http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=25783
December 11, 2009
By
Raymond Maingire
HARARE - Newly deployed United States ambassador to
Zimbabwe, Charles Aaron
Ray says the targeted sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe
by his government are
lawful and it is not possible for anyone outside the
US Congress to force
their lifting."The sanctions are beyond my individual
control and also they
are beyond the control of political parties (in
Zimbabwe)," Ray said to
journalists when he met Prime Minister Morgan
Tsvangirai at his Strathaven
home in Harare on Thursday.
President
Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party has demanded that the MDC should
effectively
denounce Western imposed sanctions on him and some members of
his former
government saying they were imposed at the instigation of MDC.
But the
newly arrived and soft-spoken diplomat said sanctions were the US
congress's
initiative and not that of any political party or individual in
Zimbabwe.
"This is a congressional mandated issue and it is up to the
US legislature
to determine what is to be done," said Ray.
"Sanctions
are a legal legislative issue that has to be decided by the
legislature not
by the Prime Minister."
Ray, who officially started his job on Wednesday,
said he discussed the
matter with President Robert Mugabe when he met him
saying the "matter was
too complex to be discussed in one
conversation".
The US envoy said he was willing to restore normal
relations with the
Zimbabwean government if it was prepared to respect
internationally accepted
norms of governance.
"I am willing to work
with everyone here who is willing to play by
internationally accepted rules
to restore this country to its former
prosperity," he said.
"Zimbabwe
has rightly been called the jewel and the crown of Africa and if I
can I
will play any small role in helping to restore the lustre of that
reputation."
He said he would not follow the aggressive path that was
employed by his
predecessors while dealing with the Zimbabwean
authorities.
"I never live in the past, I live in the future," he said.
"I talk to
everyone. I listen to everyone and I try to find common ground
with the
people that I meet focusing on things that are really important and
what is
important in this case is to rebuild Zimbabwe."
Meanwhile,
the US government has pledged an additional US$46 million on top
of a total
of $200 million since 2000 towards efforts to fight the HIV/AIDS
pandemic in
Zimbabwe.
Ray said his government remained committed towards reducing the
prevalence
of the disease which has devastated society and further reduced
life
expectancy in Zimbabwe.
"We are committed to continue a strong
partnership with Zimbabwe to defeat
the AIDS pandemic. Since 2000, we have
invested over $200 million in the
fight against HIV/AIDS in Zimbabwe," said
Ray.
"We are expecting another $46 million in 2010. In 2009 the US
government
supported anti-retroviral therapy for 40 000 Zimbabweans in need
of care
and, in 2010, we will increase the number by nearly fifty
percent."
Ray was speaking in Harare earlier on Thursday during the
Auxillia Chimusoro
HIV and Aids awards presentation ceremony funded by the
United States Agency
for International Development (USAID).
The
awards are named after Auxillia Chimusoro, one of the first people in
Zimbabwe to openly disclose their HIV positive status. At the time in 1987,
the disease was shrouded in secrecy.
Chimusoro died in 1998 at the
age of 42.
Emmy Award winning actress and Population Services
International (PSI)
Ambassador, Debra Messing also graced the occasion,
which was held at the
National Arts gallery in central Harare.
On her
part, Messing thanked Chimusoro for her courage and strength she
showed when
she came out publicly to declare her HIV status.
She also commended
Zimbabwe's efforts to reduce the HIV/AIDS prevalence.
"I am so impressed
with the strides Zimbabwe has made in reducing HIV
prevalence and so hope
that this trend continues," she said. "What became
clear to me is that there
is an urgent need to scale up male circumcision.
"I have great hope for
the people of Zimbabwe. People filled with dignity
and great spirit and
kindness and with clear motivation to improve their
health and well
being."
Messing is popularly known for her Emmy award winning television
series, "Will
and Grace".
The award presentation ceremony is held
annually and celebrates individuals
and organizations that have demonstrated
commitment and courage in breaking
the silence around the infection,
reducing stigma and discrimination, and
caring for infected and affected
people.
Despite the decline in HIV prevalence from 15,6 percent in 2007
to 13,7
percent in 2009, much still needs to be done.
Because of HIV,
life expectancy has fallen to 34 years for women and 37 for
men.
It
is estimated that about 9 out of 10 deaths are due to Aids and over 900
000
children have been orphaned by the disease.
Only about 55 percent of
around 400 000 people in need of anti-retroviral
therapy were on drug
treatment as of mid 2009.
It is estimated that 33 million people
currently live with HIV world wide,
with about 24 million in sub-Saharan
Africa.
http://www.independent.ie
Friday December 11 2009
White
farmers should be compensated for losing their land in order to kick
start
the ailing Zimbabwean economy, according to a new report.
The
redistribution of land to the black population nine years ago triggered
a
crisis which reverberates today, according to a new report from The Brooks
World Poverty Institute at The University of Manchester.
It states
that hyperinflation reached 500 million per cent 18 months ago and
in March
this year unemployment was estimated at 80%, while more than 72% of
the
population survived on food handouts.
Such an approach, say the
independent report's Zimbabwean authors, will
bring closure to a sore
chapter in the country's history and if done fairly
could kick start
investment, promoting economic recovery.
Lead researcher Dr Admos
Chimhowu called on the newly formed administration
to compensate farmers
using a combination of its own funds and donor monies.
He said: "This is
a controversial idea and donors might be unwilling to pay
compensation to
the mainly white commercial farmers rather than support poor
smallholder
farmers.
"However, we know from the cases of Japan, Taiwan and South
Korea that it
was the investment of compensation payments to dispossessed
landowners which
helped these economies grow after the Second World
War.
"Clearly things are different in Zimbabwe, but under certain
conditions such
compensation could kick start investment in selected areas
of the economy
and perhaps help with economic recovery. It may be worth
exploring this
avenue as a way of bringing closure to an issue that will
likely rumble on
in the courts of law for many years to come. "
The
report also proposes $1.6 billion (£1 billion) of investment to small
scale
farmers given land as part of the country's redistribution programme.
The
authors also suggest that a Truth and Reconciliation Commission could be
utilised to settle the "bitter differences which still remain between
Zimbabweans".
Press Association
http://www1.voanews.com/
Women of Zimbabwe Arise Co-Founders Magodonga Mahlangu and
Jenni Williams
said they are being harassed after being presented with the
2009 Robert F.
Kennedy Human Rights Award by President Obama
Gibbs
Dube | Washington 10 December 2009
Zimbabwean state security agents
have been harassing the co-founders of the
activist group Women of Zimbabwe
Arise following their recognition by U.S.
President Barack Obama who
presented them with the 2009 Robert F. Kennedy
Human Rights Award in a White
House ceremony last month.
WOZA Co-Directors Magodonga Mahlangu and Jenni
Williams said that since
their return to Zimbabwe two weeks ago they have
been closely followed by
plain-clothes police and agents of Central
Intelligence Organization.
Williams said that while the majority of
Zimbabweans congratulated them for
receiving the award, the security
apparatus views them as a threat.
Williams and Mahlangu currently face
charges of staging unsanctioned public
demonstrations over economic and
social issues affecting Zimbabweans.
In the past four days the two women
have appeared several times in Bulawayo
Magistrates Court to answer charges
under Section 37 of the Criminal Law
Codification and Reform Act. They have
challenged the constitutionality of
the law, but the Supreme Court has yet
to rule in the matter.
WOZA attorney Kossam Ncube told VOA Studio 7
reporter Gibbs Dube that court
documents for the pending case against the
two human rights activists have
disappeared from the Office of the Attorney
General in Bulawayo.
http://www.radiovop.com
HARARE, December 10, 2009 -
Controversial Tsholotsho North independent
legislator and Zanu PF prodigal
son, Jonathan Moyo is this week expected to
bounce back into the party's
power structures after he was last month
nominated into the Zanu PF central
committee by his Matebeleland North
province.
The former
Information minister is among Zanu PF Matebeleland North
province's nominees
for the 245-member central committee, the party's main
policy-making
body.
Moyo will be appointed into the central committee together with
party
loyalists from the province such as John Nkomo, Obert Mpofu and
Matebeleland
North governor Sithokozile Mathuthu.
Zanu PF is
currently holding its congress, which will see long serving
Zimbabwean
President Robert Mugabe, earning another mandate to head the
beleaguered
party after his largely predictable unopposed nomination last
month by all
the ten Zanu PF administrative provinces.
Moyo, former Zanu PF deputy
secretary for information and publicity,was
dropped from the central
committee and the politburo at the 2004 Zanu-PF
congress.
He had
infuriated President Mugabe when he allegedly masterminded the
infamous
Tsholotsho meeting in 2004 that sought to re-arrange the Zanu PF
presidium.
Mugabe found this as an attempted coup against his leadership.
He was
subsequently expelled as a cabinet minister and from Zanu PF in
February
2005 after he stood for parliamentary elections as an independent
candidate,
defying a party decision to reserve theTsholotsho seat for a
female
candidate, Musa Mathema.
Just like his rise in 2000, Moyo's
readmission into the central committee
will anger his adversaries within
Zanu PF who wanted him to rejoin the party
starting from cell level and rise
through the ranks like everyone else.
Analysts say Mugabe is keen
redeploy Moyo to the party's propaganda
machinery which has seemingly
faltered under the control of his successors
Paul Mangwana, the late
Tichaona Jokonya, Sikhanyiso Ndlovu and the
incumbent Webster Shamu.
http://www.radiovop.com
Harare, December
10, 2009- Zimbabwe Editors have demanded an urgent dialogue
on media reforms
and an assurance from the government that exiled
journalists will not be
prosecuted if they return.
President of the Zimbabwe Editors' Forum
Iden Wetherell said in anexclusive
interview with Radio VOP on Wednesday
that his organizationwas concerned by
the government's reluctance to give an
assurance onthe safety of exiled
journalists.
"We are very much
worried by the government's actions on addressingthe issue
of exiled
journalists who are working in the Diasporabecause there are
continued
threats to journalists working for the socalled pirate radio
stations. We
want the minister of Information togive us written assurances
that if the
exiled scribers come back theyare not victimised. We have been
saying this
for a long time andthere is no commitment from the part of
the
government despitethe issue being stated in the Global Political
Agreement(GPA) which formed the Inclusive government, and given a
chance to meet theminister this is our major concern as
editors.
"We are also worried by the dilly darling by the
government indealing
with media reforms a thing we believe is crucial
andshould have been
completed. It is eight months since thegovernment
discussed media issues,
its last attempt being thatKariba media reform
in May and since then
nothing has been done inthat regard. If the government
wants media reforms
why is the President holding on to the names of the
Zimbabwe
MediaCommissioners whose interviews were completed three months
ago?
Thisalone shows that there is no commitment by the government to
reformthe
media," Wetherell said.
Zimbabwe Independent Newspaper
Editor Vincent Kahiya said mediareforms were
long over
due.
"There are a number of issues that the government promised to
addresswhen
the inclusive government was formed in February and nothing
hasbeen done in
respect of reforming the media. We are disappointed bythat
development, and
we urge the government to abide by itscommitment it made in
the GPA when
they said media reforms were apriority," said
Kahiya.
The Minister of Information Webster Shamu cancelled
indefinitely aThursday
meeting with editors and chief executive officers of
all newsorganisations
he was suppose to hold citing political
partycommitments was going to attend
his political party National
Congressstarting on Wednesday.
Commenting on the last minute
cancellation of the meeting Both Kahiyaand
Wetherell said they had not got
invitations to the meeting despitethem being
editors.
"We are
usually invited at the eleventh hour and we think the inviteswere on
their
way .It also important to note that the minister hadgood reasons for
cancelling the meeting because he is participating inhis political party
congress but the fact is the issue of mediareforms is long over due and we
need continued engagement over the matter as stated in the GPA,"said
Kahiya
http://www.nation.co.ke
By KITSEPILE NYATHI, NATION CorrespondentPosted
Thursday, December 10 2009
at 19:14
HARARE,
Wednesday
A senior leader in President Robert Mugabe's Zanu PF
has unexpectedly
resigned sparking fears of a fresh battle to succeed the
ageing leader
during the ongoing party congress.
Mr Mugabe had looked
secure after he played another tough balancing act
ahead of the congress
that opened on Thursday by silencing the several
factions angling for his
job.
Protesting against
But Mr Basil Nyabadza, a provincial chairman
threw in the towel protesting
against the nominations for the party's top
four posts, which he said lacked
transparency.
