Elderly and Abandoned

The American Spectator

By Hal G.P. Colebatch
Published 4/4/2007 12:07:39 AM
The following letter from a British lady in Zimbabwe appeared the other week
in the London Daily Telegraph:

"Recently an official from the British Embassy in Zimbabwe visited a local
retirement home to answer questions from the elderly residents. She was
asked what plans had been made, given the current political violence and
looming threat of civil war, to evacuate the remaining 12,000 British
citizens, most of whom are elderly people.

"She said no plans had been made and that in the event of further violence
and fears for the residents' safety, 'you would have to make your own
arrangements to get out.'

"How exactly would we manage to do this? I am 71 (and still, by the way,
working owing to the country's economic disaster) and my mother is 97.

"We could not afford the airfares even if we could get seats, and those of
us who are still fortunate enough to own vehicles could not obtain the fuel
to reach the border as it is both expensive and scarce.

"My father and his three brothers died fighting for Britain in the last
world war. I wonder how they would feel about this causal attitude of the
British Government where their descendants' lives are concerned?"

NO PLANS? GIVEN THE STATE of Zimbabwe this letter should, perhaps, have
caused a degree of shock. However, it is part of a pattern that has been
becoming more obvious for several years. The British community in Zimbabwe
appears to have been treated with callous indifference by the British
government in the last few years as Mugabe has destroyed the economy,
violated civil rights wholesale and victimized whites, and as his regime has
deteriorated towards chaos and civil war.

Previously, back when Zimbabwe still had something like an economy, it was
possible for resourceful people there who could not export their assets
otherwise to buy an aircraft, fly it out, and sell it. But the Britons
trapped there today are a particularly helpless minority not only because
Mugabe's annihilation of the Zimbabwean economy has made their assets
completely worthless -- so that even the physical means of escape are denied
them (a plight they share with black Zimbabweans) -- but also because those
with the means to get out have largely gone, and those that are left are for
the most part impoverished and more-or-less helpless old people without the
support of families. The grotesque idea comes to mind of caravans of
octogenarians trying to trek across Africa looking for help and safety.

Technically, a lot of them are not, or are no longer, British. And thereby
hangs a tale: towards the end of 2001 Mugabe enforced a decree that British
passport holders in Zimbabwe had to formally renounce their British
citizenship, even if this had been simply inherited through parents, or lose
Zimbabwean citizenship and voting rights (whatever they are worth). This
gave rise to as poignant vignette: as these people lined up at the British
High Commission, many of them elderly and in tears, a British official was
reported as shouting at them: "You had six months to do this and you have
all left it to the last minute. The staff have to have a break and a cup of
tea!"

This apparent readiness by the British government to abandon its own people
to their fate is bad enough. Remember how Israel, with less than a tenth of
Britain's resources, beginning in 1977 airlifted out of danger, and gave
refuge and Israeli citizenship to, a community of about 15,000 Ethiopian
"Falashas," who it was decided were of Jewish origin? The contrast is
glaring.

BUT THERE IS WORSE. Quite shocking reports emerged of active discrimination
against Zimbabwean whites by the Blair government: people who had plainly
resigned their British citizenship under duress were not allowed to resume
it, and were made to pay 11 times the official rate for British passports.
The Foreign Office, when questioned about this, said it was trying to
"maximize income" from the Zimbabwean consulate! This was also forcing the
whites concerned to use black-market pricing, and thereby break Zimbabwean
law and give the deranged dictator a pretext to arrest them.

It seemed, as time went on, that British citizens could be persecuted,
robbed and murdered apparently with impunity by the increasingly insane
Mugabe regime, the persecution extending to the victimization of Zimbabwean
policemen who displeased the dictator by providing elderly British farmers
with extra blankets at night when they had been arrested on trumped
up-charges and held in a cold cell. The white-owned farms which were
previously the mainstay of Zimbabwe's economy have been expropriated, a
major factor in the present economic collapse and increasing starvation. Of
course, these elderly British are, in a ghastly sense, privileged and
fortunate in modern Zimbabwe in having lived so long. Under Mugabe black
life-expectancy has gone from 60 to 38 years.

Journalist David Blair pointed out some years ago that the age of the
remaining white victims gave this persecution a particularly horrible
aspect: "Their average age cannot be under 65. The young have gone, the
grandparents remain."

