BBC
Long wait for Zimbabwean
recovery
|
|
By Jeremy Scott-Joynt
BBC News Online business reporter
| 
Inflation means more and more banknotes are
needed |
For many Zimbabweans, life these days has a single constant, wearing
factor.
Queuing.
Food is scarce. Petrol - on the irregular occasions when it makes an
appearance - sells out quickly. The minibuses or "commuters", which run along
pre-arranged routes and serve as a key form of public transport, are fewer and
the lines for them are longer.
Seven in 10 Zimbabweans are officially out of work, with the parallel economy
increasingly important.
Out of the towns, the food shortages are even more punishing, worsened by the
drought which hit southern Africa last year.
Rampant inflation, most recently put at 526% a year, means that fat piles of
banknotes are often needed even for simple transactions, despite the
introduction of travellers' cheque-style notes for high denominations.
The government has imposed price controls on key basic necessities, but the
rising price of inputs has simply made the shortages even worse.
Mixed message
Whose fault this is depends on who you talk to.
Donors accuse the government of using aid as a political
weapon | According to the
Zanu-PF government of President Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe's ruler since
independence in 1980, the economy is under attack, sabotaged by Britain and its
allies.
Their motive: revenge for Mr Mugabe's policy of redistributing land from
white farmers to the majority black population at large.
According to independent economists, the land reform was badly botched, and
combined with general economic mismanagement to precipitate a meltdown.
The currency, the Zimbabwean dollar, is in freefall. The official rate is 825
to the US dollar - after having been pegged at 55 for years - while the parallel
market rate is above 5,000.
Foreign currency is in short supply, given the lack of exports.
Inventive businesses are finding ways around the situation, of course, and
the stock exchange in Harare is booming as profits rise.
But the country remains largely isolated, economically speaking, from the
world outside.
Turnaround
The result is a situation where more than half the 12 million-strong
population are dependent on food aid, which the government attempts to use for
political purposes and divert from supporters of opposition parties - a far cry
from Zimbabwe's former role as the breadbasket of the region.
Corruption is seen as an increasing
problem | With the exception
of a minority of the white farmers dubbed "Rhodies" - a name derived from the
country's pre-independence name of Rhodesia and suggesting they would prefer
white rule to have continued - few people doubt that land reform was an urgent
necessity.
But the way it has been done, most observers believe, crippled both food
production and cash crop output.
Tobacco sales, a key export, are way down, while maize is in short supply.
'One man, one farm'
Many of the farms confiscated remain fallow, having been seized by members of
the ruling elite.
Recent declarations by President Mugabe that corruption will not be tolerated
seem to have had little effect - and international anti-graft group Transparency
International puts Zimbabwe at position 112 on a league table of 133 countries
worldwide.
Yet more land has been handed over to Libya and China in exchange for fuel
and other imports.
With land the only sure store of value, and interest rates at artificially
low levels, the building industry has been one of the few remaining boom
sectors.
But shortages of materials are leaving many building sites empty.
Support
Many leaders in sub-Saharan Africa are on Mr Mugabe's side.
Mr Mugabe says white saboteurs are to
blame | President Levy
Mwanawasa of Zambia - and, up to a point, Thabo Mbeki of South Africa - see this
as a post-colonial issue, of the UK penalising a former territory for having the
temerity to do its own thing.
Unfortunately, that support is unlikely to help Zimbabweans much in improving
their circumstances.
Fuel and electricity imports from South Africa keep the economy just about
afloat.
But without some form of political change - Zanu-PF's national conference in
December looks set to make no mention of succession - Zimbabwe's government will
stay widely isolated, as exemplified by the International Monetary Fund's
decision to consider expelling the country.
For the moment, then, the queues are likely to keep getting longer.
|
Asia Pacific Media Network
Zimbabwean TV propaganda shock
Since
the start of the controversial land reform programme three years ago,
the
government's department of information and publicity has regularly
churned
out propaganda videosSouth China Morning Post
Friday, December 5,
2003
By Jen Redshaw
Watching state-run television in Zimbabwe
takes you back to the days of
old-style communism.