His resignation letter
also raised the issue of tribalism, a scourge that
threatens to tear apart
the former liberation movement.
Mr Nyabadza's Manicaland province had
wanted Zanu PF secretary for
administration Mr Didymus Mutasa to take over
as chairman.
But Mr Mugabe was forced to push for the elevation of
Zimbabwe's Ambassador
to South Africa, Mr Simon Khaya Moyo to the fourth
most senior position to
rescue a 1987 Unity Accord with PF Zapu.
The
accord that ended the 1980s conflict in south western parts of Zimbabwe
that
claimed the lives of more than 20,000 civilians provides for the two
parties
to share the four posts in the provinces equally.
President Mugabe and
his deputy Ms Joice Mujuru represent the old Zanu PF
while the new Vice
President John Nkomo and Mr Moyo will represent PF Zapu.
Meanwhile,
Zimbabwe's 2008 elections were marred by the widespread rape of
political
opponents by President Robert Mugabe's supporters, according to a
report
released by an HIV/Aids advocacy group on Thursday.
The report prepared
by Aids-Free World says Mr Mugabe's supporters,
including youth militia and
some veterans of Zimbabwe's 1970s independence
war, "committed widespread,
systematic rape in 2008 to terrorise the
political opposition."
http://www1.voanews.com
Zimbabwe's HIV / AIDS infection
rate has dropped to just more than 13
percent, one of the few countries in
sub-Saharan Africa to have an annual
drop in new infections. The country's
health service is starting to recover
nine months after the unity government
was sworn into power.
Peta Thornycroft | Harare 10 December
2009
Zimbabwe's HIV/AIDS infection rate has dropped to just more than
13 percent,
one of the few countries in sub-Saharan Africa to have an annual
drop in new
infections. The country's health service is starting to recover
nine months
after the unity government was sworn into
power.
Zimbabwe's HIV/AIDS epidemic, which started at least 23 years ago,
used to
record infection rates of more than 25 percent of the population. A
demographic survey conducted in 2006 it found the infection rate had dropped
to 18 percent.
Now, the health care authorities, say it has dropped
nearly five percent
since then and is at 13.75 percent.
Zimbabweans,
health-care workers say, changed their behavior over the years.
The drop
in the infection rate was announced at an event in Harare to mark
the life
of one of the first Zimbabweans to go public with her HIV/IDS
status.
Auxillia Chimusoro died in 1998 after several years as an HIV/AIDS
activist. USAID runs an annual competition in her name to reward community
workers who fight the disease.
At the ceremony, Zimbabwe Health
Minister Henry Madzorera said when he was
appointed in February all public
hospitals were closed, most rural clinics
had no drugs, and Zimbabwe was
recovering from a cholera epidemic that
resulted in more than 4,000 dying
and 100,000 people infected.
Since the start of the cholera epidemic last
year, the salaries of
health-care workers and the drugs in the
public-health-care system are
provided by donors through UNICEF. There is a
critical shortage of doctors
as many left Zimbabwe during the past 10 years
of Zanu-PF rule.
"We still have a deficit in the area of doctors, but I
am sure this will be
a thing of the past especially if we improve conditions
of service," said
Henry Madzorera.
To cope with the shortage of
doctors, Dr. Madzorera said his ministry
embarked on a new training program
for nurses since the unity government
came to power.
"We are training
primary care nurses, we now have an excess of primary care
nurses," he said.
"That means every clinic has a primary care nurse, in fact
we are posting
two nurses per clinic."
Zimbabwe had the best one of the best health-care
systems in Africa until
about 12 years ago. Now women's life expectancy has
dropped to 34 years,
nearly the lowest in the world, but despite the
political and economic
crisis there is recovery.
"If the budget that
has been allocated for next year 2010 works as intended,
and we get the
money as intended, I think by the end of 2010 our health-care
services will
be reasonably normal, not exactly where we were 10 years ago,
but very
reasonably normal," said Madzorera.
Despite the good news, there are
900,000 children in Zimbabwe orphaned by
HIV/AIDS, and only half those who
need anti-retroviral drugs to fight the
disease receive them.
http://www.zimonline.co.za
by Tafadzwa Mutasa Friday 11 December
2009
HARARE - Some ZANU-PF provinces plan to reject nominations
of members they
say were imposed to serve in the central committee when the
party's congress
officially opens today and will demand a fresh vote to
reverse a trend they
say has cost the movement critical support, party
sources told ZimOnline
last night.
Tensions are running high at the
congress, with the spectre of violence
looming, as party members are angry
that some unpopular politicians were
still being arbitrary imposed by
provincial leadership even after they had
lost elections.
Manicaland
Province will lead at least three other provinces in demanding
that certain
party officials who lost in elections for central committee
seats two weeks
ago, but were non the less imposed by their provincial
leadership be removed
and fresh elections held.
"The mood is very bad, people are speaking
openly about this imposition of
candidates and it will be raised tomorrow at
congress," a ZANU-PF politburo
member said.
"If this thing is not
handled carefully by the old man it can get out of
control, people are
saying enough is enough, you can not continue having
officials who have been
rejected by the people," said the official.
The central committee is
ZANU-PF's principal organ of congress which has
powers to make rules,
implement policies and amend the party constitutions
if necessary. It has
245 members and is chaired by Mugabe.
The biggest casualty will be Chris
Mushohwe, current provincial governor and
appointed acting party chairman
for Manicaland on Wednesday whose province
want him removed from the
province's list of central committee nominees in
favour of Mike Madiro after
a fresh vote.
Madiro defeated Mushohwe as the ZANU-PF nominee for a
central committee
position but the provincial leadership, under the guidance
of the party's
secretary for administration Didymus Mutasa rejected Madiro's
name.
Fred Kanzama from Manicaland also won the vote against veteran
ZANU-PF
nationalist Morton Malianga but was dropped from the central
committee list
of nominees.
"Manicaland will start the ball rolling
and they will be joined in by
Mashonaland West, Masvingo and Matabeleland
North provinces in rejecting
imposed candidates," another ZANU-PF member who
has been following issue
told ZimOnline.
Demonstrations
The
provinces were also said to be planning to hold a demonstration against
President Mugabe and members of the party presidium to protest against the
sidelining of popular candidates, which they say has become endemic and is
losing ZANU-PF support among voters.
Mugabe was informed yesterday of
the impending demonstrations and could be
forced to give in to the demands
of the "rebels", something the octogenarian
leader has always done when
cornered.
"The broader message is that there are people even in the
presidium who are
there because they were imposed by the leadership in the
provinces and we
want to hold a vote for some of the positions," the
politburo member said.
Tensions were running high last night with some
members threatening violence
against opponents if they did not back down on
candidates seen as unpopular
in their provinces.
Munyaradzi Paul
Mangwana was yesterday trying to meet Mugabe to give him
what he said was a
dossier compiled by his Masvingo province of all names of
imposed candidates
in the party's 10 provinces. It was unclear whether he
had managed to meet
Mugabe.
ZANU-PF provincial chairman for Manicaland Bezzel Nyabadza
resigned on
Wednesday saying he was unhappy with how the party had nominated
candidates
for the post of national chairman.
The province was
pushing Mutasa for the position of national chairman but he
was heavily
defeated by Simon Khaya Moyo. The province may still try to push
for a vote
on that position because it argues that four other provinces will
back
Mutasa but were intimidated to vote for Moyo.
"If we are going to have a
contest for the post of chairman then all the
presidium positions will have
to be contested with the exception of that of
the first secretary, who was
nominated unopposed," a former cabinet
minister, who sits in the ZANU-PF
central committee said.
ZANU-PF has for long been ridden by
factional fights, mainly pitting camps
led by former General Solomon Mujuru
and Defence Minister Emmerson
Mnangagwa, who seems to have lost the latest
contest for the party's
leadership.
Analysts say the former
liberation movement has failed to rein in divisions
which are widening now
as officials jostle to succeed Mugabe, who at 85
years is in the twilight of
his political career. -- ZimOnline.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 20:19
THE
use of multi currencies has thrown Zanu PF into financial trouble, a
central
committee report on finance for this year says.
So dire is the
party's financial position that despite claims that it enjoys
"widespread
support", it has this year managed to raise only an embarrassing
US$675 from
subscription fees despite disbursing 1,6 million cards which
should have
been sold to supporters for one dollar each.
A report seen by the
Zimbabwe Independent shows that the party is relying on
the generosity of
"friends" and "well-wishers" to keeps the party going.
But the party does not
seem too worried by this development and intends to
"find an appropriate
strategy" to address the matter.
Records indicate that all provinces except
Mashonaland East have stocks of
membership cards expiring this month, the
report says.
"Most provinces have not yet submitted to headquarters the
membership fees
they have collected," the report says.
The party says
provinces were allocated a total 1,6 million membership
cards. Of the 1,6
million sent out to provinces only 593 000 cards were sold
while a balance
of over a million are still in the provinces. The sold cards
have apparently
not been paid for.
Although Harare, Manicaland, Mashonaland East, Masvingo,
Matabeleland North
and Midlands's provinces sold close to 500 000 membership
cards, only US$675
was forwarded to headquarters.
With membership fees of
a dollar for ordinary party members, the party is
still unable to sell
cards. Ironically, the top structures of the party -
the politburo and
central committee members - who should pay US$20 and US$10
per person in
subscriptions are not paying either. The politburo with 45
members and the
central committee with more than 100 members could have
raised at least US$1
500 from subscriptions.
The party has had to run overdrafts with banks
attracting huge interest and
auction of vehicles. But Zanu PF believes that
its financial fortunes can
still change saying its many supporters will come
to its rescue.
The report said: "The widespread support for the party should
enable us to
meet these challenges of generating sufficient income to meet
our
expenditure in line with commitments and
responsibilities."
Zimbabwe's oldest political party claims it will "devise
more imaginative
ways" to generate income for the party next
year.
According to the report, the party's expenditure was US$4,5 million for
January to December against income of US$656 334.
Party restructuring and
meetings cost the party US$113 679. Constitutional
meetings expenses
amounted to US$267 404. The party says the money went
into travel,
accommodation and "subsistence".
This is despite the fact that the
constitution-making process has largely
been off the rails for part of the
year.
The party spent US$81 650 on external relations - an outfit set up to
help
the party "explain the real and true issues" relating to the land
reform
programme - which Zanu PF believes is at the "core of the campaign of
illegal sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe by the United States and European
Union.
But the US and EU argue the sanctions have nothing to do with
land reform
saying Zimbabwe's violent and flawed elections coupled with
general human
rights violations prompted the sanctions.
External affairs
effort involves, according to the report, attending
"external briefings,
meetings and conferences".
At least US$317 169 carried over from last year's
harmonised elections was
for legal fees while US$21 379 was this year's
legal expenditure. The report
does not give specifics on legal issues the
party dealt with.
The party's Women's League Conference and Youth Conference
held earlier
gobbled almost US$1 million combined.
The main National
People Congress is expected to cost the financially
troubled party around
US$2 million. The conference is on this week.
The report said there is
serious need to get politicians and party workers
off the phone after
incurring telephone expenses amounting to US$65 000.
"Telephone usage
continues to incur high costs and tight control measures
need to be
enforced," recommended the report.
Although the party is spending heavily,
there is minimal income coming in.
This year, Zanu PF's income stood at
US$656 334.
This is because of a "harsh economic environment" coupled by low
subscriptions and membership fees - the party's traditional sources of
income.
Other avenues such as "donations from friends and supporters, and
so on"
have not been shaking their wallets as much this year.
Even so,
the bulk of Zanu PF's income - US$656 334 - came from the fiscus
under a
government grant of US$485 000.
The party had to dispose of cars to raise
US$60 489 and hire out its
conference hall to raise income.
A mere US$22
284 came from fundraising which Zanu PF says was mostly in
kind - cattle and
grain against a target total of US$1 million from all
provinces.
This
comes amid reports that the party was coercing teachers and villagers
to
contribute money or some form of goods to the party towards its main
congress.
Chris Muronzi
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 20:11
THE South
African facilitation team that was in Harare this week has told
principals
of the global political agreement (GPA) to resolve outstanding
issues and
implement agreed reforms and warned them that President Jacob
Zuma will not
allow the country to disturb the 2010 Fifa World Cup
tournament. This came
at a time when details of the Sadc organ on politics,
defence and
security-mandated talks to deal with the sticking points of the
GPA have
started emerging.