OF THE 12,000 BRITISH PEOPLE remaining in Zimbabwe, it is estimated that
about half are aged pensioners (except that Zimbabwean inflation and
economic collapse has made their "pensions" worthless). Many are World War
II veterans or the widows of veterans. Private charities, such as "Zimbabwe,
A National Emergency" are trying to help them, but it appears the British
government is doing nothing and has no interest in doing anything. (It is
spending about $20 billion, so far, on the London Olympic Games, however.)

The first big wave of white persecutions by the Mugabe regime, beginning in
2001, was the first major foreign-policy crisis, with large numbers of
British lives at stake, for the Blair Government. Mugabe had shown his
colors (which he had never bothered to hide much anyway) as a terroristic
tyrant by the genocidal massacres of many thousands of Ndabele people
previously. Prime Minister Blair and the Foreign Secretary, both then on
holiday, left the matter to a junior Foreign Office Minister, Baroness Amos,
who said and, as far as one could tell, did nothing whatsoever. In January
2002, she told the Today program that "in different parts of the world we
see different countries turn to bad leadership and bad politics, and we've
seen that coming in Zimbabwe for some years and it's a tragedy." That was
it.

A plea by Prince Charles, who reportedly wrote privately to the Prime
Minister's office asking that the British people trapped in Zimbabwe be
helped, was apparently ignored. With the situation now desperate and
complete chaos and civil war in Zimbabwe looking nearer every day, the stage
is being set for a particularly cruel and unnecessary criminal tragedy.

Hal G. P. Colebatch, a lawyer and author, has lectured in International Law
and International Relations at Notre Dame University and Edith Cowan
University in Western Australia and worked on the staff of two Australian
Federal Ministers.

When thieves fall out

Pittsburgh Post Gazette

Robert Mugabe plays out his last act as dictator and destroyer of Zimbabwe
Wednesday, April 04, 2007

By Gwynne Dyer

It will take a while yet, but the long and brutal reign of Robert Mugabe in
Zimbabwe is probably nearing its end. Not because of the democratic
opposition at home, whose members are regularly beaten up and sometimes
killed by the regime's police. Not even because neighboring countries in
southern Africa are at last putting pressure on Mr. Mugabe to go. But just
because his own partners-in-crime have decided that it's him or them.

The key moment arrived last December, when for the first time the senior
ranks of the ruling Zanu-PF Party stood up to Mr. Mugabe and refused to
accept his proposal to postpone the next presidential election from 2008 to
2010. It was typical Mugabe salami tactics -- give me two more years, and
maybe I'll decide to resign in 2010 -- but this time it didn't work.

In that case, said Mr. Mugabe, I'll run for president again in 2008 (which
would keep him in the presidency for his 90th birthday in 2014).

Given the speed with which Zimbabwe's economy is collapsing and its
population fleeing abroad, seven more years of Mr. Mugabe and it would not
be worth inheriting power there -- so Mr. Mugabe's potential heirs within
his won party have begun to rebel.

All that has followed -- the vicious assaults of opposition leaders by Mr.
Mugabe's police in mid-February, the South African government's decision a
week ago to start talking to Mr. Mugabe's Zanu-PF rivals and Zimbabwean
opposition leaders, and the emergency meeting of the leaders of the
14-nation Southern African Development Community in Tanzania on March 28 -- 
is a response to this new perception that Mr. Mugabe doesn't have long to
run.

"I have been to these [southern African] summits and I know that behind
closed doors they are brutally frank," Mr. Mugabe's former information
minister, Jonathan Moyo, told The Guardian last week. "They will remind
Mugabe that he told them he would retire at the end of his term in 2008 ...
They will tell Mugabe that his rule in Zimbabwe is dragging down the whole
southern African region." None of that got into the meeting's closing
communique, which ritually expressed solidarity with Mr. Mugabe, but Mr.
Moyo is probably right, because Zimbabwe is becoming a blight on the region.

Inflation in Zimbabwe, at 1,700 percent, is the highest in the world (the
next highest, Burma, is only 60 percent), and average income is less than a
10th of South Africa's. Ten years ago Zimbabwe was seen as the bread basket
of Africa, and it earned ample foreign exchange from exports of tobacco and
other cash crops; now it cannot feed half its people, and the tobacco crop
is down by four-fifths.

There are an estimated three million Zimbabwean economic refugees in South
Africa (two-thirds of the country's working-age population), and they are
the main support of those left at home, because unemployment in Zimbabwe is
80 percent or more. Zimbabwean life expectancy is now the lowest in the
world: 37 for men, 34 for women.

