FinGaz
Njabulo Ncube Political
Editor
Hardliners face exit as govt eyes election
IN an intriguing turn of
events to the on-going blitz on prices, the
government plans to reconstitute
the Cabinet Task Force on Prices by fusing
into its ranks moderates and
sidelining hardliners such as Elliot Manyika,
the Minister without
portfolio.
Highly placed sources revealed this week that the impending
changes
signalled a gradual change in government's disastrous pricing policy
adopted
last month to one that can swiftly avert company
closures.
Manyika, who is the vice chairman of the Cabinet Task Force on
Price
Monitoring and Stabilisation, yesterday held a marathon meeting with
business leaders where he allegedly read them the riot act, following the
government's concern that basic commodities were still not available in
supermarkets and shops.
He was not immediately available for comment last
night.
Private sector representatives, who attended the meeting at the
Industry and
International Trade Ministry offices, said Manyika listened to
their
concerns over the impact of the price crackdown on their businesses,
but was
livid that goods and services remained in short supply.
ZANU PF
insiders insisted last night that while Manyika chaired yesterday's
meeting
with business leaders in his capacity as vice chairman of the
taskforce, his
tenure in the ad-hoc committee would soon be cut short
following
recommendations from the Presidium, comprising President Robert
Mugabe, his
two vice-presidents and ZANU PF national chairman, John Nkomo.
They cited his
alleged "aggressive" approach in the implementation of the
government order
on prices as part of the reasons that annoyed ruling party
bigwigs and other
supporters who felt that Manyika's conduct could cost ZANU
PF dearly in next
year's harmonised elections. Manyika would, ostensibly, be
released from the
task force to concentrate on the party's 2008 election
campaign, which the
ruling party desperately wants to win.
Manyika is the party's national
political commissar.
Nicholas Goche, the Minister of Public Service, Labour
and Social Welfare,
is also said to have been sidelined, although The
Financial Gazette could
not confirm this at the time of going to
print.
While Obert Mpofu, the Minister of Industry and International Trade
would be
retained as chairman of the taskforce by virtue of his portfolio in
Cabinet,
part of his responsibilities could be offloaded to his deputy,
Phineas
Chihota, who is tipped to take over from Manyika as taskforce deputy
chairman.
Manyika had taken to the job enthusiastically, leaning on his
position as
ZANU PF's national political commissar to aggressively drive the
price
directive in the direction of the ruling Zanu PF party's
ambitions.
New members of the task force will include Economic Development
Minister
Sylvester Nguni and Webster Shamu, the Minister of Policy
Implementation.
No one in government was keen on commenting on the latest
development.
Chihota, who also attended yesterday's meeting with the
business sector did
not return calls made by this newspaper earlier in the
day.
Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu said he could not comment as he
was
still mourning his late son, Mandlenkosi Ephraim.
His deputy, Bright
Matonga, said he was not privy to the latest issues
surrounding the
taskforce as he had been out of the office.
"I am not in the picture as I
have been out of the office but try the
Minister of Industry and
International Trade (Mpofu), he will certainly
know," said Matonga.
Mpofu
was unavailable yesterday as he was reportedly attending the Southern
African Development Community summit in Lusaka, Zambia, where he took part
in a SADC ministers' meeting.
In a bid to build bridges with the business
community, which has been dealt
a body blow by the clampdown on prices,
government has sought to sideline
ministers who have lost industry's trust,
sources said.
Yet others said Manyika and Goche had been caught up in ZANU
PF's blame-game
and political inferno ahead of next year's harmonised
elections, in which
the ruling party faces a fractured Movement for
Democratic Change.
In May this year, Manyika and Goche waltzed into the eye
of the storm over
the handling of elections in Masvingo and Bulawayo where
ZANU PF
heavyweights pulling the strings in the two provinces felt the duo
wanted to
dilute their influence.
Provincial executive elections in
Bulawayo had to be postponed after the
process degenerated into chaos, with
the interim executive led by Macloud
Tshawe being accused of locking out
some members allied to former war
veterans chairman Jabulani Sibanda, who
was expelled from ZANU PF in 2004.
Red lights started flashing for Manyika
when former finance minister Simba
Makoni was said to have embarrassed
Manyika at a recent ZANU PF politburo
meeting.
It is not clear why there
are moves to remove Goche from the task force,
where he had been nominated
by virtue of him being chair of the Tripartite
Negotiating Forum, a
round-table of government, business and labour that has
for years tried to
stabilise prices through dialogue.
The Cabinet - which established the Task
Force on June 19 - has now mandated
Vice President Joice Mujuru to "work
closely" with the taskforce, the
sources said. Mujuru and central bank
governor Gideon Gono have generally
been viewed as supportive of a less
radical approach to dealing with
business.
Although government has
remained boisterous in public about its policy, it
recently conceded some
ground in the war, approving increases in the prices
of a range of goods,
including bread, packaging materials, stock-feed and
cement.
The
concession, while seen as insufficient by industry, showed government
now
acknowledges the negative impact of its crackdown.
The exercise has been
dogged by accusations that members of the government's
price monitoring
teams, including senior officials and police officers, have
taken advantage
of their positions to loot shops.
Since government's June 25 order to
manufacturers and retailers to reduce
the prices of all goods and services
by 50 percent, hoping to tame world
record inflation, massive shortages have
hit the country, worsening an
already critical economic crisis.
Empty
supermarket shelves and long queues across the country have provided
the
clearest signs that the price slash has dismally failed, only
compounding
the current economic crisis that has shattered the once robust
economy.
FinGaz
Rangarirai Mberi News Editor
More
and more foreigners eye local assets
REMEMBER the old yarn about how, after
the dust had settled and eyes had
been opened, the settler had the land and
the native the Bible?
Watching a growing flock of vultures - in the form
of cash-rich foreign
investors - that is circling Zimbabwe, waiting for the
dust to settle before
they swoop for local assets on the cheap, you do sense
history repeating
itself.
In recent weeks, South African fund BoE Private
Clients has sent in a
delegation, hosting 65 of its clients at Victoria
Falls. The company, a
NedBank subsidiary, currently manages R59
billion.
Since June, at least eight foreign investor groups have met Zimbabwe
Stock
Exchange (ZSE) officials, scouting for assets. According to one
account, one
of the groups is a New York
fund specialising in Romania and
Croatia.
"We did the sums - they made 100 times their money in Romania," says
BoE
stockbroker director Chris Cornell in a recent issue of The Financial
Mail.
Earlier, Lonrho, the old capitalist herself, announced she had raised
US$66
million for a new arm, LonZim, to invest in Zimbabwe.
There is also
rumour that a group of Russian investors, represented by a
London outfit
called Renaissance, is currently in Zimbabwe.