Sources close to the current negotiations said
among issues where no
progress had been made was the demand by the MDC-T for
ministerial
allocations review with the party demanding to be solely in
charge of at
least one security ministry.
The facilitation team
led by African National Congress kingpins Charles
Nqakula and Mac Maharaj
and aided by Zuma’s international relations advisor
Lindiwe Zulu, which
arrived in the capital on Monday, reportedly told the
principals of South
Africa’s impatience with their failure to put finality
to the sticking
points.
The facilitators left the country on Wednesday with a report
from the
negotiators of the outstanding issues, which they will hand over to
Zuma for
onward transmission to the Sadc troika. The troika would then
decide the way
forward.
The trio met Prime Minister Morgan
Tsvangirai and his deputy Arthur
Mutambara on Monday and President Robert
Mugabe on Wednesday and expressed
Zuma’s concern and the potential danger
the Zimbabwe crisis posed on the
World Cup.
The sources said the
facilitation team had told the principals that Zuma was
under pressure
internally and externally to “clean up the region” for the
successful
hosting of the tournament.
James Maridadi, Tsvangirai’s spokesperson,
confirmed the meeting with the PM
and what was raised, adding that the South
African facilitators had
officially told the premier that South Africa now
considered Zimbabwe’s
unending political squabbles a direct threat to their
own country.
“Several issues were brought up by the facilitators
including the real
possibility of an outbreak of xenophobic attacks during
the World Cup if
political stability is not restored in Zimbabwe,” Maridadi
said.
International pressure, he said, was mounting on Zuma and
anxiety within
South Africa was rising while in Zimbabwe there was growing
frustration over
the politicians’ dilly-dallying.
“The
facilitators told the prime minister that negotiators should
conclusively
deal with the bulk of the issues without having to escalate
them to the
principals because the principals were not a negotiating
platform,” Maridadi
explained.
Zanu PF negotiators and those from Mutambara’s formation
of the MDC have
insisted negotiations had no deadline.
Sources
also said the team had met negotiators and told them that they
should show
sincerity to the GPA and implement what they had agreed in the
last two
weeks of intense talks at a secret venue in the capital.
Zanu PF
negotiators Patrick Chinamasa and Nicholas Goche reportedly said
they wanted
all outstanding issues to be resolved before implementation — a
situation
the South African facilitation team said was untenable.
The
negotiators reportedly agreed on media reforms which if implemented
would
result in Mugabe and Zanu PF losing its grip on the public
media.
Goche and another Zanu PF negotiator, Emmerson Mnangagwa, who
was standing
in for Patrick Chinamasa, a fortnight ago reportedly gave in on
media
reforms after the MDC-T had tabled a number of proposals on media
changes
including reforms of public newspapers under the Zimpapers group and
the
state broadcaster ZBC.
This has reportedly angered Zanu PF
which felt that Goche and Mnangagwa were
selling out.
The current
talks agenda has 27 items, 21 new issues and six old ones of
which little
has been achieved.
The MDC-T, the sources said, was responsible for
bloating the agenda in
their quest to “shift power from Mugabe’s office to
the inclusive
government” and share power equitably.
“As MDC-T
we want to have sole control of one security ministry because the
co-sharing
of the Home Affairs portfolio has failed to work,” an MDC-T
senior official
close to the talks said.
“We are also demanding security reforms and
the amendment of the cabinet
handbook to allow Tsvangirai to chair cabinet
in the absence of Mugabe.”
The source said they also wanted the
negotiations to deal with the welfare
of Tsvangirai who is yet to be
allocated a government house since the
formation of the inclusive government
in February.
Mugabe has reportedly said he would not leave either
Zimbabwe House or State
House to accommodate the premier. At Independence,
Mugabe who was the
premier, lived in Zimbabwe House while the late first
President Canaan
Banana lived in State House.
The MDC-T also
wants the talks to deal with relations between Tsvangirai and
Mugabe amid
concerns that the premier had no easy access to the president as
he has to
go through a bureaucracy to meet the ageing leader.
“Apart from the
routine Monday meeting and cabinet the following day,
Tsvangirai has no easy
access to Mugabe,” another MDC-T source said. “This
is unthinkable in an
inclusive government whose executive authority is
shared between the
two.”
According to Wednesday’s Prime Minister’s Newsletter there was
some movement
on the outstanding issues, especially on media reform, hate
speech, land
audit and framework, but there was no agreement on the
reappointment of
central bank governor Gideon Gono, hiring of
Attorney-General Johannes
Tomana, appointment of provincial governors,
ministerial mandates and
ministerial review.
Tsvangirai told the
newsletter that the negotiators should conclude the
dialogue and report to
the principals “so that we can finalise the
implementation plan this side of
Christmas”.
“This will enable us to begin the New Year focussing on
the Government Work
Programme and delivery to the people,” Tsvangirai said.
“It is time the
government moved away from political posturing to
concentrate on the
technical issues of governing and on delivering basic
services and freedoms
to the people.”
The negotiating teams
submitted progress reports to their principals this
week.
Constantine Chimakure
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 19:44
HEAD
of delegation of the European Union (EU) Xavier Marchal yesterday said
Europe was ready to restore relations with Harare if the country fully
consummates the global political agreement (GPA). Opening an Economic
Partnership Agreements (EPA) seminar in the capital, Marchal said the EU was
not pushing for regime change as claimed by President Robert
Mugabe.
His remarks also downplayed government claims that the
decade-long economic
recession was caused by EU and United States sanctions
imposed on the
country.
“This is the reality of the EU-Zimbabwe
relationship and prospects for
normalisation,” said Marchal. “There is no
such thing as a regime-change
agenda. Rather, there is readiness from the EU
to re-engage with the
inclusive government with Robert Mugabe as President
and Morgan Tsvangirai
as prime minister, on the basis of an agreed
methodology.
“A methodology of this re-engagement process was agreed:
Zimbabwe to
demonstrate GPA implementation through a road map, the EU to
respond by its
own road map of progressive normalisation…Trade relations are
not the
subject of restrictions from the EU. The EU as a block continues to
be the
major trading partner of Zimbabwe with several EU member states as
most
important markets in the EU.”
He said the EU has committed
more than 700 million euros in Zimbabwe since
2002 through humanitarian and
technical support.
Bernard Mpofu
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 19:32
GOVERNMENT
is on a collision course with the Matabeleland Zambezi Water
Trust (MZWT)
over its plans to nationalise the project aimed at ending
perennial water
woes in the region. Water Development and Management
minister Samuel Sipepa
Nkomo announced last week the proposed takeover of
the project from the MZWT
saying it had now been accorded the political will
it lacked over the
years.
But Dumiso Dabengwa, chairperson of the MZWT, said the move to
take over the
"people's initiative is not acceptable".
"We are
surprised by Sipepa Nkomo's latest move to take over the Zambezi
Water
Project. He never discussed with us before taking the decision to
nationalise the project," Dabengwa told the Zimbabwe Independent in Bulawayo
this week.
He said they "are waiting for an explanation from
minister Nkomo on the
whole saga before considering what to say or do"
adding that "stakeholders
are naturally angry that such a demoralising
decision and announcement about
their project could be made without their
input, let alone their knowledge".
Dabengwa said it was clear from
the outset of the project that "government
would facilitate the process but
a complete takeover of a people's
initiative, regional initiative - no -
it's not acceptable".
The former Home Affairs minister said it seemed
Nkomo was "operating against
the grain by seeking to nationalise regional
projects at a time when
everyone else has seen the need for
devolution".
Last week, Constitutional and Parliamentary Affairs
minister Eric Matinenga
urged Zimbabweans to talk openly about the
devolution of power to provinces
saying there were "no sacred cows" in the
constitution-making process.
The ambitious project seeking to end
perennial water shortages in
Matabeleland by drawing water from the Zambezi
River was first mooted in
1912.
Unreliable water supply,
especially in Bulawayo, has forced many companies
or potential investors to
relocate to Harare and other provinces.
Dabengwa, the interim leader
of the revived PF Zapu, said the MZWT was
hoping that the fragile inclusive
government which "has new players who
claim to appreciate the cause of
Matabeleland better would encourage
continuity in efforts to find a
permanent solution to the perennial water
problems in the region, but Nkomo
announcement has taken us aback".
He said Nkomo and his ministry were
yet to inform his trust of their
decision.
"MZWT hopes this level
of disrespect and disregard for others displayed by
minister Nkomo stops. We
are waiting for an explanation from Nkomo on the
whole saga before
considering what to say or do," Dabengwa said. "We can
only speculate as to
the motive of the so-called nationalisation of the
project. We hope this has
nothing to do with political rivalry. and people
of Matabeleland need not
suffer any longer due to their political
affiliation."
Nkomo said
lack of clear funding procedures had resulted in the delay in
implementation
of the project, which is one of the reasons government wanted
to take
over.
Although government had no money to commence the project, Nkomo
said
discussions were on with private players willing to join central
government
in implementing the scheme.
However, Dabengwa said
international investors whom MZWT had been working
with have been unsettled
by government's move.
"Potential investors whom we have been working
with are now sceptical about
the nationalisation issue. But as MZWT we are
assuring them that the project
would not be nationalised," he
said.
He said government failed to provide mandatory guarantees for
loans "causing
all our plans to fail".
"The trust also applied
for coal mining concessions mainly around the
Gwayi-Shangani Dam site in
Lubimbi and Lusulu areas. We have partners keen
on coal mining who are
willing to fund the completion of the dam whilst
mining coal," Dabengwa
said.
He said once they get concessions, investors "would immediately
fund the
completion of the dam as they also would need water for coal
beneficiation".
Nqobile Bhebhe
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 19:29
INDIGENISATION
lobby group, the Affirmative Action Group (AAG), has blasted
plans by
Finance minister Tendai Biti to set up a Constituency Development
Fund (CDF)
as “nonsensical”. Presenting oral evidence before the
parliamentary
portfolio committee on industry and commerce on Monday, AAG
president Supa
Mandiwanzira said the proposed fund would be a medium for
political
expedience.
Biti proposed to allocate US$8 million as initial capital for the
fund meant
to benefit the country’s 210 constituencies.
South Africa,
Botswana and Namibia are among countries in the Southern
African region
which run similar funds.
“I’m totally opposed to this Constituency
Development Fund,” Mandiwanzira
said. “It is nonsensical. The reality is
that those funds are going to be
vote-buying funds.”
The funds, according
to Biti, would be administered by the Ministry of
Parliamentary and
Constitutional Affairs on the basis of an annual
development plan submitted
by the constituencies.
“What we need to do is to promote enterprises. We will
not grow the cake by
giving MPs funds to superintend over. We are creating
another level of
bureaucracy,” Mandiwanzira said. “Given the amount of
appetite (for cash)
out there, MPs are not fallible, they are also human
beings. Are we not
creating an opportunity for MPs?”
The fund,
Mandiwanzira added, would create a “mini-authority” that would
result in
duplication of roles between local authorities and the new fund.
Under the
fund, according to Biti, lawmakers are expected to play their
“leadership
role” in the planning and execution of those local and
“community projects
with immediate impact on the livelihood of the
communities”.
Presenting
the 2010 National Budget on Wednesday last week, Biti however
said: “The
Constituency Development Fund is not intended to replace or
compete with
local authority structures and ministries decentralised
structure.
Furthermore the CDF shall not be a parallel structure to any of
the
established structures but a mere vehicle in respect of which an elected
MP
has an opportunity to make and deliver real change to the local
community.”
The CDF, according to Biti, will be chaired by the respective
MP with
elected councillors being members of the committee. The local
senator will
be an ex-official member of the committee.
He said “strict
accountability measures” would be taken to prevent the abuse
of the
money.
Meanwhile, the House of Assembly on Wednesday passed with no
amendments the
US$2,25 billion 2010 National Budget. MPs however were
concerned that Biti
did not consult them as representatives of the people
before coming up with
the Budget.
Bernard Mpofu
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 19:24
NOVEMBER
2008 still remains a dark month for the Dziruni family in Glen
Norah B. It
is now a year since they lost two daughters on the same day to a
preventable
and treatable water-borne disease -- cholera.
They still cannot come
to terms with how cholera that is viewed by many as a
minor disease took two
family members in just a few hours of each other.
The family was
engulfed in anguish mourning over the death of their two
daughters Maria
(24) and Bridget Dziruni (21).