Female newsreaders
often appear in a jacket and tie. President Robert
Mugabe's ruling party
officials and supporters are referred to as "comrade",
while opposition
members are always plain Mr or Mrs. Then there are the
incessant propaganda
songs screened during commercial breaks.
Since the start of the
controversial land reform programme three years ago,
the government's
department of information and publicity has regularly
churned out propaganda
videos.
With catchy tunes and repetitive lyrics, most of them criticise
whites and
the former colonial regime and urge Zimbabweans to take up
farming.
But the latest jingle, Sendekera Mwana Wevhu (Celebrate, Child
of the Soil)
has gone a step too far.
Alongside the stock images of
oxen, ploughs and tractors are clips of
toddlers dancing.
Government
officials claim the dances derive from traditional kongonya
routines, popular
during the 1970s war for independence.
But outraged Zimbabweans say the
gestures are sexually suggestive and have
no place on "family" television.
Newspapers, including the state-run Herald,
have been full of letters
criticising Sendekera, as it's known for short.
Questions have also been
raised about the cost of airing the jingle when
millions are going
hungry.
Brian Mangwende, acting head of the Zimbabwe Union of
Journalists, said his
group had received numerous complaints from people who
are "appalled".
"We also find [the dance] to be completely inconsistent
with our cultural
values," he said. "Nowhere in the war dances did one find
children or even
liberation soldiers who gallantly fought for our
independence gyrating."
Even war veterans - normally the government's
most loyal supporters - have
joined the fray.
Patrick Nyaruwata, the
acting chairman of the Zimbabwe National Liberation
War Veterans Association,
said the group had lodged a formal complaint.
"They overdid the video clip
and it's unfortunate," Mr Nyaruwata said.
In a sign of just how damaging
the authorities fear the spat could be, both
the minister of information and
the presidential spokesman have been forced
to speak publicly in defence of
the jingle.
The minister, Jonathan Moyo - believed to be the brains
behind the song -
complained the outcry was unfair.
"Negative forces
have sought to hide under the cover of attacking the
kongonya dances when
what they are really attacking is the land reform
programme that is being
celebrated by the jingle," Mr Moyo said.
But he admitted Sendekera could
be embarrassing if watched with one's
mother-in-law.
As well as being
screened on national television, the song is played an
average of 72 times a
day on four state-controlled radio stations at an
estimated cost of Z$1.1
billion (HK$10 million) a week.
That's an enormous sum of money at a time
when 5.5 million Zimbabweans -
nearly half the population - face
starvation.
"Wouldn't the money used for making that rubbish have been
better used in
restocking, poverty alleviation, grain imports, input
provision or education
and health?" reader Tapson Ndlela fumed in a letter to
the private Standard
newspaper.
Analysts say the barrage of criticism
may indicate that long-suffering
Zimbabweans have had enough - and are
finally starting to say so.
"I think it's the beginning of a blackened
propaganda machine," political
analyst Eliphas Mukonoweshuro, of the
University of Zimbabwe, told the South
China Morning Post.
"The
sentiment we hear is that people don't want to pay their TV licences to
watch
obscenities."
The controversy could not have come at a worse time for the
ruling Zanu-PF
party as it tries to rally support for an annual conference in
the southern
town of Masvingo.
Date Posted: 12/5/2003
JUSTICE FOR AGRICULTURE
PR COMMUNIQUE - December 4, 2003
Email: justice@telco.co.zw; justiceforagriculture@zol.co.zw
Internet:
www.justiceforagriculture.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Zimbabwe
and Chogum.