Then there is the unbridled brutality of the police force, the official
contempt for the law, the propaganda that blames all the failings of the
regime on foreign imperialists plotting against it -- it's not exactly the
image that southern Africans want for their region.

On the whole, southern Africa does not fit that image. From South Africa to
Tanzania, most of the governments in the Southern African Development
Community are democratically elected and law-abiding. Most economies are
showing good growth, and nobody is starving. But it is a well-known fact
that people in other continents have difficulty in telling one African
country from another and that investors are the most ignorant of all.
Zimbabwe's multiple failures take up more space in the international media
than news about all 13 other members of the development community combined,
and so the neighbors' patience has run out.

In fact, it ran out some time ago, but being realists about the nature of
politics in Mr. Mugabe's Zimbabwe, the other southern African leaders saw no
point in publicly demanding change. Now, however, there is blood in the
water. Mr. Mugabe managed to bully Zanu-PF's central committee into
nominating him for the presidency again last week, but everybody knows that
two major factions in the party want him to quit. That has opened the door
for others to demand change as well.

The main contenders for the succession are not without sin.

Emmerson Mnangagwa was state security minister when 25,000 members of the
minority Ndebele tribe were murdered by the regime in the 1980s for
supporting the wrong political party. Vice-President Joice Mujuru is the
wife of Solomon Mujuru, a former army chief who became very rich thanks to
his involvement in illegal land-grabs during the seizure of all the farms
owned by white Zimbabweans.

The ideal outcome would be an alliance between Zanu-PF dissidents and
Zimbabwe's democratic opposition in a transitional government leading to
free, internationally supervised elections. The reality may be a good deal
messier, because the Old Man doesn't know how to let go. He has just
imported 3,000 "security personnel" from Angola to stiffen his own police,
who are deserting in droves and going to work in South Africa as security
guards because inflation has made their wages in Zimbabwe almost worthless.

But one way or another, Robert Mugabe's long misrule has reached the
beginning of the end.

      Gwynne Dyer is a London-based journalist and military historian
(www.gwynnedyer.net).

Defiant Mugabe hops to Far East

Zim Online

Wednesday 04 April 2007

By Farisai Gonye

HARARE - A defiant President Robert Mugabe left Harare on Tuesday for the
Far East, ignoring a national job stayaway called by trade unions to protest
economic hardships they blame on his government.

Mugabe also skipped a crucial meeting of his ruling ZANU PF party's inner
politburo cabinet and that was supposed to fine-tune plans for next year's
presidential election in which he will stand after successfully suppressing
discontent from party rivals who wanted him to retire at the end of his term
next year.

Party insiders, who spoke to ZimOnline on condition they were not named,
said they too were unaware of details of Mugabe's trip or even which country
exactly he was visiting, with some speculating the 83 year-old leader might
have gone to seek urgent medical attention.

ZANU PF spokesman Nathan Shamuyarira said Mugabe would return at the weekend
but refused to disclose further details on his trip which he said was
private.

"The visit is private, so the details are equally private. He will be here,
Sunday latest," said Shamuyarira.

The ZANU PF spokesman said the politburo would still go ahead and make
recommendations on how next year's presidential and parliamentary elections
should proceed. The recommendations shall be forwarded to the government for
implementation.

Mugabe, Africa's oldest ruler, outfoxed his opponents, managing to secure
ZANU PF's endorsement for another run for the presidency at a key central
committee meeting in Harare last Friday.

Many had anticipated that the central committee would not endorse Mugabe's
candidature and force him to retire.

Critics and some party colleagues blame Mugabe for being the biggest
stumbling block to Zimbabwe's economic revival, a charge he denies. -
ZimOnline

Zim police, soldiers will be held to account: UN

Zim Online

Wednesday 04 April 2007

      Own Correspondent

      JOHANNESBURG - A top United Nations human rights official on Monday
called on Zimbabwe security forces not to shoot anti-government protestors,
warning them that those who used lethal force against civilians would be
eventually held to account.

      In a statement released to the media, Philip Alston, the UN Special
Rapporteur on extrajudicial executions said soldiers and police officers who
complied with orders to shoot protesters will be held to account.

      "Under international law, widespread or systematic attacks against the
civilian population are crimes against humanity.