Mike Dziruni, the deceased's uncle,
suspects the dirty water from their taps
caused their
sickness.
Glen Norah B, a heavily-populated low-income suburb about
15 km west of the
capital Harare, last year had raw sewage flowing in the
streets with heaps
of uncollected rubbish posing a great health risk during
the rainy season.
Maria was the first to fall sick and was taken to
Budiriro Polyclinic near
the suburb, Bridget a few hours later complained of
stomach pains and was
vomiting.
Unfortunately neither of them
could fight on and succumbed to the disease
the following day despite the
efforts of the clinic staff.
Apart from the pain of losing their
daughters the family -- for a while --
faced ostracism from the community as
they were labelled "the cholera
family", as people feared that they would
spread it.
This time last year 10 000 people had been affected by the
cholera outbreak
and by February this year almost 5 000 people had died
nationwide.
Out of the 62 districts in the country 55 were affected
with almost 100 000
cases being reported. To make matters worse doctors and
nurses were on
strike and there was a serious shortage of drugs. This
prompted some
patients to flee to the border town of Musina in South Africa
to get medical
assistance.
But this year things seem to have
changed: the United Nations (UN) says this
is because of the inclusive
government that has led to greater co-operation
between the international
humanitarian community and the government of
Zimbabwe. This has led to an
improvement in the country's socio-economic
situation, in addition to
improved humanitarian access to vulnerable
populations.
Cholera
for instance, the UN says, this year has only affected 145 people
since
September. Improvements have also been noted in hospitals nationwide;
Shamva
district hospital in Mashonaland Central and Zhombe district hospital
in the
Midlands are good examples.
UN assistant secretary general for
humanitarian affairs and deputy emergency
relief coordinator Catherine Bragg
was quite pleased with what she said was
an improvement in the humanitarian
crisis as compared to last year though
the situation was still very
"fragile".
Bragg said: "The past few months have seen a significant
improvement in the
humanitarian crisis. Challenges are still plenty; there
is still a
humanitarian situation in the country. Despite improvements 1,9
million
people still need food aid at the peak of the 2010 hunger season
(January-March).
"Cholera re-emerged in October and Zimbabwe's
HIV/Aids prevalence rate is
one of the highest in the world despite a recent
drop to 13,7%. Some 1,2
million live with the virus and 343 600 adults and
35 200 children under the
age of 15 urgently need antiretroviral treatment.
There are six million
people without access to clean water and sanitation
while 33% of children
under five years are chronically
malnourished."
With the listed humanitarian problems faced by the
country, the highest
requirement in the Zimbabwe Consolidated Appeals
Process (CAP) 2010 launched
this week, is for agriculture which required
US$100 million to assist about
650 000 communal farmers.
The
attention on the agriculture sector was CAP 2010's aim to align itself
with
the government's Short-Term Economic Recovery Programme (STERP) and
include
early recovery and humanitarian plus interventions.
The health sector
requested US$63 million while the food requirement was
US$58 million; and
water and sanitation required US$46 million.
The total funding
requested by 76 appealing agencies including UN agencies,
inter-governmental
organisations, international and local non-governmental
organisations was
close to US$380 million.
However, the Zimbabwe Association of Doctors
for Human Rights chairman
Douglas Gwatidzo said it was a big mistake to give
top priority to
agriculture ahead of health as the latter still needed the
greatest
attention. Gwatidzo said: "The health sector as we speak right now
is in the
doldrums. It is one of those institutions that has not realised
any
meaningful assistance. There is a lot that is in dire need of attention,
from infrastructure to equipment, drugs and even hospital
staff.
"The country at the moment is not in a position to attract
even a single
specialist from outside the country. So who is going to run
those hospitals
to keep them functioning. People are making a big mistake
sidelining this
system."
At $358 million, the Health ministry was
allocated the highest amount of
money in the 2010 budget.
Gwatidzo said
for a nation to generate income there has to be a good
investment in the
health of the people.
"People are becoming obsessed with income
generation of which for a good
income there has to be a good investment in
the human resource especially in
the health of a person. For those fields to
be ploughed and to produce a
bumper harvest healthy people are
needed.
"There are so many diseases affecting agricultural workers.
The nation is
full of sick people. How will we be able to make them work? We
need healthy
people to generate that income," he said.
A
political analyst who preferred anonymity was of the opinion that there
was
need for a positive improvement in the political framework to get more
assistance from donor countries and for a successful shift from being
dependent to being independent.
He said: "As long as the
political framework is such that it does not
inspire confidence then there
is very little support coming through."
Nango director Cephas Zihumwe
at the launch bemoaned the inconsistencies
that characterised some of the
donor partners whom he accused of at times
delaying the
assistance.
"It is not good to continue begging; we want to do our
own thing as a
country and this requires full participation of the
government and the
NGOs," he said.
Mark Harper, representing
international NGOs, said he was displeased by the
decreased amount of
funding from last year's appeal but raised an issue that
programmes to fight
gender-based violence were under-funded in the country.
Harper said:
"We are moving forward as a country. The increased level of
funding for
development facilities is to enable Zimbabwe to stand on its own
feet."
According to UN Office for the Co-ordination of
Humanitarian Affairs the
2009 CAP for Zimbabwe was for $719 million but it
only received 64% of the
requested funding, and the 2010 appeal remains
aligned to government's
strategic plans for economic
recovery.
Life has moved on for the Dziruni family though Mary and
Bridget remain in
their memories. Nobody wants to see a repetition of what
happened last year.
Wongai Zhangazha
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
19:21
THE 2010 National Budget, presented to parliament by Finance
minister Tendai
Biti last week has been largely welcomed by many
right-thinking and
progressive Zimbabweans. There is no doubt that Biti
tried his level best
under very difficult circumstances to come up with a
budget that strikes a
good balance between the key budget strategic
objectives of stabilisation,
equitable growth and
reconstruction.
The 2010 Budget has been presented against the
background of a major review
of the legal and policy framework governing
public finance management. The
Public Finance Management Bill (PFMB) and
the Audit Office Bill currently
before parliament are important instruments
to strengthen the use of public
resources and
accountability.
Parliament has a major role to play in ensuring that
the resources approved
are used productively and that set objectives and
targets are realised.
There are provisions in the PFMB that will
empower parliament and its
portfolio committees to meaningfully participate
in the budget process
provided that those powers are exercised and
legislators demonstrate
commitment to their core legislative functions of
law-making, executive
oversight and representation.
The Minister
of Finance is quoted in the Hansard of December 1 as saying
"the other thing
which we have had is the process that there is no
obligation on the
executive to consult formally this august House on the
formulation of the
Budget. In the amendments that we propose, we are making
it obligatory and
imperative for the executive to consult and discuss with
relevant committees
on the formulation of the Budget".
This is certainly a revolutionary
approach to Budget crafting. For a long
time, parliament has been a
spectator when it comes to budget formulation.
While it is accepted that
formulation of the Budget is largely a preserve of
the executive, it is
important that the representative body of the people is
fully consulted
during the process.
Unfortunately, past ministers of Finance and their
bureaucrats paid lip
service to consultation because there was nothing that
compelled them to do
so. Any consultation carried out was cosmetic in
nature. Now that it is
going to be a legal requirement to consult, we hope
that the legislature
will fully exercise its mandate in that
regard.
What is also important to note is that the new law
requires that for each
vote of expenditure laid before parliament, a
statement of the outputs
expected and the performance criteria to be met in
providing those outputs
has also to be laid before the House.
All
this is part of efforts to make the Budget results-based. Spelling out
expected outputs for each vote will enable parliament and its portfolio
committees to closely monitor the performance of the budget and ask the
right questions when targets are missed.
Monitoring budget
implementation is an important function for parliament
because this is when
legislators determine to what extent the budget is
realising set objectives
and that there are tangible benefits accruing to
the
populace.
Sections 33 and 34 of the PFMB deal with reporting
requirements to
parliament. Section 33 (2) says "every accounting officer
shall submit
quarterly financial statements and reports to his/her minister
for his/her
submission to the appropriate parliamentary portfolio committee,
within 60
days of the respective quarter".
Section 34 (2) says "every
accounting officer shall submit monthly financial
statements and reports to
his/her minister for his/her submission to the
appropriate parliamentary
portfolio committee within 30 days of the
respective month".
This
again is a major development that should be celebrated by all keen to
see a
greater role for the legislature in the Budget process. These
provisions are
in line with best practice, and the Minister of Finance must
be commended
for taking heed of what parliament has been advocating over the
years.
One of the main reasons why parliament has poorly
participated in the Budget
process in the past is lack of detailed, timely
and relevant information on
Budget performance made available to portfolio
committees.
The quarterly and monthly financial reports will certainly
bridge that
information gap, with the onus left to the various committees to
organise
themselves properly and scrutinise these reports and engage
ministries on
any issues that may arise.
We should not forget
however that a law on its own is not sufficient to
promote a greater role
for parliament in the Budget process. We have
numerous examples of laws that
are in place but not enforced. In some
instances, the laws have been abused
to satisfy other narrow interests.
The other major determinant for
the effective participation by legislators
in this whole public finance
management framework is institutional capacity
within parliament to
scrutinise the various monthly and quarterly reports
and raise issues with
ministries.
Though parliament may wield measurable legal powers and the
political space
to shape budgets, analytical capacity remains critical to
making sound
budgetary choices. Parliament therefore needs to have access to
independent
information and analysis on the budget, through its own research
services,
complemented by independent think tanks, the private sector and
academia.
Participation in formulation and implementation will require
that MPs have
basic exposure to public finance.
Many parliaments have set
up parliamentary budget offices to address the
question of
capacity.
Such offices have been set up by an Act of parliament in order
to give them
enough teeth and ensure their operational
independence.
The major objective of parliamentary budget offices is to
supply the
legislature with simplified expert analysis and impact
assessment of budget
proposals. Such an analytic unit can simplify
complexity for members,
promote transparency, enhance budget credibility and
promote accountability.
The parliamentary budget office, staffed by
highly experienced and qualified
personnel in economics and public finance,
can produce the following
outputs for MPs:
* Regular
parliamentary appropriations series and government budgetary
decision-making
series;
* Timely assessments of budget versus actual
performance;
* Assessments of the business case for large projects,
programmes and
the capital votes;
* Regular weekly and quarterly
economic and fiscal updates to
parliament;
* Research papers on
budget transparency, expenditure management and
government operations;
and
* In-depth or brief analysis as requested by committees and/or
parliamentarians.
Some of the robust debates witnessed so far on the
Reserve Bank Amendment
Bill and the excellent work done by the Budget,
Finance and Investment
Promotion and Public Accounts committees on the PFMB
and Audit Office Bill,
are encouraging signs that the seventh parliament is
not prepared to be used
to rubber-stamp executive
decisions.
Legislators must maintain this momentum to the budget
process. The
effectiveness of this parliament will be judged on the degree
to which it is
able to take advantage of the new legal regime and cement its
role in the
formulation and implementation of the national
budget.
Parliament must therefore use the National Budget as a powerful
instrument
to debate and establish political priorities and resource
allocations that
directly enhance people's lives.
John Makamure is
the Executive Director of the Southern African
Parliamentary Support
Trust.
By John Makamure
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
18:39
DO MPs play any significant role in the development of their
constituencies
or are they mere political figureheads?
This question
would, in a normal political setting, be rhetorical, but the
failure to hold
by-elections in constituencies robbed of representation by
death or because
members were fired has made it relevant.
Currently there are
nine vacant seats and Justice George Chiweshe, chairman
of the Zimbabwe
Electoral Commission (ZEC), the body that is mandated to run
elections, said
in August they had no money for by-elections. This means
these
constituencies may wait until the next elections, after the
constitution-making process, before they get representation.
To
make matters worse, vacant constituencies would not benefit anytime soon
from the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) that will become operational in
January. An MP will chair a committee that will administer the
fund.
It is expected that the MP for a constituency would make
assessments on
developmental needs and then apply for the funds and then
implement the
projects.
The CDF has an allocation of US$8 million
to cater for the 210
constituencies and the amounts given would depend on
the needs of each area.
Projects which are likely to be implemented
under the fund include sinking
of boreholes to improve water supply and
sanitation, repairing of schools
and setting up nutrition
gardens.
But the projects should not interfere with the operations of
local
authorities.
What this means is that the six constituencies
whose MPs died and the three
parliamentary seats where MDC-M legislators
were fired would literally be
left in the cold as they would not be able to
benefit from this fund no
matter how dire their needs may be.