When I visited Delhi a few years ago I was deeply impressed
by the profound
impact that British occupation had on that proud ancient
country and
civilisation. The tiny number of British civil servants who had
governed
India for such a short period of its ancient history and yet - here
at the
end of the 20th century, half a century after independence, there was
the
massive evidence of the continued influence of the British Raj. India
was
not ashamed of its imperial past - it had absorbed it and made it its
own.
I was also surprised to see that the architect of those
magnificent
government buildings in Delhi was the same man who designed the
Union
Buildings in Pretoria where Nelson Mandela was sworn in as State
President
in 1994 and the Bulawayo Post office. In fact he used a similar
material -
red sandstone in all three cases with dramatic effect.
What
makes the Commonwealth an enduring symbol of our common history? It is
a fact
that it was a South African Afrikaner - Jan Smuts - who first
articulated the
need for a new "Commonwealth of Nations" equal and
independent. Sharing a
common recent history and humanity and wishing to
work in a symbiotic sense
to replace the old imperial linkages which were a
thing of the past. Smuts
was a brilliant individual whose influence still
muddies the water of global
affairs. He was a person who drafted in part,
the Charter of the League of
Nations and then the preamble to the Charter
of the United Nations. Was he
wrong about the Commonwealth?
In two days time over 50 of the leaders of
the world - including India
whose economy is now larger than that of Britain
and embracing a third of
the population of the world, will gather at Abuja in
Nigeria. It is a
unique gathering in that all that holds them together is a
sort of
fellowship of history. Its nothing like the UN or NATO, more like a
club of
"old boys" from a public school. It has no legal leverage over
its
members - just a sense of what is acceptable in terms of behavior
and
manners.
The Queen will open the summit and take part in many of
its informal
gatherings - setting the tone of the debate and maintaining a
motherly
oversight. Zimbabwe will not be there but our recent behavior as a
country
will be intensely discussed and debated.
I can remember when
we hosted the summit a few years ago and how we fussed
over the Heads of
government as they flew into Harare. It is quite a
jamboree - we had to park
presidential aircraft all over the country
because we could not accommodate
them at Harare airport. It was in Harare
that the Commonwealth thrashed out a
more formal declaration of what it
stood for in the realms of governance. The
"Harare Declaration" strangely
enough, is what really damns us today for our
recent political human rights
violations.
Mugabe could never have
envisaged that when he presided over the summit at
the International
Conference center in Harare. For him at the time it was
the pinnacle of his
political life. This makes our exclusion from this
summit so much more
painful for him, no matter what he says in public.
Yesterday Mugabe gave
his annual "State of the Nation" address to
Parliament - three weeks early.
We were all hyped up to expect some
dramatic announcements. Nothing, just a
few tired platitudes and an attack
on a "unipolar" world system and racial
prejudices in the Commonwealth
club. The "white" Commonwealth was dictating
the stance of the Commonwealth
on Zimbabwe and "our" friends in the world
will not tolerate it and will
stand by Zimbabwe.
But the truth is, as
was clearly set out by the Foreign Minister of Ghana,
that the Commonwealths
position on Zimbabwe is consensual - like all other
decisions of that body.
Furthermore, he expected that all the members of
the Commonwealth in good
standing, would be present when the summit got
under way. Mugabe is uneasy
about the outcome of the summit - he knows full
well that while the
Commonwealth may not have the clout of a NATO or the
legal authority of the
UN in international affairs, the moral authority of
the Commonwealth is a
very powerful influence.
We have seen its influence very effectively in
the workings of the club in
the past two years. First when the club was fully
exposed to the duplicity
of the Mugabe regime in the June 2002 presidential
elections - there was no
hesitation, they suspended the country from its
membership. Then when
leading African States tried to get the black ball
lifted - the consensual
nature of the Commonwealth again reasserted itself
and Zimbabwe remained
off the field of play. Most recently, when the host of
the 2003 summit,
Obasanjo of Nigeria, came to Harare to ascertain for himself
whether or not
Zimbabwe was on the reform track and might be considered for
re-entry, he
found that the opposite was the case and the blackball remained
firmly on
the table.