And Imara recently opened a
fresh Zimbabwe fund, the size of which one
executive with a regional bank
put to The Financial Gazette at US$60
million. The fund was closed just two
weeks after it opened, oversubscribed.
Two recent Initial Public Offers, for
ZimRe's ZimRe Property Investments and
First Mutual Limited's Pearl, both
property stocks, drew stronger than
expected foreign interest, brokers
report.
Already, Briton Nick van Hoogstraten has been playing hardball on the
property market, building for himself a huge portfolio of residential and
commercial property.
Locals have always come short on getting real value
for their assets - ever
since Lobengula cheaply gave away those gold
concessions back in 1888.
Now analysts say inflation has undervalued
Zimbabwean assets over time. And
the price war has wiped away over 33
percent of the market's value in weeks,
leaving companies even riper for the
picking.
Here is some of what an investor strolling into Zimbabwe today with
US$2.6
billion in the wallet could chuck into the shopping basket: the
country's
largest brewer and Coca-Cola bottler, a cellular operator with
over 600 000
users, four property companies, eight banks, two supermarket
chains and one
wholesaler, three hotel groups, two
tea estates, one of
the world's largest seed producers, four miners, two
cement giants, two
short term insurers, the two largest life companies, and
the franchise
holders of Nando's and Chicken Inn.
One recent press report in South Africa
valued Barclays' Botswana business
at US$1 billion, and Barclays
Kenya at
US$1.2 billion. So Barclays Zimbabwe - the country's number two
retail
lender with the potential to hold a much bigger book than the two -
looks a
bargain at around US$150 million.
"Listed equities, particularly those with
hard assets, have preserved wealth
in hard currency terms. Zimbabwe has good
assets that are trading at huge
discounts to replacement value," BoE's
Cornell says.
The key assumption made by those readying fresh capital for
Zimbabwe is that
the economy will recover swiftly in the wake of change. The
Zimbabwe dollar
would firm almost immediately, and those holding assets
would be rolling in
dough.
"Future returns are likely to come out of a
combination of a hardening local
currency and increasing asset values," says
Thomas Chataika, portfolio
manager at BoE.
But the truth is that nobody
knows what lies beyond "reform". Many define
reform as President Robert
Mugabe's exit - a simplistic take on Zimbabwe's
complex politics. A Mugabe
departure would still leave ZANU PF in power, and
the question is whether
that lot is remotely capable of reform.
And, even if the opposition were to
pull off some unlikely miracle win,
neither variation of the split party
inspires the slightest confidence.
Skills shortages and derelict
infrastructure would also hamper a speedy
recovery.
But all this does not
seem to be cooling foreign interest.
The Russians, for instance, have a deep
pool of capital looking for new,
emerging markets.
The South Africans
would also have something to say. Of about ten South
African firms canvassed
by Business Report as the price war peaked last
month, none were thinking
about leaving. In fact, most plan capital
investment.
Absent, though,
from the reported list of new money waiting to rush into
Zimbabwe is the
country's own exiled capital, which suggests that once the
dust has settled,
and eyes have been opened, the native would once again be
left holding the
can.
FinGaz
Charles Rukuni Bureau
Chief
Councillors question membership as associations war rages
on
BULAWAYO - Some city councillors have questioned the usefulness of local
government associations, as they seem to have become political.
There
are now three local government associations, the Urban Councils
Association
of Zimbabwe (UCAZ), the Rural District Councils Association of
Zimbabwe
(RDCAZ) and the Zimbabwe Local Government Association (ZILGA).
UCAZ and RDCAZ
were supposed to have merged last year to form ZILGA, but it
seems all three
are operating as separate entities.
The Bulawayo City Council for example is
only a member of UCAZ and has
refused to join ZILGA though one of its
councillors, Stars Mathe, is an
executive member of ZILGA.
Mathe was
elected to council on a Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)
ticket but
crossed over to ZANU-PF.
UCAZ is said to be closely aligned to the MDC, which
controls most of the
urban councils while ZILGA is closer to the ruling
ZANU-PF as most of the
rural-district councils are controlled by the ruling
party.
The standoff between the two associations was clearly evident when
ZILGA had
to switch its annual general meeting from Bulawayo to Harare last
month at
the last minute.
The Bulawayo City council does not pay any
subscriptions to ZILGA but to
UCAZ where its executive mayor, Japhet
Ndabeni-Ncube is an executive.
UCAZ increased its subscription fees from $3.7
million a quarter to $18.4
million with effect from the second quarter this
year and the council had to
pay up before the end of June though the new fee
had not been budgeted for.
Speaking during the debate on the subscription
fees Alderman Charles Mpofu
asked whether the council and its residents were
benefiting from their
membership of UCAZ. He said up to 1999 UCAZ was a very
useful organisation
but it had since turned political.
"I don't see the
difference between UCAZ and a political party," he said.
"But at the same
time I would not want council to leave UCAZ because things
might change. I
am lost. At the same time I believe there is nothing that we
will achieve
under ZILGA because it has made things worse, so let's remain
in UCAZ," he
said.
The mayor agreed with Mpofu that once an organisation became political
it
lost its value but added that the council was benefiting from its
membership
of UCAZ at a professional level. He said UCAZ was even helping
the council
to lobby for its supplementary budget.
Mathe said that it was
not UCAZ but ZILGA that was lobbying for
supplementary budgets for local
authorities. A special committee had been
set up to lobby for the
budgets.
Clr Thaba Moyo said his main concern was that the money that had
been paid
to UCAZ had not been budgeted for. " Where is it benefiting us?"
he asked.
FinGaz
Staff
Repoter
BULAWAYO - Council is now owed $48 billion by residents and
government
departments despite offering a 15 percent discount to those who
settle their
debts in full and pay their bills three months in
advance.
But it said receipts from water had almost doubled between April
and May
this year after intensified water cuts.
Residents owed the
council $41.6 billion at the end of April and this dipped
to $39.4 billion
at the end of the following month.
Receipts from water, however, increased
from $6.7 billion in April to $12.2
billion in May due to intensive water
cuts.
Outstanding bills for water constituted the bulk of the money owed by
residents and stood at $27.3 billion in April and $26.1 billion at the end
of May.
Government departments, whose figures are one month behind, owed
the council
$5.3 billion at the end of March and $8.8 billion at the end of
April.
The council now offers a 15 percent discount to those who pay their
outstanding bills in full and pay for services three months in
advance.
City treasurer Middleton Nyoni said between May 25 and June 18 some
22
residents had taken up the offer and had paid $9.7 billion. They had been
given discounts totalling $706 738.29.
In May alone 7 316 consumers had
their water cut off and 6 476 were
reconnected. They owed the council $940.6
million and $787.2 million was
repaid.
There was a major blitz in June,
which saw a total of 5 695 consumers being
disconnected. They owed the
council $1.7 billion but $6.1 billion was
recovered.