MPs
who have died are John Nyamande (MDC-T) for Makoni Central, Cornelius
Dube
(MDC-T) for Emakhandeni–Entumbane, Charles Pemhenayi (Zanu PF) for
Mutare
North, Cletus Mabharanga (Zanu PF) for Guruve North, Ephrem Mushoriwa
(Zanu
PF) for Gokwe-Gumunyu and Elliot Manyika (Zanu PF) for Bindura
North.
Three other MPs, namely Abednico Bhebhe (Nkayi South), Norman
Mpofu
(Bulilima East) and Njabuliso Mguni (Lupane East) who won on the MDC-M
ticket, were unseated in July this year.
According to Section 39
of the Electoral Act, the Speaker or the President
of the Senate is supposed
to notify the President as soon as possible after
he/she becomes aware of a
vacancy.
The president then publishes a notice in the Government
Gazette within 14
days after he has been notified of the vacancy ordering a
new election to
fill the seat.
Nomination court of candidates
will sit not less than 14 days or more than
21 days after the publication of
the proclamation. An election date will
then be set not less than 28 days
and not more than 50 days after the
nomination of
candidates.
Most of the vacant constituencies are in rural areas
which are expected to
be the biggest beneficiaries of CDF given that the
district councils which
should undertake developmental projects are
currently incapacitated.
“If we are serious about development at the
constituency level, then we
should be ashamed by what has been happening
since the first death of an MP
immediately after the election last year,”
said a political science
lecturer. “It may be a case of a very weak
electorate which is being
trampled on by a carnivorous central government
which is taking advantage of
the loopholes in our democracy and in my humble
opinion, it is the
constituencies which will suffer.”
Another
political commentator who is also the director for the Centre for
Community
Development, Phillip Pasirayi, said the continued lack of
representation in
the nine constituencies was a clear sign of how
overweening the state had
become at the expense of the populace.
“From a civic society point of
view, we are saying we should challenge
government so that elections are
held,” said Pasirayi. “A delay in holding
elections is a clear sign of
denying the people of their suffrage.”
Pasirayi said the problem was
that of “negotiated debates” where everything
was left to the three
negotiating parties, Zanu PF, MDC-T and MDC-M, which
went against the
doctrine of the separation of power.
Analysts feel that one of the
problems with the political set-up in the
country is that a shadow MP or
even minister does not have much of a role to
play and they usually become
visible only during campaigning.
Bhebhe, the former MP for Nkayi
South, said while he has been fired by his
party, thus denying his
constituency of representation, he has continued
with the programmes he had
initiated.
“There are a number of programmes which I have continued
to undertake in the
constituency because I believe that it was the people
who gave me the
mandate to work with them,” said Bhebhe.
“As far
as I am concerned, I should continue working with the people and as
you may
be aware we have sunk a borehole among other developmental projects
I have
undertaken.”
While things may be slightly better for the Nkayi South
constituency because
Bhebhe may still be interested in participating in an
election, the same
cannot be said about the other eight.
It may
be a case of projects dying with their implementers as those
interested in
contesting elections may not be coming in the open as they are
not aware of
when the elections would be held.
This has led some to say that the
country should adopt other forms of
representation which will take into
account the problems faced at the
moment.
Suggestions were made
for Zimbabwe to move from the first-past-the post
(winner takes all) type of
election and adopt proportional representation
where an MP who dies or is
dismissed is replaced by someone from the same
party without going for
election.
Under proportional representation, a party prepares a list
and they are
allocated seats on the basis of how the party performed. If,
for example, a
party wins 50% of the vote in an election, they would get
half the number of
available seats until the next
election.
Should an MP die, then his/her party would appoint another
one without going
for election which makes it cheaper than having an
election each time there
is a death or dismissal.
However, there
are problems which are also associated with this system as
the preparation
of a list of MPs may be subject to manipulation and
patronage as preferred
political actors may be pushed on top even if they
did not have grassroots
support.
A political science lecturer at the University of Zimbabwe
who asked for
anonymity said when Finance minister Tendai Biti announced the
introduction
of the CDF, it exposed those responsible for administering
elections for
sleeping on duty.
“There may be many problems with
the running of the elections as was said by
ZEC, when they said they did not
have the funds to hold elections but the
importance of the elections should
take precedence over other issues,” he
said.
“What is even more
worrying is that the three parties are hushed when it
comes to
constituencies which have been affected yet they account for a
significant
fraction of the entire lower House.”
Leonard Makombe
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
18:10
SOUTH Africa's fixed-line telephone operator, Telkom, is seeking to
buy a
significant stake in TelOne, businessdigest has established.
Information
Communication Technology minister Nelson Chamisa confirmed on
Monday that
Telkom was talking to TelOne, a state-owned telephone
operator.
Chamisa did not say how much shareholding the South African group
would get
in TelOne, but Telkom was reportedly eyeing a 60% stake.
Last
month, Telkom's group executive for corporate development Mike Mlengana
told
South African news portal, ITWeb, that the company remained on the
lookout
for acquisition opportunities in Africa.
Zimbabwe has one of the lowest fixed
and mobile telecommunications
penetration rates on the continent.
Frost
& Sullivan, a global business research and consulting firm, estimated
that last year the country had 1,654 million mobile subscribers, less than
10% of the total population.
Sources said Telkom had already conducted a
due diligence examination on the
loss-making TelOne. Over the years the
company has not been able to fund
network improvements.
TelOne is in dire
need of capital in order to upgrade aged network and
expand its
market.
However, raising capital had been a hurdle given the political and
macro-economic environment and legislation limiting foreign ownership of
Zimbabwean companies to 49%.
TelOne last month admitted restricting calls
from landlines to mobile
operators to reduce its debts. TelOne owed more
than US$22 million to mobile
operators in interconnection
fees.
Interconnection fees are paid between operators to allow cross-network
calls. It is not clear if TelOne has settled this debt.
According to
TelOne managing director, Hampton Mhlanga, a cabinet decision
to force the
company to slash its tariffs earlier in the year did not help
the telephone
operator.
The directive, Mhlanga said, plunged the parastatal deeper into
debt. Its
obligations to other telecommunications operators and the Zimbabwe
Revenue
Authority (Zimra) had ballooned following the directive, Mhlanga
told a
parliamentary committee.
Under the interconnection arrangement
between telecommunications operators,
operators pay each other for traffic
between their networks. For instance,
if a TelOne customer calls a mobile
operator, TelOne pays that operator
US$0,07 per minute. Because Econet is
the largest operator, with over two
million subscribers compared to TelOne's
300 000, most of the outbound
traffic from TelOne is heading into Econet.
This means its interconnection
obligations to Econet and other operators,
who are expanding their
subscriber bases, were always rising.
Should,
Telkom go ahead to invest in TelOne, the company would have to
expunge debts
and invest millions into capital expenditure.
The company said it was
collecting about 15% of its bills from customers,
yet Zimra demanded tax
returns to be based on what the company billed, and
not what it actually
collected.
Already, the company has cut off defaulting customers in a move
management
hopes would limit liabilities. TelOne said it would use part of
the funds to
revamp some of its equipment which was either vandalised or now
dilapidated.
Chris Muronzi
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 18:09
LONZIM, a long-term
investment company with a diverse portfolio in the
country, last week raised
US$1,9 million for its operations in Zimbabwe. The
amount was raised last
Friday through the placing of 4 255 525 shares at
US$0,40 a share.
The
money raised was meant to "ensure that the LonZim investee companies
have
access to working capital to continue to run their businesses in a
commercial and professional manner as economic growth returns to the
important market sectors where the firm operates".
David Lenigas,
executive chairman of LonZim, said they were growing their
business in the
country as the economy was showing signs of recovery.
"The signs of economic
growth in Zimbabwe are now tangible," said Lenigas.
"LonZim is well placed
with its established portfolio of businesses,
purchased over the past two
years, to be a part of the economic recovery
underway in Zimbabwe. LonZim
businesses have retained quality staff,
maintained their operations and been
prepared for recovery and are now
focusing on substantial growth for
2010."
LonZim said shares were unconditionally placed pending their admission
to
trade on AIM. AIM is the London Stock Exchange's international market for
smaller growing companies.
Application was made for admission of the
placing shares to trading on AIM.
Placing shares will altogether represent
approximately 12% of the LonZim's
enlarged issued share capital and the
number of shares in issue following
completion of the placing would be 36
331 525.
LonZim, which was formed two years ago, has been growing its
portfolio and
now includes Fly540 Zimbabwe, a domestic low cost airline
which is scheduled
to fly the local skies next week.
Apart from the
airline, LonZim also owns 51% of Panafmed after it invested
US$2,3 million
in the new start up business that imports, wholesales and
distributes
pharmaceutical products in the country.
LonZim also controls Leopard Rock
Motel, Paynet, Cellsys and Millpal
Chemicals.
In Mozambique, the company
plans to develop the Don Carlos and the Estoril
Hotel sites into a luxury
hotels with conference facilities, a training
centre, retail mall, offices
and logistics units.
In October, LonZim announced that it was eyeing a local
five-star hotel as
it continues to add various investments under its
portfolio.
Leonard Makombe
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 18:06
THE
Zimbabwe National Roads Authority (Zinara) has accused the Zimbabwe
National
Revenue Authority (Zimra) of lacking transparency in the collection
and
remittance of tolls since their introduction in August. Tollgates dotted
around the country have so far raised US$5,3 million.
The money from the
gates was meant to resurface roads, patch up potholes and
finance the
construction of temporary shelters at the designated tollgate
points. To
date not even a kilometre of the country's highways has been
repaired due to
the dispute between Zinara and Zimra.
Zimra collects tolls on behalf of
Zinara, but the roads authority officials
are not part to teams who police
the gates.
Frank Chitukutuku, Zinara chief executive officer, said lack of a
mechanism
for the authority to monitor and control the fees inflows
presented
challenges for accounting and control purposes.
"There is no
mechanism for Zinara to monitor and control the inflows, for
example, the
printing of tickets," he said. "For accounting and control
purposes, Zinara
should procure and record the tickets and then allocate
them to
Zimra."
Chitukutuku is proposing that permanent toll gates be constructed
through a
public-private partnership on a build, operate-and transfer
basis.
Speaking during a question and answer session in parliament last
month,
Finance minister Tendai Biti said: "I need to say that there should
be
methods to make sure that the tollgate fees collections are more
transparent. Cabinet should make sure that leakages are minimised."
The
country presently has 22 tollgates whose rudimentary structures
reportedly
need urgent attention.
Light vehicles are charged US$1 at the toll gates.
Buses pay US$3 and
lorries pay US$5.
According to the Transport ministry,
of the total money collected, 90% has
been remitted to Zinara with the
remaining 10% being retained as
administration fees.
Chitukutuku said
there was continued discontent and scepticism by road users
about tolls
being levied and collected by Zimra, which has been empowered to
do so by
Statutory Instruments 39 and 122.
Transport and Infrastructural Development
ministry secretary, Partson
Mbiriri, was last week quoted saying monthly
toll collections ranged between
US$1,2 million to US$1,4 million but he
noted that the amount was too little
to repair the trunk roads most of which
need over US$600 000 a km for
repairs or resurfacing.
According to a
report by the World Bank released last month, Zinara is
mandated to manage
the road maintenance fund including the setting of
road-user tariff levels,
collection of the funds, disbursement of the funds
to road agencies and the
monitoring of the usage of such funds.
"The key fund raising instruments have
been fuel levy, transit fees,
overload fees and abnormal load fees," the
World Bank said.
Fuel levy accounts for 45% of Zinara's revenue and has been
the main source
of revenue for the authority
"The introduction of toll
gates in August and the decision to remit vehicle
licensing fees to Zinara
will significantly boost the road-user revenues,"
said the World
Bank.
Total projected revenue for 2009 is US$15 million. A total of US$12
million
was to be allocated to the road agencies, with 31% of the funds
going to the
department of roads, 34% to rural district councils, 16% to
urban councils
and 19% to the District Development Fund.
In a brief
breakdown of what the money raised from motorists has been used
for, the
transport ministry recently said the construction of the
provisional toll
gate shelters was already under tender.