As any schoolboy will tell you, the opinion of
your peers is very important
to you. I do not know about women, but I know
that men will go to great
lengths to maintain good relations with their peer
groups. Mugabe is no
different. He hurts when his peers in Africa and the
Caribbean and in the
Pacific Rim region exclude him from their
ranks.
His attacks on the Australian Prime Minister for his strong public
stance
on the issue of Zimbabwe are cowardly and misplaced. He forgets that
at a
crucial stage in the Lancaster House Conference that led to
Zimbabwe's
independence and his own ascendancy to power, that it was the
Australian
Prime Minister who intervened at one point to insist that
certain
principles be adhered to and not abused. This was when the
British
government was trying to circumvent those principles in an effort
to
protect Zimbabwe's minorities at the expense of the majority.
We
the people of Zimbabwe salute the leadership of the Commonwealth for
their
principled stance on the issue of governance in Zimbabwe and
elsewhere in its
ranks. We thank those who stand with the ordinary people
of this country
whose rights are being trampled on daily and whose economic
wellbeing is
being undermined by a corrupt, dictatorial regime. We pray
that they will now
go one step further and agree on how they can leverage
change in Zimbabwe and
engineer our return to the ranks of democratic,
legitimate, lawful
states.
Eddie Cross
Bulawayo, 3rd December 2003.
JAG OPEN LETTER FORUM
Email: justice@telco.co.zw; justiceforagriculture@zol.co.zw
Internet:
www.justiceforagriculture.com
Please
send any material for publication in the Open Letter Forum to
justice@telco.co.zw with "For Open Letter
Forum" in the subject
line.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Letter
1:
Dear Fellow Zimbabweans
THE LAND ACQUISITION AMENDMENT BILL,
2003,
This Bill was published in an extraordinary Government Gazette on
Friday
28th November 2003. The Bill, if passed by Parliament, will lead to
the
amendment of the Land Acquisition Act. It seeks to alter sections 5,7 and
8
of the Act so that sections will be published in the Gazette and
not
delivered to owners, and it also seeks to remove section 6, the
provisions
provided by the LA forms.
It is important to understand
that any land which was used for agricultural
purposes during the past 50
years falls within the Land Acquisition Act.
It is also important to note
that not only land owned by white Zimbabweans
has been taken for
"resettlement". Land owned by Zimbabweans of Indian,
colored and black
descent are also being taken away by government and their
forces.
If
this Bill is to be tabled before Parliament on 9 December 2003, it is
vitally
important that we, all Zimbabweans of whatever colour or hue,
understand what
rights we will forfeit by allowing this Bill to pass
through parliament. We
should understand that it will impact on the rights
of Zimbabweans to hold
property in towns as well as in rural areas. It will
impact on residential
property as well as industrial property, research
stations, universities,
schools and hospitals.
The Repeal of the Hippo Valley Agreement sets the
precedent for repealing
bilateral and other government agreements currently
protecting property
rights in Zimbabwe.
Please lobby your Member of
Parliament and other pressure groups to prevent
this Amendment to the Land
Acquisition Act from taking place. Hello, the
2,5 million Zimbabweans outside
Zimbabwe. I'm talking to you too, please!!!
Yours sincerely
Jean
Simon
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Letter
2:
The rights and wrongs of land ownership can never be settled - after
all,
issues such as this are invented by politicians to create
political
constituencies - and are not intended to be solved.
The
problem of land ownership can, however, be solved - if the focus is
shifted
away from perceived historical wrongs and the attendant need for
punishment
and retribution (political luxuries) - and towards the future
needs of
Zimbabwe (economic necessities).
The present regime has enjoyed an orgy
of childish indiscipline - most of
the land being now utilised for weekend
holiday homes, amateur farming
experiments and other frivolous forms of
entertainment.
