JOHANNESBURG, - Human Rights Watch has
criticised the lack of action
by the UN Commission on Human Rights regarding
alleged abuses in Zimbabwe.
The rights
group issued a statement at the end of the commission's
meeting in Geneva
last week.
The Zimbabwe Media Monitoring
Project reported that the official The
Herald newspaper "celebrated
Zimbabwe's escape from criticism" at the
meeting which ended on Friday 25
April, while reports in the private press
"indicated that human rights abuses
in the country were as bad as ever".
Human
Rights Watch criticised the United States and the European Union
for not
being firm enough about resolutions concerning the situation
in
Zimbabwe.
"Resolutions on Russia,
Zimbabwe and Sudan were all less critical than
in previous years and
ultimately were defeated," Human Rights Watch
said.
The rights group added that "a
powerful grouping of hostile
governments [which had] joined the commission in
recent years, including
Algeria, Libya ... and Zimbabwe, joined with China,
Cuba and Russia to
oppose several important country
initiatives".
While "African governments,
led by South Africa, worked as a bloc to
oppose scrutiny of the human rights
situation in Zimbabwe".
The Media
Monitoring Project said "the success in Geneva of the South
African-sponsored
'no-action' resolution that saved Zimbabwe from a United
States and European
Union motion condemning the country's human rights
record, had given the
state-controlled media an excuse to ignore the
evidence of on-going strife
suffered by the country's civilian
population".
"But it did not explain why
the privately owned press all ignored
South Africa's defence of the
indefensible and the discreditable outcome of
the commission's vote," the
media watchdog added.
Meanwhile, with
elections for commission membership set to be held
this week in New York,
Human Rights Watch has argued that, as a prerequisite
for membership of the
commission, governments should have: ratified core
human rights treaties;
complied with their reporting obligations; issued
open invitations to UN
human rights experts to visit their countries; and
not have been condemned
recently by the commission for human
rights
violations.
GMB Eases Restrictions On Grain Sales
UN
Integrated Regional Information Networks
April 28, 2003
Posted to the
web April 28, 2003
Johannesburg
The Zimbabwe government will allow
individuals to sell limited quantities of
grain throughout the country,
relaxing restrictions that make its Grain
Marketing Board (GMB) the sole
buyer and seller of grain, state media
reported.
Permits obtainable
from GMB depots will allow the movement of from 150 kg to
10 mt of grain
countrywide, acting chief executive officer of the GMB,
retired
lieutenant-colonel Samuel Muvhuti said.
In addition, up to 150 kg of
grain can be sold throughout the country
without a permit and communal
farmers can sell small quantities of grain in
rural areas.
"There has
been an outcry that the GMB could be overdoing its grain
monitoring exercise,
particularly at roadblocks," Muvhuti said. "People with
just a bucket or a
maximum of three bags of maize can move their grain
without the approval from
our Loss Control Department."
The police would be informed of the changes
and farmers were encouraged to
report policemen who confiscate the smaller
quantities, or larger quantities
moved with a permit. He said the government
was more concerned with the
illegal export of its heavily subsided grain than
its movement within the
country.
Zimbabwe is in the throes of critical
food shortages due to a combination of
drought, economic crisis and a land
reform programme that severely disrupted
commercial production, leaving
almost half the population in need of food
aid.
NGO's have repeatedly
urged the GMB to relax its controls on the national
grain supply and allow
free movement of grain, also from outside the
country, to alleviate
shortages.
"We are doing this in an effort to make sure that the little
we have is
equitably distributed amongst our people. We also want to build
our
strategic reserve," Muvhuti said.
A Commercial Farmers Union (CFU)
spokesman told IRIN on Monday that allowing
the free movement of less than
150 kg of grain would allow people like urban
dwellers harvesting a few bags
from a small vacant plot to send food to
family in another area. Communal
farmers would also benefit by being able to
move small amounts of their
surplus for selling, instead of taking it to the
GMB as
required.
However, for commercial farmers it would mean a tightening of
control.
"[commercial] Farmers are still not allowed to sell freely. They
are
contracted to grow large quantities for stock feed or other purposes and
now
have to deliver directly to the company they have the contract with,
instead
of going via the GMB.
"If farmers produce extra grain above
the contracted amount, they are still
forced to take it to the GMB and cannot
sell it privately," the CFU
spokesman said. "The GMB will monitor the
contract deliveries and farmers
will still only be paid the government
stipulated price."