The ministry said five of the
country's tollgates would be widened at a cost
of US$620 000; eight
provinces would share US$1 million for routine
maintenance of regional and
primary roads where the toll gates are
positioned. US$280 000 would be used
for resurfacing eight km of the
Bulawayo-Beitbridge road; US$54 782 is being
used on traffic counts being
carried out at toll gates as means of verifying
the fees being collected by
the Zimra and the rest has been earmarked for
constructing temporary
shelters at the sites.
Currently, it costs US$600
00 to rehabilitate one km of tarred road.
According to the World Bank report,
there are 88 300 km of classified roads
of which about 15 000 are paved. 5%
of the network is classified as primary
roads and has some of the most
traffick arterials that link Zimbabwe with
its neighbours.
It is
estimated that the entire road network would require US$1,8 billion or
5% of
the road asset value to restore it to good condition and an additional
US$160 million annually for maintenance.
Paul
Nyakazeya
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
17:58
AN important attribute of any budget is that tax revenues must
cover
recurrent expenditures. If tax revenues are not enough to cover
recurrent
expenditures it means the country is living beyond its means and
will
develop serious economic challenges and eventually import more while
its
domestic and foreign debts continue to rise, as has been the case with
Zimbabwe since 2000.
Analysts said for the first time in over nine years,
the primary budget was
positive at US$76,3 million. This is for the first
10 months of the year.
Even the total budget balance is US$47,9 million.
This means Zimbabwe has
been living within its means through “eating what we
kill or gather”.
Kingdom Stock Brokers (KSB) however said the current 2009
budget had one big
flaw.
“It is not sustainable because the capital
budget is extremely low. Having
planned to raise the capital budget to at
least 18%, the 2009 budget outturn
for the period to October 31 has produced
a laughable 4%, which means 96%
went to recurrent expenditure,” KSB
said.
KSB said a capital budget that is continuously being squeezed by
recurrent
expenditure does not promote national investment through gross
fixed capital
formation.
They said the budget ceases to be
growth-promoting and fiscal policy will
definitely fail to positively impact
the macroeconomic objectives.
“We are living within our means but we are not
investing in infrastructure
to provide an enabling environment for business
to thrive so that the tax
base and tax revenue rise, making it easier to
finance the secondary deficit
which is created by expenditure on capital
projects,” said KSB.
Analysts said the “worrying” aspect about the 2009
budget is that a greater
portion of the recurrent expenditure are employment
costs such as wages and
salaries which constitute about 60% of total
costs.
Given that these costs are non-discretionary, Finance minister Tendai
Biti
has little room to manoeuvre which, means Zimbabwe is likely to
experience
the same structure being perpetuated in the 2010 Budget and
beyond.
The ideal split between recurrent and capital budget should be at
least
75-25% with a bias towards the capital budget.
Surprisingly the
2007 budget performed well on the capital budget. This
probably reflects
the massive farm mechanisation drive that government
pursued although a
large chunk of it was financed outside the budget through
quasi-fiscal
activities of the Reserve Bank.
Using this analytical thrust, the 2010 budget
will perform badly on the
primary budget as it shows a deficit of US$238, 2
million but is well on the
capital budget of 22,42% of total
expenditure.
Zimbabwe Allied Banking Group (ZABG) said the cardinal rule
which must be
observed at all times is that a country must not live beyond
its means.
“It is okay to have an overall deficit as long as the primary
budget balance
is positive because it means the deficit has been incurred
through the
capital expenditures which promote growth,” ZABG said.
This
puts a question on the cash-budgeting policy. Biti expects to finance
the
deficit of US$810 million through support from donors.
Questions have been
raised as to what guarantees, there are that he will get
the support which
amounts to 36% of the budget given that the international
community has
demanded progress on the political front, especially the full
implementation
of the Global Political Agreement before they can loosen
their purses
The
observation by Biti that the bulk of our taxes are coming from indirect
instead of direct sources is a worrisome economic anomaly.
Indirect taxes
are placed on goods and services whilst direct taxes are
levied on income
and wealth. Since indirect taxes are paid only when a
particular purchase
is made, they are therefore taxes on consumption hence
they are also called
outlay taxes.
An increase in indirect taxes shows an increase in consumption
by the
nation.
On the other hand direct taxes are taxes on production as
income and wealth
can only be earned by engaging oneself in productive
ways. An increase in
direct taxes indicates an increase in economic
activity and vice-versa.
“Zimbabwe is a nation of consumers because
government is getting most of its
revenue from indirect taxes and less from
direct taxes. Indirect taxes such
as Value Added Tax (Vat), customs and
excise duties, constituted 75% of
total government revenue during the 2009
whereas direct taxes such as Pay As
You Earn accounted for only 19%,” said
KBS.
According to the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, the economy’s deposit base is
estimated at US$1,061 billion as at October 31 2009. It remains too low for
financial institutions to effectively execute their intermediary role on the
economy.
Contributing to the thin deposit base is a decrease in the
savings due to
low disposable incomes coupled with financial
disintermediation emanating
from the now unshakable informal economy.
Low
interest rates on deposits of between 0% and 3% do not encourage one to
keep
their money in a bank as the opportunity cost is very low.
According to the
Reserve Bank the reasons for the decline in savings have
been complicated by
the fact that about 90% of the total deposits are
transitory in nature and
cannot be utilised by financial institutions to
create long term-credit for
the deficit units.
Analysts said the budget could be used to restructure
asset and liabilities
of financial institutions so that they become
long-term through floating
longer-dated stock to finance the deficits in a
bid to match the long-term
funding requirements of
industry.
Paul Nyakazeya
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
18:46
LET’S hope Botswana doesn’t feel intimidated by the abuse being
hurled at it
about “pirate” radio stations. It may be useful to remind
ourselves of the
context here. In 2000 the Supreme Court struck down ZBC’s
monopoly of the
airwaves. A handful of broadcasters attempted to set up a
private station
but were raided by police and their equipment
confiscated.
They subsequently relocated to the UK where they set up a radio
station, SW
Radio Africa.
There is nothing “pirate” about this station or
any of the others. They are
licensed under the laws of the countries hosting
them. The employees have
been driven to work abroad because of their
treatment here. Even though the
GPA has opened the way to their return, the
minister has not given an
undertaking about their safety. This is a
pertinent issue given the threats
made against them in the past.
As Gerry
Jackson, who set up SW Radio Africa, comments in this week’s
Standard: “Our
broadcasts on shortwave and via the Internet are completely
legal and we
want nothing more than a free, peaceful, democratic Zimbabwe.
“And yes, we do
believe that Zimbabweans have an absolute right to the
information that has
been denied to them for so long.
“If you want to get rid of radio stations
broadcasting into Zimbabwe, free
the media. Really free it. It really is
that simple…”
“Will you please start talking about the real issues. You have
a population
that’s desperate, investors ready to throw money at Zimbabwe
the minute
there is a guaranteed return to the rule of law, respect for
property
rights, an end to political intimidation and the massive human
rights
abuses — and Gideon Gono and Johannes Tomana really do have to
go.”
Then we had some incredibly ignorant and stupid remarks on the
Botswana
issue from somebody called Dr Maxwell Hove. He said Botswana’s
stance was
not surprising given that country’s history.
He said that
Botswana’s history did not fall in the same bracket as other
Sadc members
“who got independence through protracted wars against white
racist regimes”.
Botswana got its independence by negotiation, he declared,
as if that was
some form of treachery!
And how did Zambia, Lesotho, Swaziland, Tanzania,
Malawi, and Mauritius get
their independence, Dr Maxwell? We don’t recall
any of them fighting
“protracted wars” against white racist regimes.
It
is noteworthy how little Zanu PF’s facile rhetoric on fighting wars is
shared by its neighbours. Ask them what they think of Zanu PF’s “brave
stance” against imperialism and they will simply laugh.
Malawi, one of
the poorest countries on the continent, exports food to
Zimbabwe. Botswana
doesn’t need lectures from these delusional misfits in
Harare. Botswana is a
success story, these guys commenting in the Herald are
failures. Doesn’t
that say it all?
See how Botswana manages its diamond resources and compare
that with the
disaster at Chiadzwa. That is Zanu PF’s barren
legacy.
After 30 years they still can’t provide a professional radio and
television
service. Until they do, the nation will look to external stations
for its
information.
Still on the subject of the media, why does
parliament allow only
photographers and TV crews from the state media into
the chamber during
presentation of the Budget and why have MDC ministers not
said anything
about this unacceptable discriminatory practice.
Everywhere
there are pockets of resistance to the new order. Zanu PF is for
instance
exclusively conducting foreign policy and using the Foreign Affairs
ministry
to fire broadsides at real or imagined enemies. The Czech Republic
has
recently been in the firing line for inviting prospective diplomats to
Prague. The Czech Republic and other EU members need to tell overweening
officials in the Foreign Affairs ministry very politely to get lost. They
represent the losers in the old regime which is doing everything it can to
block change. Please stop indulging their pathetic squeals of
protest.
It was good to see in the midst of these complaints Morgan
Tsvangirai
striding down a red carpet in Tripoli inspecting a guard of
honour,
accompanied by his Libyan counterpart. He was received by army and
police
chiefs on this his first official visit to North Africa.
Obviously
the visit had President Mugabe’s blessing but one couldn’t help
ponder how
things have changed since this time last year when MDC and civic
officials
were being picked up and tortured.
What the MDC-T needs to do now is publish
its agenda for reform instead of
trying to propitiate Mugabe by saying
nothing. Is it acceptable to remain
silent when a majority of voters demand
change? Why are Posa, Aippa and the
Criminal Law (Codification and Reform)
Act still on the statute book; why
have torturers gone uninvestigated and
unpunished; what has happened to
Joseph Mwale?; why are the Herald and ZBC
still instruments of reaction and
purveyors of ignorance?
Would it really
hurt for the majority party to set out its political stall?
Don’t the public
have a right to know their plans — if any? If the Senate
insists on blocking
legislation emanating from the lower House then let’s
witness them doing
just that so the nation can see the face of the beast!
So the “Look East”
policy appears to be less successful than we have been
led to believe. The
only time Zimbabwe recorded a trade surplus with China
this year was in
February, the Standard reported this week. CSO data for
October shows that
Zimbabwe only exported goods worth US$487 719 but
imported goods worth
US$6,7 million in the same month.
Still with the economy, while official
commentators say Zimbabwe enjoys
negative inflation, evidence on the ground
suggests otherwise. The numbers
are moving up — some not so slowly, a survey
suggests.
Tinned goods from South Africa are creeping up in price with no
apparent
justification. So are locally produced products. A pie in TM that
cost US$1
a few weeks ago, recently went up to $1,30 and is now
$1,55.
Castrol motor oil is going for US$820 for 210 litres when the landed
cost is
$280.
The Prices Commission that was quick to prosecute retailers
last year is
invisible in the current hikes.
Most of the price rises are
opportunistic and simply not justified by
increased costs. A local real
estate company is hiking its rents by $50 a
month as a routine procedure.
And while we wish Finance minister Tendai Biti’s
Budget can deliver 7%
growth, it cannot happen when dependent upon an
agricultural recovery
programme that is sabotaged by land seizures.
Just as a matter of interest,
how many farms has Ignatious Chombo acquired
over the past 10
years?
We would also be keen to know, on another subject, how many people
will
accompany President Mugabe to Copenhagen next week?
Sixty we
gather.
Zimbabwe is in desperate need of international funding for its very
survival. And here is Mugabe taking, we understand, his family, cabinet
ministers with no known record of interest in climate change, officials, and
other hangers on. MDC ministers will be among those scrambling aboard the
presidential flight which should be named “Gravy One”.
What sort of
signal does this send to the international community? What does
this say of
the country’s priorities?
Finally, we were intrigued by Joseph
Chinotimba’s letter to the editor last
week. Why was it published in the
Herald when it was addressed to this paper
and concerned matters published
here? And — coming from Chinotimba — how
come it didn’t have a single
spelling mistake?
The answer is obvious. The Herald gave it away by placing
the letter in the
space normally reserved for letters emanating from, how
shall we say, spooky
and subterranean sources. And the fact that it didn’t
contain a single error
from a writer whose education was interrupted by war
service would tend to
indicate that it was not entirely his own work.
We
also have to bear in mind that this is the same man who told a court
regarding his relations with other politicians that: “On the surface we
appear to be in good books but we lie to each other a lot.”
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
18:42
IN formulating Zimbabwe's 2010 National Budget, Minister of Finance
Tendai
Biti was confronted with a horrendously difficult task. Government is
bankrupt (as recently openly admitted by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai)
and opportunities of access to revenue are very limited.