The council said the
amount recovered was higher than that owed because
consumers were asked to
pay a reconnection fee of $17 450 for those in the
high-density suburbs and
$61 065 for those in the low-density suburbs. They
were also required to pay
a deposit of $87 000.
Nearly 12 000 consumers in the low-density suburbs have
at one time been
disconnected since December but 9 416 were
reconnected.
Some 24 015 consumers were disconnected in the high-density
suburbs and 20
553 were reconnected.
Final demands were issued to 269
residents who owed the council $97.8
million in May while 209 were handed
over to council lawyers. They owed the
council $54.7 million.
The council
said consumers who lived close to council boreholes were slower
to clear
their accounts because they had an alternative source of water even
after
the water cuts.
FinGaz
Clemence
Manyukwe Staff Reporter
TICHAONA Machingauta has lived in Kuwadzana since
1984 and recalls with
nostalgia his childhood in the high density suburb
situated on the western
part of the capital.
Much of his youth was
spent playing with a plastic ball on an open space
near his home. The
"ground" has long been lost to urban farming, but the
final onslaught is now
coming: houses taking shape on all available open
spaces.
Since 2000,
Tichaona has seen a rapid decline setting in, uncollected
garbage, blocked
sewerage, potholes and the disappearance of trees, the
direct result of
punishing electricity cuts.
This decay does not worry him much. He sees it
as
temporary, reversible with time. What worries him is the permanence of the
new housing developments.
"That open space was the only playground for
the kids. They are now building
houses all over the place. Soon the suburb
will be overcrowded," he said.
A town planning expert said this week that the
closure of open spaces in
high-density suburbs had adverse effects on
residents.
Open spaces are left during initial planning, firstly, because the
soils
could be poor, but also because of the need for future developments of
facilities such as crèches and schools.
Space with poor soils is usually
left for recreational facilities such as
parks.
The expert said the main
reason why homes are sprouting up on open spaces is
that it is cheaper to
build over existing infrastructure, as opposed to
opening new areas to
service for development.
Already, government is struggling to provide basic
infrastructure at White
Cliff and Hopley, two farms outside Harare where
some of the victims of 2005's
Operation Murambatsvina are
settled.
Experts also say council no longer owns large swathes of land around
Harare,
with much of it now in the hands of housing co-operatives backed by
ZANU PF.
One effect of closing the open spaces, the expert said, is that it
creates
"overloading of institutional facilities" such as schools and
clinics, as
the initial planning would not have catered for more
houses.
"Building houses in open spaces as is currently happening upsets the
ratios
in terms of the support services," the expert said.
In Kuwadzana,
this "overloading" has started to manifest itself in the form
of overflowing
sewerage.
Tichaona says Kuwadzana residents were not consulted over the
infill,
although council by-laws require that if an open space is to be
closed,
there must be an application for change in land use that must be
approved
after consultation with residents.
"Change in land use affects
the value of properties in a particular area.
Imagine the noise after a beer
hall or industrial site takes over an open
space," the planning expert
said.
The Harare Commission has previously conceded that some houses have
been
built on sites without proper analysis of the consequences of actions
taken.
Every rainy season, houses in Kuwadzana Extension are flooded, as they
are
located on low-lying and hollow areas where water collects easily.
In
December 2006, then Harare Commission spokesperson Percy Toriro said the
developers had not taken note of flood lines before building the Kuwadzana
Extension suburb.
Constituency information for Kuwadzana on the
Parliament of Zimbabwe website
points to an area
where facilities are
already failing to cater for the current residents.
One of the
recommendations says there is need "for various service delivery
systems to
be improved, in fact an overhaul of the whole service delivery
system with
regards to water supply, sewer system, refuse collection and
electricity
supply is imperative."
Chairman of the Combined Harare Residents Association,
Mike Davies, said
they had objected to the land infill programme when it
started in the late
1990s.
"The land infill started with the (Solomon)
Tawengwa (council). We objected
to it because green belts are important in
cities," he said.
"(Infills) increase density. They have negative social and
environmental
impact."
Davies alleged favouritism in the allocation of
the stands.
FinGaz
Kumbirai Mafunda Senior
Business Reporter
MOZAMBICAN authorities are withholding 36 000 tonnes of
wheat destined for
Zimbabwe pending payment of US$15 million owed by the
government for the
grain.
Government and milling industry sources
have disclosed that the Grain
Marketing Board (GMB), the country's grain
monopoly, was unable to pay for
the release of the wheat stocks, which
docked at the Mozambican port city of
Beira two months ago.
A commodity
company identified as Holbud sourced the wheat from Argentina, a
major grain
supplier to Zimbabwe.
The Mozambicans are demanding cash upfront in foreign
currency before the
wheat, which could ease the worsening bread shortages,
can be released.
Millers said the delays in releasing the wheat would worsen
the bread
crisis, which deteriorated sharply since government ordered bakers
to slash
prices to June 18 levels.
Bakers say existing flour stocks have
reached critical levels, and any
further delays in the arrival of fresh
wheat supplies would result in more
bakery closures.
Government has
admitted that this year's wheat harvest could be the worst
since
Independence in 1980.
Wheat output is projected to fall significantly below
the 85 000 tonnes
harvested last year, far short of annual domestic
consumption of 400 000
tonnes. Government blames the expected poor yield on
power utility ZESA,
whose erratic power supplies have disrupted
irrigation.
Millers say the projected harvest will be less than a quarter of
the country's
annual requirements.
"Unless urgent steps are taken to
avail foreign currency to secure more
wheat, the country is heading for a
huge food crisis, particularly so given
that most supermarket shelves have
already been emptied of alternative
foodstuffs. This food crisis is expected
to spill well into next year until
the next harvest," said one miller,
asking not to be named.
GMB acting chief executive officer Samuel Muvuti
could not be reached for
comment.
This is not the first time that the
government has failed to pay for imports
at neighbouring ports. The
government has previously failed to pay for
maize, wheat and fuel imports at
Mozambican and South African ports.
FinGaz
Njabulo
Ncube Political Editor
CIVIC society organisations and the Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC)
have alleged serious irregularities in the voter
registration exercise
raising yet another prospect of disputed elections
next year.
Both factions of the MDC were this week singing from the same
hymn sheet,
claiming to have unearthed evidence discrediting the voter
registration
exercise, which ends this weekend.
The MDC, which almost
ended ZANU-PF's stranglehold on power in the 2000
general election, has
turned to the courts, disputing outcomes of previous
elections citing the
ruling party's tinkering with electoral processes.
In a statement to The
Financial Gazette, the Zimbabwe Election Support
Network (ZESN) said it has
stumbled on irregularities in Hatcliffe in the
Harare North constituency
where people were using letters from a housing
co-operative linked to the
ruling ZANU PF as proof of residence.