A recently released report, "Relief and Recovery in
Zimbabwe", by the
Training and Research Support Centre (TARSC), analysed GMB
deliveries in
January 2003. It noted that national deliveries of
price-controlled food by
the GMB had run into difficulties in 49 percent of
districts.
The problems facing the GMB's inability to maintain supplies
were reportedly
due to fuel and transport problems, and the government's lack
of access to
foreign currency - all factors compounding the GMB's low
reserves.
Quoting December figures from the Zimbabwe Vulnerability
Assessment
Committee, the TARSC report noted that only 14 percent of
households said
they were able to afford the uncontrolled "parallel" market
rates for grain.
"Importing adequate supplies and making national food
imports accessible to
poor households at community level are thus the most
important immediate and
urgent gaps to address in food security," the TARSC
report said.
Timothy Neill, a spokesman for the National NGO Food
Security Network
(FOSENET) told IRIN that the decision to allow freer
movement of grain was a
step in the right direction.
"The more things
are freed the better. There should be no restrictions, as
these create
artificial shortages, particularly in urban areas where people
have had food
confiscated, and where the government has used food as a
political
weapon.
"The whole control of grain is very much a smokescreen for
corrupt
practices, and increasing freedom means reducing the levels of
corruption,"
he said.
sunspot.net
Book Review
'Into Africa' - the search for a 'lost'
explorer
--------------------------------------------------------------------
By Paul
Taylor
Special To The
Sun
Originally published April 27,
2003
Into Africa: The Epic Adventures of Stanley & Livingstone, By
Martin
Dugard. Doubleday. 288 pages.
$24.95.
Just off the main lobby of the grand old Victoria Falls Hotel in
Zimbabwe
there is a wood-paneled sitting room with an unusual name: the "I
Presume
Room."
I passed through there a decade ago and was captivated not just
by the
mellifluous sound of that room's name, but by the sharp, evocative
power of
the allusion. How many other short-hand phrases conjure up so much
wonder and
awe about the continent of
Africa?
I was struck, too, by how little I remembered about the story
behind it. Hmm,
there was a famous explorer named Livingstone who set out to
discover the
source of the Nile, right? When he vanished, someone named
Stanley went
searching for him. And when the two finally met, Stanley
uttered the phrase
that grade-school geography students have been repeating
ever since: "Doctor
Livingstone, I
presume?"
That's the dimly remembered outline. But what was the story
behind it? And
why are fancy hotels still naming rooms for their fateful
rendezvous more
than 130 years after the
fact?
Into Africa is a workman-like narrative history that supplies
the answers. In
the 19th century, the continent of Africa held a far firmer
grip on the
world's imagination than it does today. Its dense interior was
still
uncharted and steeped in mystery. It was bisected by the Nile - the
world's
longest river and a sort of holy grail for
explorers.
It was to the 19th century what Mount Everest and the moon were
to the 20th.
It flowed south to north, from the continent's midsection to
the
Mediterranean Sea. Moses, Cleopatra and Alexander had all drank its
waters.
But despite centuries of expeditions, no one had been able to
determine where
the river
began.
Finding the source became a particular obsession in England, and
the most
legendary of that country's explorers was a missionary named
David
Livingstone. He'd spent a lifetime in Africa - battling lions,
cannibals,
malaria, slave traders, swamp fever, dysentery and pagans. Well
past his
50th birthday, he determined that finding the source of the Nile
would be
his crowning achievement. So off he
went.
In due time, he disappeared and was feared dead, "swallowed by
the
continent." But a brash American newspaper publisher, eager to
capitalize on
the world's fascination with Livingstone, played a hunch and
sent an intrepid
young reporter on an expedition to find
him.
Henry Morton Stanley endured at least as many misadventures as
did
Livingstone. Finally, the two met and formed a short-lived father-son
bond,
despite the fact that the old explorer was a gentle soul and the
young
reporter a brute. Did either ever find the source of the Nile? Hey,
read
the
book.
Both men did keep copious journals, so Dugard has ample material
to work
with. Perhaps too ample. There are only so many bouts with diarrhea
a reader
can absorb in 300-plus pages. The adventures are indeed epic, but
they come
in such detail and profusion that the effect is often numbing.
