OVER the past three weeks, Southern Africa had appeared to close
ranks,
refusing to publicly denounce President Robert Mugabe and allowing
his
government to claim unreserved regional support. But it has taken a
rusty
Chinese ship to blow that claim right out the water.
The An Yue
Jiang arrived in Durban last Tuesday, bearing 77 tonnes of arms
destined for
Zimbabwe.
A dramatic week later, it was clear regional solidarity was not as
assured
as Zimbabwe must have imagined, and that President Robert Mugabe’s
government is increasingly isolated.
None of Zimbabwe’s claimed allies
have so far allowed the ship to dock at
their harbours.
News of the
ship’s arrival in Durban immediately rattled the activist cage.
Dockworkers
were lobbied into refusing to unload the ship.
The ship then reportedly first
headed for Mozambique’s supposedly friendlier
waters. But officials there
refused it clearance to dock.
Soon, the ship was heading up the west coast
and towards Angola. It had been
suggested the ship would have it easier
there. After all, it was said, just
a week earlier, President Eduardo dos
Santos had been among the regional
leaders at the Southern African
Development Community (SADC) summit in
Lusaka to oppose strong action
against his old comrade President Mugabe.
But on Tuesday, it became clear
that not even Luanda was willing to take on
the ship, and the physical and
political baggage it carried.
“This ship has not sought a request to enter
Angolan territorial waters and
it’s not authorised to enter Angolan ports,”
Filomeno Mendonca, director of
the Institute of Angolan Ports, told private
Luanda Radio LAC.
Jendayi Frazer, the United States assistant secretary of
state for Africa,
said she had exerted pressure on America’s regional allies
to refuse the
ship permission. The US has strong ties with Angola and has
oil interests
there.
Other reports then suggested Namibia was in fact the
ship’s destination. But
Namibian foreign ministry spokesman Isaak Hamata
said: “We have not received
any official request to dock, refuel or off-load
the Chinese ship, but if it
does come, we would consider it on its
merits.”
He said the merits would depend on the content of any request from
the
Zimbabwe government.
Even China herself began to sound uneasy.
Chinese Foreign Ministry
spokeswoman Jiang Yu, while insisting the arms
shipment was “perfectly
normal trade in military goods between China and
Zimbabwe”, conceded the
company involved was now considering shipping the
cargo back to China.
China’s hands are already full with controversy over
Tibet and the Olympics.
Jacob Zuma, president of South Africa’s ruling ANC,
who has latched on to
the Zimbabwe controversy to rebrand himself in the
eyes of a sceptical West,
has also been unequivocal. He was quoted on
Tuesday as calling on all SADC
countries to bar the ship.
But the hardest
knocks were coming out of Lusaka, whose relations with
Zimbabwe have frozen
over.
Zambian president Levy Mwanawasa, the SADC chairman, dropped all
diplomatic
niceties to publicly urge “all African countries” not to receive
the ship.
Reacting to news that the ship had been turned away in South Africa
and
Mozambique, Mwanawasa said: “I hope this will be the case with all the
countries because we don’t want a situation, which will escalate the
situation in Zimbabwe more than what it is.”
Mwanawasa even had some
words for China. He said China could play a more
useful role in the
Zimbabwean crisis than supplying arms.
But while he escalated his war with
Zimbabwe, Mwanawasa claimed to have been
“embarrassed” by remarks by an
official of his party, the Movement for
Multiparty Democracy’s Lusaka
chairman Geoffrey Chumbwe, calling for the use
of force to remove President
Mugabe from office.
“I hope our Zimbabwean colleagues will appreciate that a
man like him would
have no authority whatsoever to speak on behalf of the
party. He is so
junior in the party hierarchy that I was personally
embarrassed when I heard
of this,” Mwanawasa said.
It is not clear
whether Harare will be comforted by Mwanawasa’s
“embarrassment”.
But what
is now known is the true state of Zimbabwe’s regional alliances.
The ship has
tested these friendships within SADC. Without the shelter of
the anonymity
of SADC communiqués, none of these friendships has stood the
test.