What this means is that people are
being registered in a constituency where
they do not belong simply because
they have been allocated stands in that
particular constituency.
"We
observed that there were no people who reside at the stands as no
developments or construction is taking place at the stands yet people are
allegedly staying at these stands," said ZESN. "To make matters worse, those
who have been offered the stands and the 'proof of residence' by this
housing co-operative (Ernest Kadungure Housing Co-op) are ordered to provide
five witnesses who are subsequently also given 'proof of residence' against
the same stand number," added the ZESN.
Tobaiwa Mudede, the registrar
general, could not immediately react to the
allegations when The Financial
Gazette sought comment on the alleged
irregularities in the voter
registration exercise.
There is, however, a general consensus that there is
lack of interest in the
whole process.
South African president Thabo
Mbeki - thrust at the
centre of the Southern African Development Community
mediation efforts - has
in the past
spoken of a free and fair election
being pivotal to the resolution of
Zimbabwe's multifaceted economic and
political crisis.
This week ZESN alleged that teachers who are resident in
remote areas have
also been registered to vote in the Harare North
constituency before they
have even started developing their stands in
Hatcliffe.
"One wonders how many hundreds of people have been registered
against these
stands. What is, however, clear is that for every stand, a
minimum of six
people get registered in a constituency they do not reside,"
read part of
the ZESN's statement.
ZESN said it had also noted that there
have not been any mobile registration
team for Masvingo urban.
The
organisation said all the centres covered by the mobile teams were
outside
the city with the closest being Chikarudzo Business centre, which is
more
than 20 kilometres out of Masvingo.
ZESN has been inundated with calls from
residents of Masvingo who felt
disadvantaged by the absence of the mobile
registration facility.
"They allege that efforts to get assistance from the
Registrar General's
office in the city have been futile as the officers at
the RG's office
allegedly told them that the registration exercise currently
taking place is
for rural areas."
Nelson Chamisa, the spokesman for the
Morgan Tsvangirai faction of the MDC,
said his political formation had noted
discrepancies in the voter
registration he claimed was being conducted by
state security agents.
"The whole thing is being done to give ZANU PF an edge
over us before the
elections are held," said Chamisa. "Rigging is already
going on. The whole
exercise is being done clandestinely. In the rural areas
our supporters are
being denied the chance to register. We have reports from
rural areas that
youths are being told that their chance to register will
come later. Only
old people are being allowed into registration centres,"
said Chamisa.
Chiefs and headmen were allegedly assisting people to register
in the rural
areas.
"There has not been much advertising of the whole
process," said Chamisa.
Gabriel Chaibva, the spokesman for the Arthur
Mutambara MDC faction, said
chiefs and landlords, especially in the rural
areas, were reluctant to give
proof of residence
to suspected opposition
supporters.
"We have cases where chiefs are refusing to give people letters
to prove
that they reside in their areas," said Chaibva. "The whole exercise
is in
shambles. There are also a lot of logistical problems where you find
that
there is no stationery or officers report for duty late due to fuel
problems," he said.
FinGaz
Clemence Manyukwe Staff Reporter
GOVERNMENT ministries
have resorted to unauthorised expenditure after
exhausting their allocations
from the 2007 $4.6 trillion budget.
Information obtained from Parliament
shows that funds had run out at a time
the legislature was in recess,
delaying the presentation of a supplementary
budget. The revelations come a
week after President Robert Mugabe signed
into law the Financial Adjustments
Bill, which legalised all previous
unauthorised state spending. The
supplementary budget is expected once
Parliament resumes seating on Monday
next week. Parliament will rubber-stamp
all current spending in
retrospect.
The military was the first government arm to run out of funds,
followed by
key Home Affairs departments, in particular the police and the
Registrar
General's office.
When the 2007 budget was presented last year,
the chairman of the transport
and communications committee, Leo Mugabe, told
Parliament that the budget
was likely to run out by March.
Presenting his
committee's report on the 2007 budget allocations to the
Ministry of
Information and Publicity, Mugabe said: "The budget was
presented with
figures excluding interest costs. This oversight puts the
country at the
risk of exhausting the whole 2007 budget within the first
three
months.
"The Honourable Minister of Finance indicated that the fiscus would
now take
over quasi-fiscal operations from the Reserve Bank, but with the
mismatch
between total bids of $24 trillion and proposed provisions at $4.5
trillion,
we risk grinding to a halt all Government operations by as early
as March
2007."
Last May, Secretary for Defence Trust Maphosa told the
Parliamentary
committee on Defence and Home Affairs that soldiers were
running out of
funds for food and training. In May, Bright Matonga, the
Deputy Information
Minister sought to deny a Financial Gazette report on
Maphosa's testimony.
"He (Maphosa) did not say that the soldiers were
starving but highlighted
the need for a quick response by Treasury on the
issue," Matonga said.
"Treasury has responded very positively and the funds
have been released."
FinGaz
Clemence Manyukwe Staff
Reporter
THE government has handed back Stockdale farm in Chegutu to
Senate president
Edna Madzongwe a month after the High court ordered her
eviction.
Stockdale farm, which had been held by farmer Richard
Etheridge, has been
gazetted in favour of Madzongwe in yet another sign of
the discord within
the country's land policies. Last week, Madzongwe said
she had found it
difficult to move onto the farm as Etheridge had threatened
to take legal
action.
Etheridge had claimed that Madzongwe forcibly
occupied his farm in June
after Lands and Land Reform Minister Didymus
Mutasa had served him with a
notice to vacate the property by August
30.
He successfully obtained an interim relief from the High Court, ordering
Madzongwe to vacate the property.
"(Madzongwe) and all other persons
claiming occupation of the property
through her and any other person not
being a representative, employee or
invitee of applicant (Etheridge),
forthwith vacate the property," the order
said.
In court, Madzongwe denied
acting unlawfully, saying her actions were based
on an offer letter from the
government.
She claimed to have occupied the property on the understanding
that
Etheridge was committed to a smooth handover of the farm.
Last week
Madzongwe said to the Sunday Mail: "I am moving up and down
carrying my
papers to move onto the farm, but I am failing as the former
owner is
refusing to move out threatening to take me to court. I do not know
what
makes these farmers brave enough to defy the law. There is a law that
clearly states that these farmers can be arrested."
Last year, Mutasa
ordered the eviction of a resettled farmer, Langton
Masunda, who is locked
in a fierce ownership wrangle with Speaker of
Parliament John Nkomo over a
lucrative hunting concession in Matabeleland,
barely a week after the
Bulawayo High Court had ordered Nkomo not to
interfere with its
operations.
Mutasa later reversed his decision.
FinGaz
Kumbirai Mafunda Senior
Reporter
ZANU PF is set to purge several leaders from its powerful Youth
League,
bringing fresh intrigue to its convoluted succession
battles.