This is a book
I'd recommend for Africanists and action-adventure
aficionados. More casual
readers may well find it a heavy
slog.
Paul Taylor, president and founder of the Alliance for Better
Campaigns, was
southern Africa bureau chief for The Washington Post in the
mid-1990s. His
book See How They Run was published by Knopf in 1990.
JAG OPEN LETTER FORUM
Email: justice@telco.co.zw; justiceforagriculture@zol.co.zwInternet: www.justiceforagriculture.comPlease send any material for publication in the Open Letter
Forum to
justice@telco.co.zw with "For Open
Letter Forum" in the subject
line.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Letter
1: Victor Frankl (Written whilst prisoner in a concentration camp)
" Let
us live for every second of our present lives...give of ourselves
completely
and totally in the moment and the results will take care of
themselves.
Refuse absolutely to accept despair...of all the emotions this
is the killer
- a man in despair is one of the living dead. We have
everything to live
for...everything to justify why we are right here, right
now in our lifetime.
Seize this day - the why is already apparent - we
stand for peace, for love
and for a better future in our chosen community -
the how is what you are
doing right now - the fight for freedom has never
been
easy...."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Letter
2: W Breytenbach
With the tobacco-selling season about to begin, I, as a
farmer who lost
everything that we worked for during the past 40 years, would
like to ask
Mr. Jim van Heerden and other tobacco merchants a simple
question.
Is the tobacco industry in Zimbabwe going to follow the example
of the
international horticultural market and refuse to buy from producers
who do
not hold title deeds or even a lease to show that they are official
owners
of the land they occupy, or does the Industry look upon the scenario
as the
long awaited for opportunity to finally control the production of
tobacco
in Zimbabwe the same way as they do in several other
countries?
Keep in mind that sooner or later, legality will return to
Zimbabwe and
then litigation against all those who are deemed to have
supported the
present madness will commence with a
vengeance.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
All
letters published on the open Letter Forum are the views and opinions
of the
submitters, and do not represent the official viewpoint of Justice
for
Agriculture.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Justice
for Agriculture mailing list
To subscribe/unsubscribe: Please write to
jag-list-admin@mango.zw
Reuters
28 Apr 2003 12:12:26
GMT
S.Africa meeting to refine "blood
diamond"
pact
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
By
Andrew Quinn
JOHANNESBURG, April 28 (Reuters) - Diamond-producing nations
are trying this
week to refine a pact to stem trade in "blood diamonds",
blamed for funding
wars and political violence across
Africa.
Representatives of some 70 countries are meeting in Johannesburg
to assess
the first months of the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme, an
agreement
reached in November to track one of the world's most prized --
and
misused -- commodities.
"We are here to check the effectiveness of
the system," Abbey Chikane, the
South African chairman of the group, said at
the start of the three-day
meeting on Monday.
"Even though we still
have a lot to do in improving the system, we have a
very solid
basis."
While the Kimberley pact has been hailed by diamond importing and
exporting
countries as well as the diamond industry and the United Nations,
human
rights groups say it lacks mechanisms to deal with
violators.
Specifically, groups have accused Zimbabwe, the Congo Republic
and the
Central African Republic of acting as conduits for uncut gems from
the
Democratic Republic of Congo, which rebels in countries such as
Sierra
Leone, Angola and Congo have then used to finance wars and commit
human
rights abuses.
"There has to be some process for evaluating all
of the countries, to assess
the extent of their compliance," said Corinna
Gilfillan of Global Witness, a
British-based non-governmental group which
monitors the diamond trade.
"This is a real credibility test. If they
don't take action, it will call
into question the credibility of the whole
system."
WILLING BUT UNABLE?
Chikane said most signatories were
eager to follow Kimberley guidelines, but
some lacked the legal or
administrative mechanisms to do so.
He cited the United States, which
only last week approved legal measures to
follow the Kimberley process
and begin tracking diamonds from Africa's mines
to the shops where they are
eventually sold.
Despite calls for a closer look at diamond sales in
Zimbabwe and other
African countries, Chikane said the Johannesburg meeting
would focus on ways
to determine compliance rather than on individual
cases.
He added that South Africa -- a major force in reaching the
Kimberley
agreement -- did not explicitly support calls for an independent
monitoring
system, preferring to work for better national monitoring and
control
procedures.
But Chikane said that once compliance terms have
been set, countries could
expect to come under close scrutiny.