Neighbours might claim publicly to be her friends, but none of them
is
willing to risk their own credibility by taking on Zimbabwe’s burdens.
FinGaz
Comment
WHEN news of a Chinese vessel carrying
armaments
destined for Zimbabwe filtered through from South Africa last
week, there
was guarded optimism that these reports were nothing but a ruse
de guerre
meant to ratchet up pressure on President Robert Mugabe’s
government.
It had been thought that Harare’s
information tsars
would move in quickly to deny ownership of the
controversial cargo, and as
has become the norm, jump to its famous ploy of
blaming it on “the
machinations of the
imperialists”.
Our worst fears were confirmed on
Monday when
Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa came to the defence of
government’s
latest acquisition.
“It is our
sovereign right to buy arms from anyone
to defend ourselves. And you defend
yourself from enemies and not
civilians…I don’t understand this hullabaloo
abut a lone ship,” Chinamasa,
who of late has assumed the role of ZANU-PF’s
chief propagandist, was quoted
saying.
Granted,
it is in Zimbabwe’s interest to arm its
defence forces to the teeth in case
its territorial integrity might come
under
attack.
To this end, the efficiency and preparedness
of
institutions such as the police and the army becomes vital, provided the
cost is something the country can afford.
However, ZANU-PF’s definition of an enemy has been
adulterated by the
party’s insatiable appetite to hold on to power at any
cost, even if it
means circumventing the people’s will.
An enemy, as
far as the ZANU-PF government is
concerned, is anyone who does not share the
party’s beliefs and value
systems.
Holding
different views is considered treasonous and
critics have been labelled
sell-outs and stooges of the imperialists, whose
bidding in Zimbabwe,
according to government, is done by the Movement for
Democratic Change
(MDC).
It is not a secret that, in ZANU-PF’s view,
the MDC
and its supporters are enemies of the State, which explains the war
of
attrition silently being waged against defenceless activists since the
March
29 elections.
It is in this context that
Chinamasa’s irony-laden
response must be
considered.
Before anyone can swallow the Justice
Minister’s
argument hook, line and sinker, Chinamasa must explain to the
restive
population the timing of this shipment and whether it is just a
coincidence
that government is taking delivery of the cargo at a time when
tensions are
rising due to its inexplicable delays in announcing the results
of the
Presidential election held about four weeks
ago.
The drama surrounding An Yue Jiang, the Chinese
vessel, has lifted the veil of camaraderie the powers-that-be have
previously used to claim popular support in the region in the face of
mounting opposition internally and
internationally.
By denying the ship permission to
dock at their
harbours, South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania, Namibia and
Angola are sending
a loud message that all is not well in
Zimbabwe.
None of Zimbabwe’s neighbours would want to
invite
trouble to their doorsteps by giving a helping hand to what might
eventually
lead to the commission of the worst sort of human rights
violations and an
influx of refugees at a time when the continent is still
grappling with a
volatile situation in Kenya.
Latest reports indicate that Poly Technologies, the
Chinese arms
manufacturer, might recall the ship, buckling to
pressure.
Government has no moral justification for
forking
out an estimated R10 million on three millions rounds of AK-47, 1500
rocket
propelled grenades and more that 3000 mortar rounds and mortar tubes
when
its people are starving due to poor
harvests.
Chinamasa and his colleagues could have
presented a
solid moral argument had they ransacked the fiscus to avert
hunger by
importing staple grains and allocating the little foreign currency
available
to agricultural input manufacturers ahead of the 2008/09 farming
season.
While the Defence Ministry has been
conspicuous by
its silence on the issue, one wonders how the cargo was
financed given that
the Ministry was only allocated a $374 trillion cheque
in the current budget
and might have exhausted the vote in one swoop if the
R10 million is
converted at parallel market
rates.
It is however, not a secret that military
spending
has not been commensurate with the size of the country’s tottering
economy.
Instead of increasing funding towards
critical
sectors such as education, health and agriculture, scarce resources
have
been diverted to the military despite the fact that there is relative
stability in the region now and that prospects of an aggression against
Zimbabwe have greatly diminished.