The ruling party - long derided for its rank of aged "youth
wingers" - will
no longer allow members above 30 years of age to lead the
youth wing, party
officials confirmed.
The sources said the plot to oust
the over-aged youth leaders is targeted at
sidelining the influence of
Saviour Kasukuwere, the party's deputy secretary
for youth and Mt Darwin
Member of Parliament, who was appointed into the
ZANU PF politburo on his
youth leadership position.
Kasukuwere confirmed the planned changes
yesterday, but said this was only
part of aligning the Youth League to the
party's constitution.
"We are rejuvenating the ranks of the party to filter
through young cadres
of the party to learn the ropes. We need to create room
for young people. We
are sticking to the spirit and letter of the party's
constitution," said
Kasukuwere.
But insiders said the purge is part of
the succession battle within the
troubled party, which faces a divided
opposition in next year's harmonised
presidential, parliamentary and local
government elections.
The changes to the membership requirements of the Youth
League are part of
far-reaching changes to be decided at the party's annual
people's conference
in December.
The purge is said to be backed by a
faction behind vice-president Joice
Mujuru, battling for influence against
supporters of Emmerson Mnangagwa, the
former ZANU PF secretary for
administration seen as President Robert Mugabe's
heir apparent.
Sources
said the Mujuru camp was desperate to gain control of the Women's
League and
the Youth League, two of the party's most influential organs.
Last year,
Kasukuwere publicly criticised unnamed senior officials of his
party he said
were jostling for positions in the Presidency when its members
still had the
"energy" to continue.
"It is saddening to note that some people within the
party are already
taking positions and rallying behind some individuals in
the succession
debate. We are shooting ourselves in the foot because we are
empowering the
opposition in the process. People are being harassed with
some being
arrested over flimsy cases because of this succession issue. The
Presidium
should remain as it is because it still has the mandate of the
people. Our
leadership should ruthlessly deal with all those causing
confusion in the
party because of this succession issue," Kasukuwere told
the state media at
the end of a Youth League meeting in Mutare last
September.
The restructuring, the sources say, could also be part of a plot
by powerful
cliques in the party to sideline young turks while crippling the
youth wing,
which has already backed President Mugabe's bid for re-election
at next year's
elections.
The changes will disqualify Kasukuwere from
leading the wing. He turns 37 in
October, according to a US sanctions list.
However, party insiders said the
axe will spare Absolom Sikhosana, the
secretary for youth, after he secured
backing from President
Mugabe.
Despite a constitutional clause limiting leadership positions of the
party's
youth wing only to people aged 30 and below, the ruling ZANU PF
party has
over the years largely violated its own constitution, appointing
and
electing leaders well above the age limit.
FinGaz
Nkululeko Sibanda
Staff Reporter
SACKED Harare Commission chair person Sekesai Makwavarara
has reportedly
been served with a notice evicting her from the Gunhill
mayoral mansion.
Officials at Town House disclosed
this week that
Makwavarara had been served with an eviction notice, just
days after she
"resigned" from office.
But in an interview yesterday, Makwavarara laughed
off the reported attempts
to evict her.
"I have been getting calls from
people enquiring about that same issue and I
have told them that it is not
true," said Makwavarara.
"I am still here until I get somewhere else to stay.
I am still here. Ask
even the Minister (of Local Government, Ignatius
Chombo). People should stop
wasting my time. I am a busy somebody."
Local
Government, Public Works and Urban Development Minister Ignatius
Chombo said
last night: "The town clerk, Tendai Mahachi is the one who works
out such
kind of details. But ordinarily, when one knows they are no longer
on the
job, it follows that they need time to prepare for their exit from
such
properties and I think one month is an appropriate time to prepare to
vacate
the property."
Engineer Michael Mahachi, who replaced Makwavarara at the helm
of the
Commission last week, said he was not keen on an
immediate move
into the controversial mansion.
FinGaz
Comment
THIS week
Zimbabweans celebrated Heroes' Day - a day set aside to remember
the
sterling work done by the country's fallen heroes in fighting colonial
rule
in what then gave birth to an independent Zimbabwe in 1980.
Whereas
people would have turned up in their thousands to honour selfless
efforts
made by the liberation war heroes who, after a seven-year-long
struggle,
delivered a free Zimbabwe, the numbers have dwindled. The
enthusiasm of the
1980s has, somehow, been lost as evidenced by the low
level of
attendance.
In fact, most of the people making up the numbers at these
commemorations
are either rented crowds or entertainment-seekers wanting to
break away from
the daily frustrations brought about by the worsening
economic and political
crisis tearing apart what used to be one of Africa's
brightest spots.
In other words, the celebrations have lost meaning, an
indication that
something has gone terribly wrong. Expectations were quite
high at
independence, as people genuinely believed that the new political
dispensation had something new and better to offer to everyone. And rightly
so, after the supreme sacrifices of the country's heroes, it was everyone's
hope that living conditions would improve for the majority. Apparently,
these were also the wishes of the liberation war fighters lying at the
various national shrines within Zimbabwe and in neighbouring
countries.
What has followed, is however, worlds apart from these wishes.
Twenty-seven
years on Zimbabweans are battling for survival, hunting for
basic
commodities, which are now in short supply owing to government's
ill-advised
crackdown on prices. Long winding queues have become the order
of the day,
with commuters bearing the brunt of a transport crisis that has
been caused
by acute fuel shortages that have crippled industrial
operations.
The economy, which in the 1980s had been a star performer in the
provision
of social services and in reconstruction and development, has been
devastated by chronic energy and food shortages. And indications are that
the economic woes, now in the eighth year, might worsen in coming months
owing to worsening food shortages and deepening foreign currency
shortages.
Ironically, land, which was central to the liberation struggle,
has
contributed the bulk of the country's troubles.
Poor handling of the
land reform programme has seen agricultural production
decline with the
country's single largest foreign currency earner, tobacco,
falling from over
200 million kgs in 2000 to about 55.5 million kgs last
season. The land
reforms have been chaotic in character, benefiting senior
ZANU PF
politicians, some of whom own multiple farms against the government
policy
of one-man, one-farm.
Despite substantial investments made in the country's
educational and health
sectors, the brain drain and foreign currency
shortages have conspired to
reverse the celebrated post-independence
advances in these areas.
Years of mismanagement have meant that 80 percent of
the country's
population is unemployed. The bulk of the country's 13 million
people are
also living below the breadline. Inflation, at 4 500 percent as
of May, is
the highest in the world.
It is against this bleak background
that all hope has dissipated. For most
people, the fallen heroes must be
turning in their graves, as there is very
little to show for their
sacrifices.
A defiant President Robert Mugabe this week said he would not
change course
because of western opposition to his policies.