"We
will have to decide how to deal with those countries that have not
complied,"
he said. "We were looking at the forest. We are now going to look
at the
trees, and we will begin looking at the leaves."
Some non-government
observers said the Johannesburg meeting should address
doubts about the
Kimberley agreement -- noting that some major signatories
such as Australia
and Canada had received certification documentation from
only a handful of
participating countries.
"We find that shocking," said Ian Smillie of
Partnership Africa Canada. "It
goes to the heart of the effectiveness of the
Kimberley process."
Does
Iraq seem likely place for democracy?
ROBERT D. KAPLAN
N.Y. Times News
Service
THE FUTURE OF FREEDOM: Illiberal Democracy at Home and
Abroad
By Fareed Zakaria. W.W. Norton. 236 pages.
$24.95.
The triumph of democracy in Central Europe after the collapse of
the Soviet
empire led to the fatuous assumption that democracy would succeed
everywhere
else. Many intellectuals brushed aside the advantages that Central
Europe
had that other regions lacked: high literacy rates, a long
bourgeois
tradition and exposure to the Western Enlightenment.
Thus
policy-makers were not prepared for elections that helped pave the way
to
mass killings in the Balkans, to new dictatorships in Central Asia and
to
chaos in Africa. As Fareed Zakaria explains in "The Future of
Freedom:
Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad," elections are not
necessarily
synonymous with constitutional liberalism: "Democracy is
flourishing;
liberty is not."
Zakaria, the editor of Newsweek
International, defines constitutional
liberalism as the "bundle of freedoms"
that include the rule of law, the
rights of free speech and religion and the
protection of minorities. Such
freedoms, he writes, require the limitation of
power, although democracy can
sometimes mean the accumulation of it by an
electorate that is little more
than a mob. An example is his native India,
where Hindu politicians pursue
the "rhetoric of hatred," which has led to
"the ethnic cleansing of tens of
thousands" simply because it appeals to so
many anti-Muslim voters.
Zakaria's complex argument is particularly
relevant today, as the United
States is at the apex of its power in the
Middle East, facing the decision
of whether to democratize Iraq quickly and
whether to push for change
elsewhere in the region.
He provides this
cautionary note: "The Arab rulers of the Middle East are
autocratic, corrupt
and heavy-handed. But they are still more liberal,
tolerant and pluralistic
than what would likely replace them. Elections in
many Arab countries would
produce politicians who espouse views that are
closer to Osama bin Laden's
than those of Jordan's liberal monarch, King
Abdullah."
Nevertheless,
elections in Iraq, particularly in the Shiite areas, might
show the world
that the United States is bent on the Iraqis' liberation
rather than on their
subjugation. Elections would also pressure the Shiite
regime in neighboring
Iran to liberalize. But it is the circumstances of
each Middle Eastern
country that should dictate how far and how fast we push
for democratization,
and not our ideological hubris.
Elections often constitute the
culmination of liberalization rather than its
beginning. The United States
will surely be at its best in the Middle East
when it promotes the general
principles of a free society, rather than when
it seeks to interpret those
principles too narrowly and legalistically by
demanding elections when it is
dangerous to do so. In a post-Saddam Hussein
Middle East, Zakaria implies,
our truest allies will be patience and
endurance. His book, whose target is
zealotry and not democracy, could not
have been published at a more
appropriate time.
Democracy's mixed record in producing liberty is
Zakaria's theme. He writes
about Karl Lueger, the rabid anti-Semite who in
1895 was elected mayor of
Vienna. The unelected Habsburg emperor, Franz
Joseph I, refused to honor the
election, an anti-democratic measure that
furthered the cause of historic
liberalism rather than impeded it. As the
author shows, the rise of fascism
in the first half of the 20th century was
inextricable from the expansion of
the democratic franchise: Hitler rose to
power through a free and fair
democratic election.
Because social and
economic conditions in much of the non-Western world now
approximate those of
Europe between the wars, Zakaria is able to catalog a
vast array of instances
in which the electorate's will led to the
retrenchment of liberty. In 1994
voters in Belarus overwhelmingly elected
the extreme nationalist Alexander
Lukashenko as their president. The recent
crackdown on independent news media
by President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia
was sanctioned by the electorate in
opinion polls. In 1998 Venezuelans
elected as their president Hugo Chavez,
the angry populist and cashiered
army colonel who then eviscerated the
legislature and the judiciary.