The land should be managed by farmers, who are actually
interested in
farming commercially - if any can be found!. As a starting
point, land that
was until recently productively farmed should be returned to
those who were
farming professionally until the advent of the "land
issue".
The easiest way to do this, for any future government, is simply
follow the
law - as most of the "acquisitions" are not legal in one way or
another.
Enforcement is a problem, as the present regime has successfully
corrupted
most Zimbabweans - particularly civil servants such as policemen -
whom
appear completely confused as to their real function in civilised
society.
Any future government would be wise to embark on a complete
re-training of
the police force. I'm sure aid would easily be obtained for
this purpose
from the ex-colonial power, in the form of suitable officers to
conduct
such re-training.
William
Jackson
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Letter
3: Re Open Letters Forum No. 198 dated 03 December 2003
Dear
Debbie,
Thank you for your good wishes to me and my god. However, there
is a
slight problem as there is no god in Buddhism! (We just try to abstain
from
evil, cultivate virtue and tame the mind) so I'll spread your good
wishes
around instead.
Isn't wonderful how much we learn when we have
an open mind?
Famba Zvakanaka.
Jacquie
Gulliver
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
All
letters published on the open Letter Forum are the views and opinions
of the
submitters, and do not represent the official viewpoint of Justice
for
Agriculture.
JUSTICE FOR AGRICULTURE LEGAL COMMUNIQUE - December 4, 2003
Email: justice@telco.co.zw; justiceforagriculture@zol.co.zw
Internet:
www.justiceforagriculture.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
JAG
MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT
IMPORTANT JAG MEETING FOR
AGRICULTURAL TITLE DEED
HOLDERS
Please be advised that following the last meeting on 28 November
2003,
which police closed down unlawfully but which Chief Superintendant
Madzingo
apologized for, we have set another meeting date for Tuesday 9th
December
2003 at Northside Community Church Hall at 8 Edinburgh road,
Borrowdale
(100m from Borrowdale Post Office).
In the meantime we have
commenced legal proceedings against certain Details
at ZRP
Borrowdale.
We apologize for the late notice of this meeting and change
of venue. Art
Farm trustees have refused the Art Farm facilities and hall as
a venue to
farmers to discuss these important compensation and restitution
issues, and
we are extremely disappointed by their succumbing to illegal
pressure.
VENUE: NORTHSIDE COMMUNITY CHURCH HALL, BORROWDALE.
DATE:
TUESDAY, 9 DECEMBER
TIME: 9.00 AM FOR 9.30 SHARP
AGENDA
1.
Opening prayer - Tim Neil
2. Introduction - D. Conolly
3.
Compensation / restitution / reality or pipedream - J.
Worsley-Worswick
4. Documentation of losses /getting the job done - W.
Hart
5. Steps on the road to legal challenge - B. Freeth
6.
Commercial Agriculture and its future in Zimbabwe - D. Conolly
7.
Questions and answers
8. Closing prayer - B. Freeth
NB: Mr Louis
Bennett and Mr David Drury from our legal fraternity will be
there to answer
any legal questions. Mr Graham Mullett chairman of the
valuations consortium
will be there to answer questions as well as
accountants from Price
Waterhouse.
PLAY YOUR PART IN CHISELING OUT YOUR FUTURE OUT OF OUR
LAND
Reuters
| 04 Dec 2003 23:16 |
 |
 |
|
Commonwealth
Heads Into Racial Row Over Zimbabwe
By Tom Ashby and Manoah Esipisu
ABUJA (Reuters) - Commonwealth leaders headed into a racially-charged row
over the exclusion of Zimbabwe from the 54-member group as they gathered in the
Nigerian capital for a summit starting Friday.
Despite attempts by host President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria to prevent a
split in the club of mostly former British colonies, key leaders stuck to
entrenched positions over the southern African country.