Does it ever
bother the powers-that-be therefore
that the country continues to spend
money on military hardware when there
are no essential drugs in hospitals
and clinics? The country’s education
system is on its deathbed due to
shortages of textbooks and other teaching
materials and the same applies for
agriculture, which cannot import vaccines
for
cattle.
The arms fiasco has also exposed the extent
to which
government has destroyed industries because ordinarily the
armaments could
have been sourced from the Zimbabwe Defence Industries
(ZDI), which is now
surviving on non-core operations after years of under
capitalisation.
Instead of capacitating struggling
local companies,
government imports the basic arms to preserve jobs in
Shenzhen, China,
allowing the scourge of retrenchments and company closures
spawned by its
disastrous policies to continue locally. And as a result,
ZDI, which has
suffered a dual status of being both a private company and a
state
enterprise, is slowly dying.
On Monday,
Southern African Development Community
(SADC) chairperson and Zambian
president Levy Mwanawasa took the
unprecedented step of urging regional
states to bar the Chinese ship from
entering their waters fearing the
shipment could deepen Zimbabwe’s election
crisis.
As if to confirm Mwanawasa’s fears, the MDC claims
10 of its members have
been murdered and scores others injured since the
March
polls.
In addition, at least 3000 people have been
displaced, allegations denied by ZANU-PF, which has accused the MDC as being
the authors of the violence.
The stance taken by
SADC and the civic movement in
the region shows that patience is running
wafer thin against Harare and that
the region would like to avoid a repeat
of the Kenyan scenario where more
than 1200 people were killed while over
350 000 others were displaced since
the disputed
elections.
Tutu was right about Mbeki
EDITOR — During last year’s
African National Congress (ANC) congress in
Polokwane, South Africa,
Archbishop Desmond Tutu made a controversial
statement that neither Thabo
Mbeki nor Jacob Zuma was fit to be president of
South Africa. He was spot
on.
When Mandela’s handpicked successor took office one of the first things
that
he did was to expel Chief Gatsha Buthelezi from cabinet. Mbeki said at
the
time: ‘Where were some of these people during the liberation struggle
who
now want to participate in our politics?’ or words to that effect.
It
has been the ANC’s policy to support only parties that were in the
so-called
liberation wars during white colonial rule. Even Winnie
Madikizela-Mandela
had a few choice words about the MDC a few months ago.
I pity the MDC because
Mbeki continually tricks them. He tricked the MDC
into participating in sham
elections, from which there could only be one
winner – ZANU-PF.
He
(Mbeki) is the one who instigated the holding of these elections to try
and
get legitimacy for this government from the international community
hoping
that it was going to be a walkover, but instead this has backfired in
spectacular fashion.
Now he comes around fawning and simpering in the
most nauseating manner that
there is no crisis in Zimbabwe and that the
delay in announcing election
results was normal because it was in accordance
with Zimbabwe’s election
process!
The man doesn’t even know the time of
day let alone what’s happening in
Zimbabwe. Mbeki has always spoken with a
forked tongue; he is an upstart and
one wonders why he is feted so much by
the West? Mbeki is anti-MDC, full
stop.
He will do whatever it takes to
make sure ZANU-PF stays in power. There is
no such thing as ‘quiet
diplomacy’. This time he acted quickly because
ZANU-PF had lost.
This is
typical of an African leader who has helped further under-develop
the
continent in his short time in office. Mind you, Zuma is no better.
It was
too much to expect any good to come out of the marathon SADC
‘emergency’
meeting in Lusaka because 95 percent of those deliberating were
themselves
not properly elected in their respective countries.
There were people like
Bingu wa Mutarika of Malawi, who owns vast tracts of
land in Zimbabwe. Such
a leader could never be neutral.
Why it took 13 hours to come up with such
daft resolutions is a mystery.
With all evidence pointing to an MDC win
despite the lop-sided election, the
summit suggested that the opposition
should just accept amended fictitious
tabulations from their rivals? It
beggars belief.