And while Americans and Israelis justly
despise the misrule of the
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, the author
points out that Arafat "is the
only leader in the entire Arab world who has
been chosen through reasonably
free elections."
"The Future of
Freedom," however, is no polemic against elections. Rather,
it is a calm
antidote to the fervency of those who want to force elections
down the throat
of every society, no matter what its particular
circumstances and historical
experience. As any foreign correspondent knows,
there are all kinds and
gradations of dictators. Saddam cannot be compared
with Gen. Pervez
Musharraf, whose coup in Pakistan in 1999 led to an attempt
at "radical
political, social, educational and economic reform" that no
elected
politician would have dared. Nor can Lee Kuan Yew, who wrought an
economic
miracle in Singapore, be compared with another dictator, Robert
Mugabe, whose
thuggery and incompetency have brought Zimbabwe to the brink
of famine and
bankruptcy. Zakaria, far from extolling dictatorship, usefully
reminds us of
a complicated world that cannot be depicted as a Manichaean
divide between
democratic and authoritarian.
"It should surely puzzle these scholars and
intellectuals," Zakaria writes,
"that the best-consolidated democracies in
Latin America and East Asia --
Chile, South Korea and Taiwan -- were for a
long while ruled by military
juntas. In almost every case the dictatorships
opened the economy slowly and
partially, but this process made government
more and more liberal."
Nor did our own democracy spring from completely
exalted ground. Zakaria
notes that Western liberty was born of naked
struggles for power. The
Vatican, though itself reactionary, furthered the
cause of individual
liberty by competing with the power of the state so that
the state lost its
monopoly on ideas. There was also the dumb luck of
geography: Europe's many
rivers, mountains and navigable bays allowed for the
growth of feisty,
independent countries, in contrast to the flatlands of
Asia, easily overrun
and thus friendly to despotism. Earned wealth also
helped the West. The rise
of a bourgeoisie and private businesses weakened
the state's centralizing
power.
The author nowhere denies moral will
as a factor in liberty but writes that
people of strong moral will exist in
many places that are still not liberal,
often because history, geography and
economic conditions have not been
propitious.
As for Iraq,
Mesopotamia's flat geography, so friendly to conquest, as well
as its ethnic
splits and absence of public opinion (at least as we know it),
would not make
it seem fertile ground for democracy. Nevertheless, the
nation's high level
of education and relatively secular tradition should
give us some cause for
optimism. Who knows? Iraqis may turn out to be wise
in the way of Eastern
Europeans, who had experienced a similar
despotism.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Robert
D. Kaplan, a correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly, is the author of
"Balkan
Ghosts," "The Coming Anarchy" and other books.
The
Times
Zimbabwe prepare for departure after visit from the
vet
By Owen Slot, Chief Sports
Reporter
FACING the prospect of protests and counter-publicity, the
Zimbabwe cricket
team will leave Harare today for the two-Test tour of
England, having
completed the process of being "politically
vetted".
"Politically vetted" is the expression of the leaders of the
gathering Stop
the Tour campaign, but it is endorsed by Alistair Campbell,
the former
Zimbabwe captain who retired last month. "That's what the team
are," he said,
"a bunch of 'yes' men. And Heath Streak (the captain) couldn'
t say a bad
word about anything. If you could pick your best Zimbabwean
side, not many of
these guys would be in
it."
The team, says Campbell, will have been passed by Zimbabwe's
Sports
Commission and the players will have been told that if they are going
to open
their mouths while in England, then it is only the right sort of
words that
are permitted to come out. "I used to have a clause in my
contract that said
that if anything from me appeared in the press that was
politically
orientated, then I'd be suspended without pay, pending
investigation,"
Campbell
said.
"So all you'll hear from these players is: 'we're here to play
cricket'.
That's
it."
After the experiences of Andy Flower and, particularly, Henry
Olonga during
the World Cup, the consequences of speaking out against the
Zimbabwean
Government are well established. That is one reason, explains
Campbell, why
the touring team is so young. Tatenda Taibu, the wicketkeeper,
is only 19,
yet has been appointed
vicecaptain.
"These are young guys who still want to make their way in the
game, so
they're not likely to do anything wrong," Campbell said. "It's a
lot of
untried youth. I actually feel sorry for them. It's unfair to thrust
them
into the international arena so
early."