None of the
policies pursued by his government has however, ever worked
because their
application has tended to be half-hearted and piecemeal. Since
independence
in 1980 President Mugabe has fully committed himself to one
economic policy
on the advice of the late former finance minister, Dr
Bernard Chidzero - the
Economic Structural Adjustment Programme - but
because the government
ignored certain elements of the World Bank-inspired
economic rescue package,
it never worked, hence its abandonment in the
1990s.
Thereafter, the
government has hopped from one economic blueprint to the
another with the
latest project, the National Economic Development Priority
Programme
(NEDPP), now on the backburner.
The current disarray in the Zimbabwean
economy, fuelled primarily by the
price clampdown announced by the
government in early July, and plans to
transfer the majority shareholding of
companies to indigenous Zimbabweans,
will be hardly reversed by the Zimbabwe
Economic Development Strategy
(ZEDS), being mulled by the government, as the
successor programme to NEDPP.
Like so many previous economic revival
programmes, ZEDS will join the wish
list of high-sounding economic
programmes to emerge in the past two decades,
only to end up in the
dustbin.
In his message this week, opposition leader Arthur Mutambara noted
that,
"Our generational challenge is now to restore the economy and the
moral
fabric of our nation. At the root of our national crisis are three
inter-related challenges: political legitimacy, poor country governance, and
the lack of both economic vision and strategy."
Well said.
It,
however, does not appear that the powers-that-be are ready to deal with
the
country's multi-faceted economic challenges, which are beginning to
threaten
stability in southern Africa.
FinGaz
Matters Legal
It's
becoming increasingly difficult to apply an intricate web of laws
THERE
appears to be enough evidence to prove that one of the major reasons
why our
economy continues to suffer negative growth is because of government's
over
regulation of almost every sector of our economy.
A coterie of legal
instruments, be they Acts of Parliament, Statutory
Instruments or ordinances
have with little hesitation been passed, at times
on impulse, in the process
creating an intricate web of laws that have left
authorities confused as to
how to apply them.
Some of the laws have not been applied
consistently.
Some have been applied selectively, while others have hardly
been put to any
use.
In fact our government's strong urge to regulate and
misuse law to the
detriment of not only the economy at large, but most
importantly the rights
of citizens is a subject of epic proportions that in
itself may require
investigation through a doctorial thesis.
Attempting
to ventilate this controversial, and at the same time interesting
subject in
this column might not do justice to the case.
Be that as it may, I am
compelled this week to critically look at one
example of government's
confusion with regard to its laws that I think has,
to a large extend,
helped in crippling our economy.
I am talking here about government's
affirmative action policy vis-a-vis
decrees on the fuel and meat
industries.
Again, these issues will have to be
looked at within the
context of two key laws that government has made much
noise about and these
are; the Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Bill
together with the
Competition Act No. 7 of 1996.
Over the years, government has openly
advertised its intention to have key
economic sectors controlled by
indigenous people as a means of empowering
them and ensuring an equitable
distribution of wealth.
At the same time, and as an incentive to boost the
economy through
competition, since the early 1990's, government introduced a
policy to
dismantle monopolies to ensure that
new opportunities were
created for previously disadvantaged groups.
To some extend, and under
intense pressure from lobby groups like the
Affirmative Action Group,
government caused some indigenous people to access
opportunities mainly in
the financial, and later manufacturing sectors,
among a few
others.
Pursuant to these policies, and particularly after the monopoly of
the Cold
Storage Company had been abolished, government gave its tacit
approval to
indigenous people to venture into and exploit the meat
business.
Resultantly, and encouraged by government, hundreds of people set
up private
abattoirs that are now dotted around the country.
Cattle farms
were purchased, expensive infrastructure was set up, at times
through funds
supplied by banks. Others expanded their businesses and
established a
network of butcheries across the country as a means of getting
a direct link
with consumers. Thousands of people were employed, and were
able to look
after their families.
However, after decades of operation, the Minister of
Industry and
International Trade, Obert Mpofu, came with a shocker.
Just
in one day, he killed what had taken others years to build.
Through a not
only a draconian but also purely emotional decision that was
devoid of any
rationality, all private abattoirs had their licenses revoked.
There and
then, the nation also witnessed the monopoly
of the Cold Storage Company - an
organisation that had for many years not
only been in slumber but literally
dead being restored.
The results have been devastating. Indigenous people
were suddenly
emasculated and elbowed out of business.
Thousands of
people employed by these private abattoirs suddenly lost
employment.
Their infrastructure was rendered useless with the other
embarrassing result
being
that for the past two months many beef
consumers have
been turned into vegetarians unwillingly due to a crippling
shortage of beef
and other meats.
Those in the fuel sector suffered the
same fate.
After the National Oil Company of Zimbabwe (NOCZIM) had dismally
failed to
deliver a constant, sufficient supply of fuel, government allowed
private
importers to access this sector.
This noble move was not only
intended to empower citizens, but it was also
aimed at doing away with the
monopoly of NOCZIM that in the past had caused
more harm that good to the
nation's energy needs.
Since the advent of the new millennium, hundreds of
indigenous people spend
billions of dollars setting up or improving
infrastructure for the fuel
industry.
Some who accessed capital from
banks are still saddled with loan repayments.
However, notwithstanding that
there is a Minister responsible for energy,
Minister Mpofu, in his capacity
as chairperson of the so-called
price-monitoring Task-force, saw it
necessary to just in one day destroy
what had taken others years to
build.
Today, all private service stations are a sad spectacle. They bear
testimony
to one of our government's horrendous policy blunders.
Infrastructure is
lying idle.
Business people have been dis-empowered and
hundreds of their employees have
been deprived of an income.
One other
sad result is that the country is experiencing a critical shortage
of fuel
whose ripple effects are being felt all over except in the corridors
of
power where cheap government fuel is always available.
That this happens
after government had at one time acknowledged the
untenable monopoly of
Noczim points to a typical case of confusion and
thought paralysis.
What
one then notices is that
lately, government has to a large extend
demonstrated appalling
inconsistency, hypocrisy and ignorance - factors that
have hugely undermined
what in the beginning were good intentions in any
nation building process.
In the face of such astounding lack of economic
wisdom, one then wonders
whether authorities are serious with their
"empowerment" and
"anti-monopolies" mantra.
In fact what comes out clear
is that those in government have never had a
genuine bona fide belief in
black-empowerment.
Theirs has only been a mission to create wealth for
themselves, their
cronies, relatives, patronage-seeking political players,
and a few other
hangers-on without them having any interest in a long term,
all-encompassing
empowerment programme.
It is very ironic that when
parliament is debating what others see as a
progressive law, and further
when there already exists a law enacted to curb
the dominance of business
monopolies, our government goes at tangent with
its policies to demolish
that which they claim to have been building.