Why was the election held in the first place when one side is
prepared to
conceal the results? Surely, they could have saved themselves a
lot of
bother by just stating that this was a one-party state: no elections,
full
stop.
Mbeki has an abiding vendetta against parties that didn’t
participate in the
so-called armed struggle, not least the MDC.
He
unwittingly joined the so-called struggle because of his father, it was
not
his own initiative. In any case what did he do other than study first
world
economics while the others were in the bush?
The ANC is anti-MDC; they regard
FRELIMO, ZANU-PF, SWAPO, MPLA (Angola) as
comrades in arms from their days
in the bush and no other organisation would
do for them in these states
besides those mentioned.
The MDC should be aware of this because they have
very few African friends.
SADC is one toothless, two-faced organisation that
has in the past-declared
disputed polls in Zimbabwe free and fair because
ZANU-PF had ‘won’.
T. Chidhakwa
United
Kingdom
---------------
Time for Zimbabweans to stand
together
EDITOR — I have been watching with interest as the
Zimbabwe drama unfolds.
It seems to me there are a lot of characters, clowns
included.
How can anyone dream of military invasion of Zimbabwe? The problem
is that
people misjudge moods. British people will never support any
military
intervention in any country as long as Iraq is still as it
is.
People also make the mistake of thinking that when a political party
wins,
everyone supports it, therefore they can say or do what they want. Do
they
know that there is the silent majority? What’s the population of
Zimbabwe
and how many people voted? What do those who didn’t vote
think?
It’s high time Zimbabwean politicians start behaving responsibly and
know
that the country is ours and no one can solve our problems for us. We
want a
responsible ruling party and a responsible opposition.
Let’s have
the best interests of our country at heart. Who benefits when we
beat each
other? Who benefits when we circulate pictures of mutilated bodies
from
other countries and claim they are from Zimbabwe? Who benefits when you
lie
that your life is in danger and you claim asylum when you have never
been
politically active? Who benefits when you compile a documentary with
stage-managed scenes and claim that’s what your country is about? My
countrymen don’t sell your souls for bread.
Bomby
Vanjick
Portsmouth, UK
--------------
Zim situation: A biblical
perspective
EDITOR — Well, it has been the most unheard of
thing that has happened in
Zimbabwe and I know it all comes to one thing
whether you believe it or not;
its all in the hands of God now.
Tell me
what has not been done to solve the current situation in Zimbabwe.
Accusations are flying from all over and stories about hate and deceit are
the common thing.
Even America and Britain can just say they don’t know
what to do next. Now
SADC says Zimbabwe is not in a crisis. I am not a good
political analyst but
I am a religious fanatic.
So I tell you one thing,
let us brace ourselves for something mighty and
powerful is about to
happen.
For the scripture says “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor
ear
heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things, which God
hath prepared for them that love him” Corithians 2v9.
All has been done
but the word from above has not been communicated to the
men and women of
Zimbabwe.
Lloyd
South Africa
------------
Mufuka must show
tolerance
EDITOR — There was really no need for Ken Mufuka to
offer Joseph Miller his
flimsy excuse for leaving Zimbabwe in 1983.
I do
however, share Miller’s strong belief that Ken Mufuka is one of those
Zimbabweans in the diaspora who seems comfortable courting certain
politically connected “brothers” in ZANU-PF who have unashamedly destroyed
our motherland.
Is this not typical of someone who is so afraid of
retribution and for
self-interests would much rather “run with the hare and
hunt with the
hounds.”
Why be so racist Mr Mufuka, it is so callous of
you to compromise your
academic standing by drawing these distinctions based
on colour.
In the USA, which is your preferred country of domicile, it is
taboo to be
obsessed with the skin colour of fellow humans.
Even back
home, Zimbabweans, I am sure, take great offence when people such
as Mudede
and Mahoso, the latter who you referred to as my “learned
brother,” exhibit
racist tendencies.
What about Ian Smith or FW De Klerk the “white brothers”
both of whom were
detested for their racism but at least they showed some
compassion?
When they saw the writing on the wall they succumbed. Can we say
the same of
the brothers back home?
Nazir Lunat
California USA