      "Members of the police and military who comply with orders to gun down
demonstrators will eventually be held to account," said Alston.

      An opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) supporter, Gift
Tandare, was shot and killed by the police last month during anti-government
protests in Harare's Highfield working class suburb.

      Two other opposition supporters, Nickson Magondo and Naison
Mashambanhaka, were also shot and seriously injured by the police during
Tandare's funeral wake in Glen View working class suburb.

      Major Western governments and some African countries condemned the use
of deadly force by Mugabe's state agents. But Mugabe has publicly defended
the police, accusing the opposition of seeking to violently oust him from
power.

      Alston said the Harare authorities had shown a total disregard for the
need to balance "the rights to political participation" and the need by the
government to maintain public order.

      "Full, independent investigations must be undertaken as soon as
possible," said Alston. - ZimOnline

U.S. urges Americans in Zimbabwe to take precautions

International Herald Tribune

The Associated PressPublished: April 3, 2007

    Text Size

WASHINGTON: The U.S. Embassy is urging American citizens in Zimbabwe to
avoid any large gatherings, including political rallies, and to choose with
care the bars and nightclubs they visit, particularly in the high-density
suburbs.

A message sent to the American community in Zimbabwe on Wednesday said
Zimbabwean Republic Police (ZRP) raided an upscale nightclub in Borrowdale,
detaining more than 80 people and beating several.

"The ZRP is increasingly using excessive force including in enforcing a
widespread closure of bars and beer halls in the southern high-density
suburbs," it said.

Tensions in Zimbabwe have been high since police violently broke up a prayer
meeting last month, detaining and severely beating government opponents.

Zimbabwe Mediator Mbeki: No Regime Change, But Transition Ahead

VOA

      By Blessing Zulu
      Washington
      03 April 2007

South African President Thabo Mbeki, appointed mediator in the Zimbabwe
crisis last week by Southern African Development Community leaders, said his
first concern is to ensure that the next elections that are held in Zimbabwe
be free and fair.

In an an interview published in the Financial Times of London on Tuesday,
Mbeki said that although "regime change" does not figure on his agenda, he
does expect that President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe will eventually stand
down.

"We don't have a big stick," Mbeki told Financial Times reporters, meaning
that he did not intend to force a change in Harare through intervention,
military or otherwise.

He told the newspaper that he would try to restart informal discussions
between Mr. Mugabe's ruling party and the opposition, hoping to pave the way
for presidential and parliamentary elections less than a year from now in
March 2008.

Mbeki's comments on Zimbabwe elections tacitly contradicted the communiqué
issued at the SADC summit, which asserted that elections in Zimbabwe since
2002 have been free and fair. The elections drew wide criticism for alleged
voter intimidation and ballot fraud by Mr. Mugabe's ZANU-PF party,
particularly in isolated rural communities.

He acknowledged that Zimbabwe's electoral process was flawed, "but we do
have to get Zimbabweans talking so we do have elections that are free and
fair."

International Relations Secretary Eliphas Mukonoweshuro of the opposition
Movement for Democratic Change faction of Morgan Tsvangirai told VOA that he
would welcome a negotiated settlement and would concede defeat if elections
are free and fair.

Mbeki spokesman Mukoni Ratshitanga told VOA that the negotiation process was
well under way, noting that the secretaries general of the two MDC factions
had met with officials from Mr. Mbeki's office two weeks ago.

Johannesburg-based independent analyst Obri Matshiqi told reporter Blessing
Zulu of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that Mr. Mbeki's latest comments
indicate that despite its seeming support of Mr. Mugabe, SADC has hardened
its stance on the crisis.

Missing will

USA today
Posted at 12:20 AM/ET, April 04, 2007

Worlds away in Africa, another dictator is getting away with murder and
more. Zimbabwe's leader, Robert Mugabe, 83, has no central role in U.S.
security. But the abuses he is perpetrating on his people have reached a
level of inhumanity that cries out for condemnation and for his removal.
Mugabe has become an extreme caricature of a despotic African dictator.
Zimbabwe has 80% unemployment and 1,700% inflation. Opposition leaders are
beaten and murdered, and starvation is on the rise. Among his abuses: razing
shantytowns, leaving people without homes. Despite some sanctions, he has
taken to taunting the West. "Nothing frightens me, not even little fellows
like Bush and Blair," he said recently.