It is hardly surprising, then, that Alan Wilkinson, the leader
of Stop the
Tour, has described the touring party as "ambassadors for Robert
Mugabe", and
is galvanising support in order to carry out a campaign
of
disruption.Wilkinson does not envisage a "mass following" and he
concedes
that there will probably be more people watching the cricket than
protesting
against it, but he promises that there will be "activity" at every
game.
"Stopping the tour is clearly what we'd ultimately like to
achieve," he said,
"but we want to make sure that when every game is being
played, people
realise that there are others back home whose lives and
freedom are under
threat."
Among those joining the protests at Lord's and
Chester-le-Street, the two
Test match venues, will be Kate Hoey, Labour's
former Sports Minister, whose
protest will be contrary to party
line.
On March 24, Tessa Jowell, the Secretary of State for Culture,
Media and
Sport, wrote a letter to Tim Lamb, the chief executive of the
England and
Wales Cricket Board, in which she gave the Zimbabwe tour the
green light.
"Whilst we did not support the England team going to Zimbabwe
during the
World Cup because of the propaganda opportunities that could have
afforded
the Mugabe regime," she wrote, "we do not wish to stand in the way
of
Zimbabwean teams competing
here."
However, it is strange that the Government should be so happy to
endorse the
tour when the agreement between the two cricket unions was made
on the
understanding that England would return to Zimbabwe in
2004.
Perhaps this was why Hoey was so forceful in a parliamentary
debate on
Zimbabwe on April 1. "No one who watches the two Test matches and
the other
matches will enjoy them, knowing that the lives of some of the
Zimbabwean
players have been threatened," she said. "The Government should
say that they
do not want Zimbabwe to
tour."
Zimbabwe's Test tour
squad
H H Streak, captain (age 29, Tests
51)
T
Taibu, vice-captain (20,
6)
G W
Flower (32,
63)
D D
Ebrahim (22,
14)
M A
Vermeulen (24,
1)
B G
Rogers (20,
0)
S M
Ervine (20,
0)
A M
Blignaut (24,
8)
M L
Nkala (22,
7)
S V
Carlisle (30,
27)
R W
Price (26,
10)
T J
Friend (22,
10)
V
Sibanda (19,
0)
D T
Hondo (23,
1)
ITINERARY: May 3-6: v British Universities, Edgbaston. 9-12:
v
Worcestershire, Worcester. 15-18: v Sussex, Hove. 22-26: 1st Test,
Lord's.
May 30-June 2: v Middlesex, Shenley. June 5-9: 2nd Test,
Riverside.
The
Herald
President not leaving office
Herald
Reporter
PRESIDENT Mugabe has not indicated a wish to leave office now or at
any
other time before the expiry of his term, the Department of Information
and
Publicity said yesterday.
"All the President did in the recent
interview marking the 23rd anniversary
of independence, was to invite
national debate on a range of national
questions including that of
succession.
"But sadly, so far, there has been no debate or debaters,
serve for flippant
speculations and crazy scenario building," the Department
said in a
statement.
It said of late there has been a bombardment of
sensational media reports
that have been drawing up uninformed and
uninforming hypothetical political
scenarios which seem to imply a
constitutional/legal, institutional and
personnel vacuum in the
country.
"The Zimbabwean people know only too well that the highest
office is
occupied, and is only available to aspirants strictly on the basis
of
democratic processes, procedures and practices provided for by
the
Constitution.
"Consequently and against these basic constitutional
realities, any
speculative reports on 'transitional government',
'transitional arrangements
', 'exit plan' or 'exile' are best wishful, and at
worst an undemocratic
insult to the people of Zimbabwe based on a desire to
subvert and usurp
their sovereign will cynically in their name and in the
name of democracy,"
the Department said.
It said such reports have
largely been inspired and originated by the
British-linked newsmen and
newspapers in defence of white interests in
Zimbabwe and southern
Africa.
"This patently mistaken and self-serving reportage is meant to
create an
atmosphere of uncertainty and division, in order to detract the
Zimba-bwean
people from focussing on and addressing real issues.
"The
Zimbabwe Government restates that Zimbabwe has a living constitution,
which
has consistently shaped and guided its politics since the end of
British
colonial rule in 1980."
The Department dismissed reports that Presidents
Thabo Mbeki of South
Africa, Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and Bakili Muluzi
of Malawi would visit
the country to work out President Mugabe's "exit
plan".