In light of such apparent policy
incoherence no sober person should believe
it when government
officials
rant and
rave about affirmative action and liberalisation of the
economy.
Vote Muza is a legal practitioner with Gutu and
Chikowero Legal
Practitioners. He can be contacted on email: gutulaw@mweb.co.zw
Website: www.gutu law.co.zw
FinGaz
Lorna Kali Senior Tax
Advisor - Tax Advisory Servi
THE recent price slashes have inevitably
affected tax collections as ZIMRA's
revenue base has shrunk
considerably.
This was inevitable because in taxation, a rate of tax,
usually expressed as
a percentage, is applied to a taxable amount determined
by a set of rules
based on the existing tax statutes. Should that taxable
amount diminish, tax
collections will diminish as well. The following points
relating to Value
Added Tax (VAT), Quarterly Payment Dates (QPD) payments
and capital gains
tax are intended to help clarify this point.
Value
Added Tax
With VAT there is a direct relationship between the prices charged
by
VAT-registrants and the tax payable. A sudden price slash translates into
a
sudden reduction in VAT collections.
Any businesses that purchased
merchandise before or after June 18 at
uncontrolled prices, but have had to
sell them at controlled prices are
likely to end up with VAT refunds. Such
refunds result from input tax for a
tax period exceeding output tax for the
same tax period.
Refunds are supposed to be processed and paid by Zimra to
the taxpayer
within 40 days from the date of submission of the relevant
return provided
such return is correct in every respect and Zimra have
raised no issues
requiring clarification which are likely to cause
delays.
Refunds also provide Zimra with an opportunity to look at the other
tax
heads such as PAYE and income tax to see if the business is completely
up-to-date with tax payments. Should there be underpayments on one account,
then the VAT refund is transferred to that account.
Any operator who does
not receive a refund within the stipulated time is
entitled to claim
interest from Zimra at the market rate.
It is expected that the price slashes
have already affected the following
VAT returns:
lMay/June VAT returns
for Category B operators which were due by 20th July
2007
lJune/July VAT
returns for Category A operators which is due by 20 August
2007.
lJune
and July VAT returns for Category C operators due on 20 July 2007 and
20
August 2007 respectively.
Those businesses that had made credit sales at
uncontrolled prices and
charged VAT (output tax) accordingly but can only
recover an amount
equivalent to the controlled price. The customer, usually
another business,
who has demanded a refund of the excess needs to be issued
credit notes in
respect of the non-recoverable amounts. Cases have also been
heard where
credit notes have had to be issued because cash buyers have gone
back to
their suppliers to demand price adjustments in keeping with
government's
directive. Any such credits should be reflected at the
appropriate section
of the VAT return.
Income Tax 2007 - Quarterly
Payment Dates
Quarterly Payment Dates are provisional payments of income tax
based on
estimated annual taxable income payable on a quarterly basis as
follows;
25 March-2007 10%
25 June-2007 25%
25 September-2007 30%
20
December-2007 35%
The price slashes must have affected the projected annual
taxable incomes
and consequently the projected annual tax liabilities of
most businesses.
QPD payments for the last two quarters of the 2007, due on
25 September and
20 December respectively may therefore be considerably
reduced. In some case
businesses may find that they have already over-paid
their tax for 2007 and
need not pay any more. Whatever the case may be
businesses are expected to
submit returns (on forms ITF 12) for provisional
tax by the appropriate
dates shown above.
Capital Gains Withholding
Tax
Prices of marketable securities, particularly of those companies in the
retail and manufacturing industries were also affected by the price slash.
The drops in the prices caused a drop in the withholding tax revenue base as
well as the final 20% capital gain tax raised on assessments.
It is with
the foregoing in mind that one may be excused to think that
though
government may at times choose to forego tax revenue in order to
promote
certain policy issues it is not clear if the impact of the price
slashes
were foreseen at the planning stage.
Whatever the case may be, Zimra will
understandably become more aggressive
in their audits as they seek to meet
their collection targets from the
shrunken tax base. Compliance with tax
legislation is therefore of paramount
importance to avoid penalties and
interest.
Disclaimer: This publication contains information in summary
form and is
therefore intended for general guidance only. It is not intended
to be a
substitute for detailed research or the exercise of professional
judgement.
Neither Ernst & Young Zimbabwe nor any other member of the
global Ernst &
Young organisation can accept any responsibility for loss
occasioned to any
person acting or refraining from action as a result of any
material in this
publication. For further information or comments please
e-mail
marketing@zw.ey.com or call
Marketing on 750979
No need to worry about spy Act
EDITOR
- The Communications Interception Act - Zimbabwe August 6, 2007
empowers the
government to establish an Information Centre to eavesdrop on
telephone
conversations, open mail and intercept faxes and e-mails.
I will discuss from
a technical point of view as to what the Information
Centre can do and
cannot do. To start with, the government has failed to set
up the so-called
Command Centre. The key reason for this was lack of funds
and
expertise.
So as a quick fix the government will force Internet Service
Providers (ISP)
to install and maintain the equipment and train its own
people at their own
cost.
What can be intercepted?
Postal mail - this
is too obvious as all the government agents need to do is
wait at the post
office serving your area to open your letter before you get
it. As a result
sensitive communication should never be sent via the
postman.
Faxes -
Faxes can be intercepted pretty easily by agents if of course they
know your
fax number. The technology and software involved is expensive but
very
possible considering the government owns TelOne, which runs the
telephone
wires to the fax machines in Zimbabwe. In this instance the agents
have to
physically tap directly into TelOne circuits. As a result use of fax
for
sensitive information should be avoided unless of course you are using a
cellular fax number, which in turn mean agents will need GSM provider access
to intercept the cellular faxes. The best option here is using web-based
faxes.
Internet faxes - These Internet faxes have an international number
based in
say, the USA or UK. You send and receive your faxes from your
computer. You
pay something like $9.99 per month.
Local e-mail -
Interception of e-mail depends on two specific items: is your
e-mail a local
Zimbabwe e-mail or not. If your mail ends with .co.zw,
.org.zw, .co.ac.zw it
is a local email. International e-mails are those
services like Yahoo,
Hotmail, Gmail just to mention a few.
To intercept your local (Zimbabwe)
e-mail the government agents will only
need to go to the ISP where the email
services are being hosted, log into
the mail server and read your e-mails.
Again the local e-mails are stored in
machines that reside in Harare, with
Bulawayo servers being provided by the
likes of ZOL, Mweb, Telco internet
etc.
lInternational e-mail - Any of the free international e-mails are the
safest
to use. The command centre cannot intercept them. Traffic on the web
travels
in different routes every time you send a message. Also most
importantly,
the e-mail services are not hosted in Zimbabwe but in the US or
UK or Japan
etc. All you do when you open your e-mail from Yahoo, for
instance, is
sending a request to Yahoo with your username and password and
Yahoo will
respond and push your messages onto your inbox. When you send
your username
and password they are encrypted, meaning it would be pointless
for any
person to try and intercept your login details.