True enough, Bush, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and other major Western
leaders are preoccupied with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Zimbabwe has
little strategic or economic significance. Their military intervention is
unlikely, and there are few more sanctions they can impose. But they can
prod other African countries to step into the breach.

To date, the efforts of African leaders have been disappointing. But there
are some signs of hope.

Protests in Zimbabwe have been gathering momentum. One of Zimbabwe's top
Roman Catholic clerics, Archbishop Pius Ncube of Bulowayo, is calling for
mass peaceful demonstrations, even if it means standing "in front of blazing
guns." Last month, opposition leaders led demonstrations. Several were
beaten by police and one died, stirring outrage at home and around the
world.

Until now, Mugabe has been able to count on his ZANU-PF party because its
members get the best jobs and perks. But with the economy collapsing, even
ministers can't find school fees for their children. Dire economic problems
caused by Mugabe are deepening, and fast.

But since 2000, Mugabe has seized, and handed to supporters, most of the
white-owned farms that were the backbone of a once-prosperous economy. Their
subsequent collapse has helped push Zimbabwe into its downward spiral.

The hope is that Zimbabweans will overthrow Mugabe - and that when they do,
the outside world, particularly South Africa and other African countries,
will rush in to help.

Trusting dictators is sometimes needed in the short term. As both Musharraf
and Mugabe show, it's a dangerous long-term plan.

Lawyer seeks journalist's release

New Zimbabwe

By Torby Chimhashu
Last updated: 04/04/2007 10:19:02
LAWYERS representing Gift Phiri -- a reporter for the Zimbabwean newspaper
published from London and distributed in Zimbabwe -- say they been barred
from seeing their client who is still detained by police despite an expiry
of the legal detention period.

Phiri, who was heavily assaulted in police custody on Monday following his
arrest on Fools Day is still in custody and police have indicated they want
to apply for an extension to his detention.

Rangu Nyamurundira, Phiri's lawyer, said he has been barred from seeing the
newsman.

"I have been denied access to Gift. I don't know of his condition. Those who
brought him food said he looked stressed. Police have indicated to me that
they
will apply for extension of his detention," Nyamundira said.

Phiri is being charged for practising without a licence and writing
falsehoods under the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act. He
could be jailed for up to two years or fined if found guilty.

Under Zimbabwean law, police are bound to send an accused person to court at
the expiry of 48 hours. A warrant for further detention which is for up to
96 hours can only be granted if police need more time to continue
investigations.

Police can only hold suspects for a period up to 21 days if they have
committed an economic offence as prescribed under the Evidence and Criminal
Procedure Act (under Presidential Powers).

Nyamundira said he was preparing an urgent High Court application to force
the
p olice to release Phiri or send him to court.

The Zimbabwean reporter was unable to sit, walk or support himself after the
assaults by detectives from the Law and Order Section on Monday evening, his
lawyer earlier said.

"He was beaten on the buttocks, back and on the soles of his feet by police
using baton sticks. He told me he was forced to sign a warned and cautioned
statement in which the state is alleging he is practising journalism without
accreditation and writing falsehoods," lawyer Nyamundira said.

Phiri was arrested on Sunday afternoon while drinking with friends from the
same neighbourhood at Sunningdale shopping center.

In February 2006, Phiri was waylaid on his way home and heavily assaulted by
suspected state security agents using knuckle-dusters.

Phiri becomes the fourth journalist to be assaulted by police in as many
weeks
following savage attacks on Luke Tamborinyoka, Tsvangirai Mukwazhi and
Tendai Musiyazviriyo.

The trio was brutally beaten by police while covering a prayer meeting by
civic groups and members of the fractious opposition MDC in the poor
township of Highfield on March 11.

Tamborinyoka was recently beaten and tortured, again in police custody.

Zimbabwe feared to slide further in abyss

Kuwait Times

Published Date: April 04, 2007
By Susan Njanji

Zimbabwe's political and economic crises are set to deepen further following
a decision to have octogenarian leader Robert Mugabe, already in power for
27 years, seek a new term in elections next year, analysts said Saturday.
The ruling Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic-Front (ZANU-PF)'s top
decision makers decided in Harare on Friday that despite growing domestic
opposition to

Africa's oldest leader, he would stand again for elections next year.
Commentators say the decision spells disaster for the southern country whose
economy is already on its knees and could see a rise in political unrest.
"It's a very serious decision which signals a sure direction towards the
continuation of economic collapse and will deepen the political crisis,"
said constitutional reform activist Lovemore Madhuku. Eldred Masunungure, a
university of Zimbabwe political scientist, said everything depended on the
policy decision the leadership adopts, "but if it is business as usual,
clearly it will be disastrous... it means the country will slide irrevocably
down the drain." There will be "a total collapse which will see popular
unrest in the country", said Madhuku. "The fear is that there will be so
much unrest that the country will break down ... to the levels we have seen
in some west African countries where they have had civil wars," he added.