Although
2009 has indisputably witnessed some significant economic recovery
developments, that recovery is not yet so extensive as to yield substantial
inflows to the fiscus.
In contradistinction, the monetary needs of
government are immense, and
especially so if government is to rapidly
minimise the magnitude of
suffering within Zimbabwe, and is to stimulate
ongoing and rapid economic
recovery.
Bearing in mind the greatly
constricting and demanding circumstances
confronting the minister, the
budget that he presented to parliament last
week must be commended as being
very comprehensive and substantially sound.
But that does not detract
from the fact that there are some material
deficiencies and omissions in
that budget, many of which could have been
addressed, and inevitably one
must ponder on the calibre and capability of
some of the minister's
advisors, for they apparently failed to focus his
attention on those
deficiencies and omissions.
The resultant conclusion of in-depth
consideration for Biti's 2010 Budget is
that it is similar to the title of a
renowned movie of yesteryear: The Good,
The Bad, and The
Ugly.
What were the ugliest features of the budget? Undoubtedly the
foremost of
those features was that he accorded the harshly oppressed
low-level wage
earners a ludicrously contemptuous increase in the threshold
of individual
income tax of US$10, from US$150 to US$160.
In October
(the most recently available Consumer Price Index data being for
that
month), the Poverty Datum Line for a family of six was approximately
US$496.
Assuming such family has two income earners, generating
income in a 3:2
ratio, one would have an income of marginally under US$300,
and the other an
income approximating US$200.
Thus the minister sees
it fit to levy direct tax from those who are
desperately struggling for the
survival of themselves and their families,
and to intensify their immense
hardships and distress, with a virtually
meaningless concession, reducing
their devastating tax burden by a niggardly
US$2 per income
earner.
Another ugly feature of the budget is that it contains very
little to
encourage the much needed investment which would be a key catalyst
of
economic recovery.
It contains no investment incentives
whatsoever, and no incentives to
stimulate employment. Instead, it reduces
the first year capital
expenditure allowances for businesses (SIA) from 50%
to 25%, foreshadows
discontinuance of export market development expenditure
incentives in 2011,
and berates the mining sector, concurrently with
increased imposts upon that
sector, and that with disregard for the extent
that mining can accelerate
economic recovery.
Yet another ugly
feature of the minister's budget statement is the absence
of any policies to
bring about public private-sector partnerships, being
partial privatisations
of parastatals, or to facilitate total
privatisations.
Without such
actions, it is inevitable that Zimbabwe will continue to
suffer, extensive,
interruptions in energy supplies, erratic and defective
telecommunications,
appallingly poor rail services, air service deficiencies
and similar
inadequacies from other parastatal service providers.
Not as ugly,
but nevertheless bad, were some other budgetary features.
The level
of bonuses not subject to taxation was set at a miniscule US$400.
The
tens of thousands of employees struggling to fund the basic needs of
their
families and themselves, including rents and utilities, food,
transport,
health care and education, were anxiously hoping for some
temporary relief
from year-end bonuses, but now know that little of those
bonuses will escape
the income tax noose.
Moreover, greater generosity by the minister would
not have been of
substantial cost to the fiscus. The bonus recipients would
have had greater
disposable income, as a result of lesser incidence of
income tax, and the
fiscus would benefit from enhanced indirect taxes (Vat,
customs duties etc)
on the increased spending of the bonus-receiving
employees, and as a result
of improved income tax flows on the greater
profits attainable by commerce
and industry as a result of the greater
spending by the bonus-recipients.
Another tragic feature of the
Budget is that the minister has extended the
date for payment by businesses
of Vat by a "grandiose" five days, from the
fifth to the tenth of the
month. This is a very shallow concession, of
exceptionally limited benefit
to the business community.
With pronounced money market illiquidity
prevailing, most businesses cannot
accord credit to their customers, and
especially so if they have to remit
Vat to government long before receiving
payment from customers.
But the economic recovery would be greatly
accelerated, with much increased
productivity, enhanced availability of
goods and ongoing containment of
inflation, if business was enabled to offer
credit, which would partially be
made possible if Vat was remittable to the
state only once received from
customers.
Of lesser consequence,
but nevertheless of concern, was that the minister
saw it fit to contend
that the economy has "stabilised", implying that it is
now
stable.
That is not so! It is recovering, and in some respects
impressively so, but
it is still very volatile and vulnerable, and therefore
contentions of
stability are deceptive. So too were certain of government's
economic
projections, enunciated by the minister.
He suggested that
next year Zimbabwe's tobacco harvest would exceed 200
million kg, against
the 2008/9 crop of a paltry 46 million kg, and that
Zimbabwe would produce
at least 1,4 million tonnes of maize, compared to the
last crop of 600 000
tonnes.
These projections are far-fetched and extremely misleading with
no prospect
of attainment in the absence of sufficient inputs, effective and
constructive land usage programmes, and consistent utility
availability.
However, there were some very positive and good
contents in the budget, to
some extent overriding the negatives. First and
foremost was the minister's
categoric statement that "re-introduction of a
local currency" would not
occur in the foreseeable future.
He said
that such re-introduction could only be effected when there is
evidence of a
strong economy, "with annual sustainable GDP growth rates of
over 6%, high
exports and high foreign exchange reserves" and when there is
"a balanced
budget and institutional credibility". He was also emphatic
that until
then, Zimbabwe would continue to operate a multi-currency basket.
In
doing so, he has constructively squashed the endless flow of specious and
damaging currency rumours which have greatly intensified money market
illiquidity, and recurrently increased economic despondency, depression and
negatives.
Constructive, and the one limited budget boost to the
investment drive, was
the reduction of corporate income tax and withholding
taxes on royalties,
technical fees and the like, and on dividends on quoted
shares, closer
aligning Zimbabwean taxation to regional levels.
The
minister's policies to resolve the endless, highly costly
(business-wise)
and tourist demotivating, chaos at Zimbabwe's border posts
are exceptionally
commendable, as are his intents to temporarily continue
the suspension of
duties on imported basic commodities and on manufacturing
inputs of basic
commodities.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009 18:31
FINANCE
minister Tendai Biti's National Budget statement last week is the
first
since Zimbabwe's Independence in 1980 to be presented by a minister
who does
not owe political allegiance to Zanu PF. This Budget has been
presented
amidst the Sadc mediation on outstanding issues in the global
political
agreement (GPA). The Budget also specifies a time frame for its
implementation (January-December 2010).
This signifies both an
air of permanence to the inclusive government or at
least a guarantee that
the government will last until 2011. The Budget's
contents and intended aims
are linked closely to the question of whether or
not Biti's Budget is the
new GPA.
The latter point is made because the Budget cuts across
party lines and must
have been arrived at with cabinet approval as well as
competitive bids by
ministries to get higher resource allocations. This
would mean it, too, is a
negotiated document, but one that has a direct and
technical bearing on the
functions of government.
The first issue
to be reflected upon is that this is a Budget presented by a
minister with
no allegiance to Zanu PF but arrived at with Zanu PF input and
approval.
This means that the MDC is now an integral part of the inclusive
government.
That is to say, for all the outstanding issues that Sadc
is addressing,
there is a functional government that has the MDC
contributing as important
a policy instrument as the national Budget; and
this for a period of 12
months.
Therefore the MDC can no longer
easily seek to wash its hands of the
policies that are undertaken by the
inclusive government, as long as the
Budget is followed under the tutelage
of Biti. As a result, the inclusive
government can no longer be viewed
either as "shaky" or "fragile" primarily
because the Budget represents its
permanence for the next 12 months.
It also indicates that because
Biti's office is of such national importance,
no one can honestly say that
he presented the Budget with an intention to
simply abandon it to another
person, especially one who is not in his party
if the MDC once again decides
to disengage from the inclusive government.
The second factor that
adds weight to the first is that Biti indicated in
his speech to parliament
that the framework for the next fiscal year is
derived from a three-year
economic strategic plan etched out in August at
Nyanga. If one were to read
between the lines, one would see that it is more
than likely there is
continued tacit agreement that the inclusive government
will last for the
same period of time.
This particular Budget should therefore not be
understood solely within the
context of the next 12 months but by an
intention, as hinted by Biti, to fit
the three-year economic lifespan of the
inclusive government.
The Sadc mediation therefore merely becomes an
ongoing characteristic of the
inclusive government because Biti, in
presenting the Budget, has shown that
it is possible to have the usual
problems of the GPA while at the same time
attending to serious government
business together with Zanu PF.
It is necessary to reflect on the
actual policy intentions of the Budget.
In his preamble the minister
mentioned that his Budget was essentially meant
to be "pro-poor, broad
based", and "inclusive". He then proceeded to give
the health sector a
large chunk of the Budget together with social
protection while bemoaning
the government wages bill as being unsustainable.
The major undertone
of all of this was what can be discerned as a sense of
nostalgia in the
allocations, a strong intention to return the economy to
its pre-1996 years,
where the Budget tended to be characterised by measures
to ensure social
welfare especially in education, but at the same time
trying to rein in
government expenditure. This is exemplified by the
allocations given to the
Basic Education Assistance Module (Beam) project
under the social protection
line items.
The discernible intention of Biti is to "normalise" the
economy, and not
necessarily to change its structural focus, this being a
"market-driven"
economy.
The latter point is strengthened by his
comparative references to Sadc best
practices and the prioritisation of a
regionally integrated market.
These are issues that were in vogue during
the late Ariston Chambati's
tenure as well as that of Bernard Chidzero as
the country decided, under a
Zanu PF government, to embrace structural
adjustment.
Where the minister tackled the land issue, while stating
that it was not his
intention to undermine the land reform programme, there
is once again a
return to the big debate of the 1990s.
The key issue
being that of land tenure ostensibly in order to ensure the
development of
collateral for farmers but more fundamentally, to reduce the
role of the
state in land ownership.
The merits and demerits of such an approach may
not be appropriately
discussed here, suffice it to say, its emphasis is a
return to normality.
The introduction of a constituency development
fund for members of
parliament, evidently popular in the House of Assembly
more than it would be
in the Senate, is interesting to say the
least.
This is because politically, it is meant to protect the sitting
MPs
primarily due to the constituency development problems that they have
been
facing since election in 2008.
Such a fund helps the current
parliament meet its performance legitimacy
issues with the primary aim of
retaining power for MPs as well as their
parties.
The constituency
development fund is therefore a fund that will, politically
speaking, seek
to retain the balance of parliamentary presence for the three
political
parties and essentially complement the GPA structure.
While others
may consider it progressive that there are some funds directly
allocated to
women and youth empowerment programmes, the difference these
funds bring is
that youth and women's access to resources, previously the
forte of Zanu PF,
is to be shared by the three parties.
Whether these funds will not be
used in the manner Zanu PF has tended to use
them remains to be seen, but we
can only pray that they are not used to
extend the patronage systems so
typical of Zanu PF.
A final point to ponder about the Budget is that
it perhaps is the new GPA.
Even though he does not allocate particular
resources to issues such as
constitutional reform despite mentioning it,
Biti intends to make this
Budget work.
This Budget is therefore the
technical template of the inclusive government
and therefore of the GPA. It
is the newly negotiated crosscutting document
that will determine the next
12 months the country faces.
To conclude, the presentation of
Zimbabwe's national Budget by the Finance
minister was extremely important
politically. The fact that it occurred in
the midst of GPA disagreements,
and yet seemed to be an agreed-to document
means it is possibly the new
GPA.
It has however failed to indicate a departure from the old
practices around
budgets and has failed to firmly put the stamp of "a new
beginning" to our
country's politics. Its main character is reflective of a
desire to return
mainly to the early 1990s' somewhat market-driven approach
to economic
challenges, especially where it integrates IMF Special Drawing
Rights into
its anticipated public service rehabilitation
projects.
The inclusive government, and not just Biti, has, in
presenting this Budget
failed to significantly shift the state's focus from
people-centred economic
planning and development. It has sought the path of
a return to "normalcy"
which though a stabilisation factor, does not begin
to challenge the
problems the country encountered under structural
adjustment in the 1990s.
Takura Zhangazha is the National Director of
Misa Zimbabwe.
By Takura Zhangazha
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
19:18
THE dust seems to have settled on Zanu PF's fratricidal contest for
the
party's presidium comprising its first secretary, two second secretaries
and
a national chairman. The Zanu PF politburo on Monday endorsed the
presidium
that was nominated by the party's 10 provinces ahead of the fifth
party
congress that opened on Wednesday.