It said the three leaders had expressed an interest to visit the
country to
update themselves on "our situation in the context of their
protracted
mediation efforts between Zimbabwe and Britain".
"This
proposed visit is predicated on a firm understanding that the people
of
Zimbabwe held elections that were recognised by the whole of Africa as
a
legitimate expression of the will of the Zimbabwean people.
"It is
based on a firm recognition that the people of Zimbabwe desire and
deserve
full sovereignty and to that end are supported by Africa.
"Indeed, the
Presidents are aware that the land question has been the core
issue at the
heart of Zimbabwe's politics and that everything else depends
on the
resolution of this question in favour of the previously landless
black
majority.
"The three Presidents are clear that Zimbabweans have no wish
to see their
gains reversed through backdoor deals meant to either entrench
or perpetuate
colonial interests in Zimbabwe," the Department said.
It
said Zimbabwe had a legitimate and functional Government in office
whose
mandate derives from the June 2000 parliamentary elections.
The
ruling Zanu-PF won 57 of the country's 58 districts in the 2002
rural
district elections and above all the country had a sitting President
elected
by Zimbabweans in March 2002 whose six-year term expires in
2008.
"For all the self-serving biased coverage, the people of Zimbabwe
have not
expressed a wish to withdraw the mandate they gave to the
present
Government.
"Nor have they indicated a wish to transit to
another dispensation, whether
constitutional or political, shaped and defined
by processes which exclude
them and are largely called by foreign interests,"
the Department said.
It said what was disturbing about the reports was
the clear contempt of the
Zimbabwean people who are treated as if they have
no say in their political
future, but have to count on foreign political
processes, actions and actors
with no legitimate role or authority in shaping
the country's political
future.
"Zimbabweans are accustomed to
directing and expressing their political
wishes and choices through their own
well-established electoral calendar and
rhythm.
"They know the office
of presidency to be elective; they know the office of
Member of Parliament to
be elective. Indeed, they know that the institution
that governs them comes
from them through the ballot, and never to them
through phoney negotiations
that undermine the national interest and seek to
suspend their rights of
suffrage, even for a single day."
The Government thus read with utter
dismay reports that seem to suggest that
the verdict of the people of
Zimbabwe as expressed through elections has to
be side stepped, circumvented
and altogether set aside for the sake of a
"transitional Government" or some
so-called government of national unity
that pleases certain foreign powers
with colonial interests here and that
seek a political accommodation of the
opposition MDC which lost local
government, parliamentary and presidential
elections.
"Government is also dismayed by opportunistic and downright
mischievous
attempts to draw comparison between Morgan Tsvangirai and the
late
Vice-President Joshua Nkomo; between PF-Zapu and the MDC, or to make a
case
for dialogue between Zanu-PF and MDC on the basis of principles of
the
historic Unity Accord of 1987.
"The late Vice-President Nkomo,
PF-Zapu and the Unity Accord were products
of nationalist and liberation
politics, as opposed to the British-directed
quisling politics of Tsvangirai
and his MDC."
The Department said there was no agenda for talks with the
MDC with a view
to overturning the people's electoral verdict and no
negotiation committee
has been set up for that stillborn
purpose.
"Zanu-PF and its Government will not dabble in any political
misadventures
whose outcome seeks to temper and attenuate, let alone
overthrow the will of
the people of Zimbabwe, as expressed through a popular
vote."
On the basis of its 2000 and 2002 election manifesto, the Zanu-PF
Government
defines the real issues facing Zimbabwe as resolving the long
standing land
question, reviving the economy, particularly safeguarding the
interests of
workers and consumers, and defending Zimbabwe's sovereignty,
which stands
threatened by neo-colonially minded Western governments and
interests.
"While much ground has been covered in respect of the land
question, a lot
remains to be accomplished, particularly in respect of
adjusting the
constitutional and legal framework of the country to confirm
the de facto
land tenure situation arising from land reforms, as well as
mopping up areas
of persisting landlessness in a number of congested communal
areas.
"This, coupled with the urgent question of making the new farmer
productive,
is a major pre-occupation of the Party and
Government."
The Department said since the commencement of the land
reform programme,
Zimbabwe's sovereignty has been under a British-led attack
both directly
through sanctions and downright interference in its internal
affairs and
indirectly through the use of surrogate forces, principally the
MDC.