"Disaster is in the making. It will accelerate the economic meltdown," said
the secretary general of the Zimbawe Congres of Trade Unions (CTU),
Wellington Chibebe. Opposition within Zimbabwe has soared in recent months
with inflation now the highest in the world at 1,730 percent and forecast by
the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to climb up to 4,000 per cent by year
end. Four out of five people are out of work and live in abject poverty. The
economic woes have driven millions out of the country with the CTU
estimating that half of the the country's 13 million people are in the
diaspora, with at least three million in nearby South Africa.

Commentators fear political unrest will worsen, although there are
indications that even if re-elected, the 83-year old might not complete his
term. According to the state-run Herald, ZANU-PF is also proposing
contitutional reforms that would enable parliament to elect a successor if
an incumbent president fails to complete his term due to death, or steps
down. If he wins a new term next year, Mugabe, who has ruled the former
British colony since independence in 1980, would remain head of state until
the age of 89. "The political landscape will be very nasty in terms of
violence and elimination," said Chibebe.

"At the moment they are beating up people, but their extent of desperation
will soon see them start shooting people," said Madhuku, who earlier this
month was badly assaulted by police, along with the opposition MDC leader
and dozens of others. Mugabe, who has been widely blamed by the West for the
arrests and assaults of his opponents and critics, said the group asked for
the beating because they provoked the police. While there have been
rumblings of discontent within ZANU-PF towards Mugabe, no-one put their head
above the parapet to challenge his nomination during the lengthy debates at
the party's headquarters in the capital. The cash-strapped government is
also expected to take care of an expanded house of assembly after next
year's elections, following ZANU-PF's central committee approval of plans to
increase the number of lawmakers from 150 to 210. - AFP

Mugabe's ghost haunts SA's 2010 World Cup project

Zim Online

Wednesday 04 April 2007

By Nigel Hangarume

HARARE - A senior South African football official has expressed concern over
the political tension in Zimbabwe saying the crisis could become the next
question on South Africa's suitability to host the 2010 World Cup.

The official, a member of South Africa's World Cup Local Organising
Committee who did not want to be named, spoke as the international community
rounded on President Robert Mugabe for his violent repression against the
opposition.

"A lot of questions have been raised about our preparedness to successfully
host the World Cup, but we had not expected Zimbabwe to worry us," the South
African official told ZimOnline.

"But we are worried and we hope the political situation will calm down
because the World Cup is not for South Africa alone but our neighbours and
the whole of Africa as well."

He said only 2010 Local Organising Committee spokesman Tim Modise could give
an official comment, the reason he didn't want to be named.

Modise was yesterday unavailable for comment as he was said to be in a board
meeting in Johannesburg.

Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai at the weekend
warned South Africa President Thabo Mbeki that failure to quickly resolve
the Zimbabwe crisis would cast a shadow over the 2010 World Cup.

Mbeki was appointed mediator in the Zimbabwe crisis after a Southern African
Development Community extraordinary summit in Tanzania last week.

"That pride (for Africa to host the 2010 tournament) will turn to shame if
the World Cup is blighted by the inability of Africans to solve the Zimbabwe
crisis," said Tsvangirai, whose brutalisation and that of other members of
his party at the hands of state security agents has drawn widespread
criticism against Mugabe.

In February, South Africa had expressed pleasure with Zimbabwe's progress in
preparing for the 2010 tournament.

Zimbabwe, expecting economic benefits from the World Cup, has set up a
sport, tourism, image and communication taskforce that it also hopes will
help reverse the country's pariah status.

South Africa has indicated it will not be able to accommodate the 300 000
visitors expected for the World Cup, leaving its neighbours to capitalise
for their own economic benefits.

However, the political tension in Zimbabwe could keep potential football
tourists away.

Besides crumbling infrastructure and services, the country is also
struggling to fund fuel, power, drug and food imports due to a serious
foreign exchange crisis, while the provision of clean water has also been a
major challenge. - ZimOnline