The nominations will now
be confirmed at the congress. This weekend the
nation will be exposed to the
unedifying picture of a party of Cold War
comrades all being forced to agree
unanimously to a line-up that few of them
actually wanted.
The
resignation of Manicaland provincial chair Basil Nyabadza illustrates
the
extent of this dichotomy.
This is how these denizens of a discredited
past have run this country and
would want Zimbabwe to be administered in the
next five years; where the
will of the people is subjugated to protect the
camaraderie of patronage.
Didymus Mutasa was actually right in
pointing to procedural manipulation
which saw all 10 provinces endorsing
Simon Khaya Moyo as chairman when most
of them had planned on supporting
somebody else.
But the prospect of President Mugabe unleashing his
not inconsiderable
powers of denunciation against those that declined to toe
the party line --
meaning his line -- was too ghastly to contemplate for
many a delegate.
Manicaland, Mashonaland Central and Masvingo all retreated
from their
original positions and instead backed the dubious claim that the
national
chairman as well as a second secretary had to hail from
Matabeleland.
Whenever Mugabe is asked about the succession in
television interviews, he
invariably points to the process within the former
ruling party that gives
to congress the ultimate say in who will succeed
him. This, he likes to
claim, is the will of the people in
action.
We saw that process shattered in Harare recently when two
party factions
were at each other's throats over the Harare provincial
chairmanship, with
the winning candidate coming last. It was democracy Zanu
PF-style!
It is little wonder that the national voters' roll, over which
party
apparatchiks preside, is in such a mess.
But there is a further
issue at stake here. Having exposed the nation to
this exercise in crude
political control, where dissident voices are
silenced, nobody seems to have
asked what Mugabe will do with his next
five-year term. What policies will
he pursue to improve the nation's health?
At present, it seems, his
only salient policy is to keep the MDC out of
office. He formed the
government of national unity, not because he thought
it would be a good
thing to unite the country, but because electoral defeat
and an increasingly
anxious Sadc made it mandatory.
Just like the MDC, Mugabe had to
retain the region's goodwill to stay alive
politically. But that doesn't
mean he can't continue to pursue policies
aimed at keeping his grip on
power. Strutting upon the international stage
in Denmark next week is
one.
Keeping up appearances is designed to impress friends and foes
alike. As the
directive to the state media to proclaim all his titles at
every mention of
his name suggests, this is a ruler in desperate need of
recognition.
What is there for Zanu PF to claim as a priority area
once its new presidium
is in place? Agriculture cannot prosper so long as
farms continue to be
seized and property stolen. And, related to this, there
will be no
investment until there is security of property. That will impact
on
manufacturing.
Zimbabweans in the Diaspora will not return
home until there is peace and
security. Any suggestion of a return to the
Zimbabwe dollar will scupper
their return and generally damage
confidence.
Other facets of repression including media-regulation
will further damage
the internal consensus as well as hurt international
relations. Mugabe has
nothing to offer here. He will quickly learn in
Denmark next week that
insincerity on the GPA front and retention of a
repressive apparatus will
not win him the lifting of sanctions he so
desperately wants.
The president has few options left. He has a
diminishing audience for his
revolutionary rhetoric. The younger generation
doesn't buy his
blandishments. How can voters be persuaded the US is "the
enemy" when it
keeps the country fed?
This is why the current
rearguard action in the state media against the
MDC-T is not going to help
Mugabe's electoral prospects. Very simply, Zanu
PF has run out of anything
useful to say. Everyone except a handful of
hardliners wants regime
change.
How can a leader who has presided over unprecedented economic
collapse and
is still trying to block change contribute to the nation's
recovery?
Where he can be useful is in restraining the military and
other instruments
of reactionary control from getting in the way of the
change juggernaut.
That would improve his image and help the country
to get out of the abyss he
has dug for it.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
19:14
SINCE the end of colonial rule, Zimbabwe's fiscal policy had been
largely
dominated by unnecessarily large defence budgets. The Defence
ministry,
which runs the Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) and the Air Force, has
since
1980 come second only to Education in budgetary allocations. Defence
consumed in excess of 20% of almost every budget announced after
Independence even when there was no threat to the country's stability and
tranquillity.
Finance minister Biti has commendably put an end to
this nonsense in his
budget.
Out of the bloated 36 ministries of
the inclusive government, Health
commendably got the largest chunk when it
was allocated US$358 million,
Education, Sport and Culture got US$313
million, Labour and Social Services
US$147 million, Home Affairs US$104
million and Defence US$98 million.
That the Defence ministry came a
distant fifth shows the commendable shift
in government
priorities.
In a research paper entitled The Zimbabwe Defence
Industry, former
University of Zimbabwe political science lecturer, Dr
Norman Mlambo, claimed
that the country's high Defence expenditure between
1980-1995 was largely
informed by regional and local
factors.
Among some of the factors, he argued, were the activities of
the Five
Brigade against "dissidents" in Matabeleland.
"At the
same time the Defence budget increased with the expansion of the ZNA
whose
infantry brigades increased from four in 1980 to six in 1990. This
expansion
of the ZNA was largely a response to external threats and
especially to
Zimbabwe's involvement in the Mozambican war against the
Mozambique National
Resistance Movement (Renamo)," wrote Mlambo. "In the
1984-85 period Defence
spending declined because there was a hope for
decreased Renamo activity
following the Nkomati Accord between Mozambique
and South Africa. However,
the expected peace did not materialise and
Zimbabwe's defence expenditure
went up again from the 1985-86 period when
the Zimbabwe Defence Forces
started raiding Renamo bases inside Mozambique."
Most of the
increases in the Defence budget after 1990 were due mainly to
the increases
in inflation in Zimbabwe, which by 1995 had reached 22,6%. It
was also
worsened by the country's DRC intervention in 1998.
There is no doubt
that the country's economic crisis was also a function of
fiscal deficit
worsened by excessive military outlays in the 1990s. The
failure by the
government to control its budget deficit in the same period
can only be
blamed on the state's illogical stance not to lower expenditure
in
non-productive sectors like Defence.
The country's military burden
since 1990 has been higher than the average
for sub-Saharan Africa, and
indeed, exceeded the average of world regional
groupings, except the Middle
East and North Africa.
The country's defence expenditure was
influenced more by the external wars
than internal
conditions.
Zimbabwe is not under threat from any entity or
organisation internally or
externally, hence the defence budget should be
lowered immensely. The
country cannot be seen financing the repression and
restriction of its
citizens.
Over the years Zimbabweans have
become victims of military brutality.
Various military hardware was procured
to wage what government termed a
counter-insurgent operation against
dissidents in Matabeleland and Midlands
provinces, which left over 20 000
civilians dead and thousands injured.
Only last year soldiers
allegedly spearheaded an orgy of violence in mostly
rural areas to secure
the re-election of President Robert Mugabe who was
staring defeat in the
face at the hands of MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
According to the
MDC, the security agents killed at least 200 of its
supporters and displaced
over 10 000 families before the June 27 2008
presidential election
run-off.
State security agents reportedly turned the country into a
prison and
citizens into convicts who were always too eager to
escape.
That state resources were channelled to prop-up Zanu PF and
Mugabe is scary
and is reason enough to institute security reforms and curb
Defence
expenditure and channel more resources into the country's productive
sectors.
The murmurs in some government department corridors that
Biti had
extensively under-funded the Defence ministry should not be taken
seriously.
We are not at war and we are not under any military threat. Why
should we
spend huge sums of money on military hardware whilst the country's
productive sectors cry out for recapitalisation funds?
Biti
should continue to tighten the Defence ministry's budget in future. We
should not go back where we came from where military might is rewarded.
Zimbabweans deserve peace and social development.
Constantine
Chimakure
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
Thursday, 10 December 2009
18:49
BEN Rafemoyo is my friend; I mean the Zesa Holdings chief
executive.
Teetotal and deeply religious, he exudes commonsense. I can bet
my bottom
dollar if he put his signature to the Zesa/Nampower deal that was
the right
thing to do in the circumstances. I go most days without
electricity in my
home, so does everyone else. I have reverted to behaving
like a bachelor.
I pass by the butcher’s every day after work to buy a
small chunk of meat
because the fridge is switched off. My cat is getting
fat on sour milk. My
geyser is off too; so I have to do with cold baths.
Often I want to be angry
with Rafemoyo; to pick up the phone and really give
him a go-over but I hold
my horses.
I travelled the whole length
and breadth of Zimbabwe in 2001 and part of
2002 before the presidential
election with Rafemoyo and we became very
close.
Those were the days
of Zesa’s Expanded Rural Electrification Programme.
Being a haughty young
man who questioned everything, I used to ask him why
we were doing this
programme when we knew it did not make any sense. He, the
stoic, always said
rural electrification would benefit posterity. “Once we
have put in the
pylons, they cannot be removed; so even if this looks mad
now it will be
good in future,” he would say.
Let me tell you the source of our
problems; it’s not Rafemoyo!
The 2000 constitutional referendum had
been a wakeup call to Zanu PF that
its erstwhile iron grip on the populace
was loosening. The elections of that
year too had seen the young MDC party
almost upstaging Zanu PF in spite of
it having entrenched itself in the
country for 20 years.
The 2002 presidential elections loomed large and
there was the real danger
of Morgan Tsvangirai trouncing incumbent President
Robert Mugabe in that
poll. The Mugabe mystique had been shattered and
people now knew he could be
defeated in a free and fair
election.
Zanu PF had to quickly reconnect with the electorate from
which it had
distanced itself as it ensconced in power. How could Mugabe’s
popularity be
restored again in the quickest way possible? Someone came up
with an answer:
let’s do something so populist that the electorate will sit
up and say, “Oh
he still exists.”
The plan was to electrify the
whole countryside and let Mugabe address all
the commissioning ceremonies,
that way he would reconnect with the masses.
It was a
masterstroke!
But there were problems and everyone in Zesa knew them.
The power stations
were not working properly; there were constant
breakdowns.
Hwange Colliery was broke and so could not provide enough
quality coal to
power Hwange Power Station. Kariba Hydro was not working at
full capacity
because of lack of spares.
The small thermals at
Bulawayo, Munyati and Harare had been decommissioned
because running them
did not make sense. Zesa itself was too broke to pay
for power imports. Very
importantly it was common knowledge that the
southern African region would
have a power deficit beginning 2007.
So, the logical thing was not to
expand electrification but to ensure that
the power stations were
refurbished so they could supply enough electricity
to our industry and to
our households.
But political expediency had to come first. The
strategists at Zanu PF knew
the then Zesa CEO Simbarashe Mangwengwende was
too sensible to embark on
this mad project, so against the Electricity Act,
the position of Executive
Chairman on the Zesa Board was created and Sydney
Gata appointed to it.
Gata is a highly qualified engineer and consults
for dozens of power
utilities in Africa and overseas. But he was also
Mugabe’s brother-in-law.
Although he knew all the problems associated with
the rural electrification
project he would play ball for, there was too much
at stake.
Mangwengwende and literally all of his lieutenants were
pushed out; these
were real technocrats who knew what they were
doing.
So, for the next year or so all Zesa resources were channelled
towards rural
electrification; the power stations were left to rot. Mugabe
went on a
hectic schedule; he was flown all over the country to address the
grateful
rural folk. He won the election.
Everybody knew it was
folly to electrify areas where power would be used to
light up little
general dealerships and bottle stores in places as remote
and inaccessible
Muzabani and Border Munaka.
Everybody knew the revenue from those little
outposts would not make
economic sense; it would always be cheaper to give
these people the power
for free than to drive around the country collecting
the little amounts. So,
after such a massive programme in which millions of
real dollars were spent,
no revenue would be collected.
Meanwhile
the regional power deficit deepened and our power stations could
not be
refurbished because there was no money to do so.
There was another
problem — vandalism. Zimbabwe has no aluminium or copper
mines but it was
exporting the metals. Thieves who were most likely
disgruntled Zesa
employees stole aluminium and copper conductor and had it
smuggled to ready
markets notably South Africa.
Transformers were drained of their oil.
Replacing stolen cable and oil goes
into millions if not billions of
dollars. The whole network collapsed.
Gata got his comeuppance — he
was sacked.
Good old Rafemoyo took over the mess. I don’t envy
him.
Nevanji Madanhire