"A people, especially peasants in the countryside, who have in the
past paid
the ultimate price for their freedom and sovereignty, cannot be
expected to
embrace forces and processes designed to undermine that very
sovereignty."
Herald
UK
working with MDC to topple Government: Donnelly
Herald
Reporter
BRITISH High Commissioner to Zimbabwe Mr Brian Donnelly has conceded
that
his government is working with opposition parties and civic groups
to
install a new government in Zimbabwe.
Mr Donnelly said there was
nothing wrong with supporting civic groups whose
aims are to promote
democratic policies in the country.
He was speaking to reporters on the
sidelines of a workshop on elections in
Zimbabwe in Vumba last
week.
The British High Commission has in the past denied interfering in
the
domestic affairs of Zimbabwe and supporting the MDC.
But the
latest revelations by Mr Donnelly have vindicated the Government's
stance
that Britain is involved in covert activities aimed at undermining
the
country's independence and sovereignty.
Mr Donnelly said Britain had a
tradition of supporting democratic processes
worldwide and Zimbabwe was no
exception.
"What's wrong with supporting the opposition and civic groups
that promote
democracy?" asked Mr Donnelly.
When asked whether it was
not the responsibility of Zimbabweans to elect a
government of their own
choice, Mr Donnelly said under international law, it
was acceptable for a
foreign power to advocate for a change of government in
another
country.
He said before the outlawing of foreign funding of opposition
political
parties, opposition parties and some civic groups in the country
used to
receive funds from the Westminster Foundation, which is directly
funded by
the British government.
He, however, said that the High
Commission was still supporting civic groups
in the country and was
undertaking various developmental projects mainly in
rural areas.
The
High Commissioner said his Government did not recognise the Government
and
President Mugabe as Head of State.
"We don't deal with the Government, we
deal with the country. We deal with
the people and we have various projects
that we are doing with the people,"
he said.
Asked to elaborate, Mr
Donnelly said this was so because of the sour
relations existing between
Harare and London.
The relations soured after the Government embarked on
the land reform
programme aimed at correcting historical imbalances that had
seen the
majority blacks eking out a living on poor soils while a tiny
minority of
whites, most of whom are of British origin, owned vast tracts of
the
country's arable land.
Mr Donnelly said Britain was campaigning
for the isolation of Zimbabwe from
various multilateral organisations and the
imposition of sanctions because
he believed the country was not following
internationally accepted
democratic principles.
"When you see your
friend not following the same laws that he is signatory
to and is not
following internationally accepted laws and norms of
governance then that
friend does not deserve to be your friend," said Mr
Donnelly.
He,
however, conceded that there was no total collapse and breakdown of law
in
Zimbabwe as portrayed by most Western media.
"Of course there is no total
collapse and that is why I am still here. Our
commission is still operating
in Zimbabwe because of the relations that
exist between Britain and
Zimbabwe," he said.
Despite frosty relations between the two countries,
Britain and Zimbabwe
have had long and strong historical relations and that
his country has a lot
of economic interests in Zimbabwe.
Britain was
one of the major consumers of Zimbabwe's tobacco and had a
number of economic
ventures in the country.
As a way to reinforce his point, Mr Donnelly
said Zimbabweans were so much
attached to British culture as seen in their
interests in English soccer.
Mr Donnelly said his country was open to
dialogue with the Zimbabwean
Government as the current stalemate was not
benefiting the two countries.
He, however, could not explain who was
stalling the dialogue.
On the silence of the British and other Western
nations in condemning the
recent violent MDC stayaway, Mr Donnelly said the
European Union had issued
a statement in which it disapproved of the violence
that characterised the
stayaway.
Mr Donnelly denied reports that the
British government had changed its
strategy of demonising the country because
of the land reform programme and
was now focusing on issues of human
rights.
"That's nonsense, we have always emphasised that Britain wants to
see a
peaceful and democratic Zimbabwe. We have not shifted from that
stance," he
said.
The British High Commissioner castigated the public
media for what he
alleged was unfair reporting.
He alleged that the
unfair reporting recently forced him to turn down an
invitation by the
Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation to share his views on
its current affairs
programme on the invasion of Iraq.
He said the public media always
criticised the British government for
alleged double standards in its
definition of democracy but the same public
media did not tolerate divergent
views.