Of course you
must not have weak passwords like "father". Your passwords
must not make
sense to anyone except you. A good password will contain a
variety of
characters. The stronger your password, the harder for any person
to guess
it.
In sumary, if you are a lawyer, journalist or someone who thinks the
government has reason to intercept your emails, use Yahoo.com or Gmail.com
or Hotmail.com. They are free and secure - unless of course you tell someone
your password.
Telephone calls - of course if you are using a TelOne
phone tapping is
pretty easy here as the agents only need to put a wire from
the CO (central
office) this is an exchange that switches your
calls.
Cell phones - this can be done of course with the cooperation of GSM
providers who can listen to your conversation from the switches.
As you
can see from above, the Act is only effective for those systems that
are
operated in Zimbabwe like local e-mail and land line. And the Act has no
leverage to intercept what you post on the Internet and the e-mails/faxes
you send on the Internet. Yahoo and Gmail would be excited to hear that the
agency from Zimbabwe intercepted e-mails from and to their servers based in
Sunnyvale and Mountain View California!
Robert
Ndlovu
USA
----------
Friends indeed!
EDITOR -
Hwange Colliery Company is failing to supply coal while ZESA is
failing to
supply electricity to farmers and industry. This has, no doubt
led to
significant loss in revenue not only for the companies but the rest
of
industry.
What happened to Feruka refinery? What happened to the pipeline?
Noczim
should be the cheapest and biggest supplier of combustible fuel in
this
country. Hwange at one time was said to have the fifth largest coal
deposits
in the world yet we are importing coal!
The excuse that we are
under sanctions just doesn't cut it because we have
"friendly" countries
that we can trade with or obtain lines of credit from.
Instead of shipping us
second hand cars and clothes, China should be looking
at capitalising these
companies (if they really are our friends). No
economic turnaround is
thinkable until the mess at the parastatals is sorted
out.
CKM
Harare
--------
Byo folk would pay anything for
this water
EDITOR - I am writing this letter in the hope that
some responsible official
somewhere will do something about my urgent
appeal.
In March this year during a visit to Mutare, I happened to use the
main
public toilet at the Meikles Park just a few metres from the Publicity
Association building. Inside the toilet is a tap that was spewing water at
full blast. I asked the taxi drivers who park outside why the tap water was
left running this way and they could only say that it had been like that
since January.
I wrote a letter about this to the Manica Post but I don't
know whether it
was published. As I write this, several months later on
August 13 2007, the
water is still gushing out. It has created a long mini
river outside the
toilet, and combi drivers use this water to wash their
vehicles.
One wonders how much treated water has been lost this way. I'm sure
the
people of Bulawayo would give anything for this kind of "free"
water.
There are also two taps, which have water endlessly gushing out behind
the
toilets at Sakubva Main Terminus.
In the city centre treated water is
flowing from a water point in a delivery
lane outside Tradex Marketing just
opposite the Holiday Inn. I shudder to
think how many more water points have
water gushing out in Mutare alone. It
seems noone is in charge of water in
the city any more.
What will it take for the "responsible" authorities to do
something about
this sad state of affairs?
I'm sure the answer lies in
the next elections!
Zvakaoma
Mutare
---------
We do have sacred
cows
EDITOR - A golf club in Tiger Woods' hands is worth a
million US dollars,
and a warehouse full of cooking oil at some factory in
Coventry Road is
considered hoarding.
Can the price control inspectors
explain this to the nation. They ran around
ransacking warehouses and
telling the nation that businesses are hoarding.
Yet this particular
warehouse in Coventry Road is full of cooking oil.
These faithfuls from the
commission went there twice but have failed to come
up with the zeal they
normally have when they pay others a visit because the
loot belongs to a
certain big chef.
So much for a free, fair and overzealous lot. Unfortunately
for people like
Pius Ncube, kugocha kunoda
kwaamai.
John
Harare
---------
Forget POSA, Zim media is
gagging itself
EDITOR - Persistent and on-going in the local
Zimbabwean media there are
wails about AIPPA and POSA legislation that are
in actuality ill-founded.
The alleged legal gags on local reporting on
sensitive Zimbabwean matters is
already subserviently or voluntarily in
place - not less than by the now
alleged boot-licking or the durably cowed
local free-press.
No special mention or 'tribute' is necessary for the
already proven or
alleged deranged prostituted and mental paraplegic
servants in the
employment of state media services.
The provable reality
is that the intellectually and morally reduced local
Zimbabwe media has
often failed to find, research, disclose and/or to
factually report on
submitted or well-founded authenticated material, facts
or stories,
particularly about alleged un-lawful or other illegal or unusual
conduct by
certain allegiant ZANU PF comrades.
At times when they do publish a cursory
report, the essence of their reports
are often distorted, devoid of detail,
in denial, or in retention of the
real known facts.
The easily
demonstrable folios evidence is that despite often being given
stimulating
real fabric for research and reporting opportunities, most local
'free-media
editors' have in effect elected to 'filter' and / or abstain
from reporting
on the 'politically alienating or embarrassing' matters
exposed to their
respective offices from victims (or well-acquainted others)
of Zanu PF's
criminally disposed persons.
The natural conclusions may be, in part or
whole, that the alleged local
free-press are either in part or all of:-
n
Lazy, deficient, lacking of intellectual acuity, or are devoid of proper
moral or responsible journalist principles;
n Are now fellow-typical
Zimbabwean cowards who have in fore-knowledge
willingly electing a future
life in grass-huts and to eat rats and weeds
rather than making a moral or a
civilized stand;
n Are nervous after having been infiltrated by despotic
influences;
n Have a distorted understanding of real history and facts;
n
They, or their owners / editors have been influenced by the 'on-going
retrospective' renaissance of Africa, historical mis-guided solidarity, or
out of anxious fear.
Another concept for consideration is that they have
been promised
self-serving benefits by Zanu PF master controllers to be
another group of
temporarily usable quiet stooges, and to tow the Zanu PF
party line.
It is apparent that most local Zimbabwean media reporters
apparently do not
understand fundamental values. If ever they had a prospect
of gaining a
moral compass, they have never found it, or they have lost
it.
Understandably, no one hears much more about international acclaim
towards
Zimbabwean Journalists who were or are aware and adherent to the
principles
of their profession.
As they now stand, many may conclude that
they are collectively a bunch of
fellow Zanu PF bootlicking comrades
hell-bent on survival and self-gain at
any cost.
Above this, even gross
human-rights abusers such as in China have failed to
curtail free-expression
- even over Global Internet Services.
Walter Hurley
Pretoria, RSA