Zimbabwe was suspended last year on charges that President Robert Mugabe had
rigged his re-election in 2002.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair, aboard his plane to Abuja, said
maintaining the suspension would "send the right message of strong disapproval
for what is happening in Zimbabwe."
His position was echoed by Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, who said it
would be unacceptable to lift the punishment if Zimbabwe made no progress in
answering Commonwealth demands for political dialogue and basic freedoms.
At the same time, a small but powerful group of southern African states
rejected Zimbabwe's exclusion and asked that it be allowed back immediately.
"We do not believe that the continued isolation of Zimbabwe is delivering the
desired result. In our opinion they should return to the fold," Mozambican
President Joaquim Chissano told reporters on his arrival in Abuja.
SURPRISE CHALLENGE
The deep division between African and Western states produced a surprise
challenge last week to Don McKinnon as Secretary-General of the Commonwealth.
Analysts said the Sri Lankan challenger, backed by South Africa, showed no
signs of wide support, but illustrated the bad blood in the organization.
"President Obasanjo had hoped to de-Zimbabweize the summit but he failed. The
Zimbabwe issue will dominate," said Alex Vines, head of the Africa program at
London's Royal Institute of International Affairs.
Once southern Africa's breadbasket, Zimbabwe now relies on aid to feed
millions, unemployment is running at more than 70 percent and inflation is above
500 percent.
Political opponents of Mugabe, who has held power since independence from
Britain in 1980, are regularly harassed and there are strict curbs on press
freedom.
Mugabe earlier this week accused Britain, Australia and New Zealand of
forging an "unholy alliance" against him and threatened to withdraw from the
Commonwealth.
Vines said it was simplistic to describe the division in the group as black
versus white, "but Mr. Mugabe was very good at making British criticism look
like the bullying of an old colonial power."
Many African states also support Zimbabwe's suspension, but are less vocal
than the big Western powers in condemning Mugabe. (Additional reporting by
Andrew Cawthorne and Randall Palmer)
|
IOL
US: Zimbabwe is an international pariah
December 05 2003
at 01:57AM
Washington - The United States on Thursday gave firm
backing to a move to
expel Zimbabwe from the International Monetary Fund,
calling the country a
"pariah" state whose leaders are guilty of appalling
misrule.
"We believe that Zimbabwe's actions have made it a pariah in
the
international community," deputy State Department spokesperson Adam
Ereli
said when asked about a Wednesday vote by the IMF board to start
the
expulsion process.
Later, a State Department official said
Washington had wholeheartedly
supported the board and that the US
representative at the meeting had voted
in favour of initiating "compulsory
withdrawal" proceedings against
Zimbabwe.
"We believe it was an
appropriate action for the IMF board anonymity, noting
that the vote had been
22 to two in favour of the expulsion step."
'Zimbabwe failed to
meet even the modest repayment schedule'
"We believe the near-unanimous vote
on the IMF board is reflective of the
fact that virtually everyone thinks the
government of Zimbabwe is not moving
in the right direction," the official
said.
In an extremely rare move, the IMF launched the proceedings against
Zimbabwe
citing a lack of cooperation and arrears of more than $270-million
running
back almost three years.
"As of end-November 2003, Zimbabwe's
arrears to the IMF amount to
$273-million, or about 53 percent of its quota
in the IMF," the board said
in a statement.
The State Department
official said Zimbabwe's record of cooperation with the
IMF had been
deplorable and that there was no sign that President Robert
Mugabe's
government might act to improve the situation.
"Zimbabwe failed to meet
even the modest repayment schedule it set for
itself and hadn't in the past
six months established any kind of a track
record that would indicate it
would," the official said.
The IMF board had met to consider what to do
about the deteriorating
economic situation in the Southern African country
whose gross domestic
product has declined by some 40 percent between 1999 and
2003 and where
inflation rose to 526 percent in October.
Zimbabwe has
not only been dogged by severe drought, but also political
instability and a
controversial land reform programme that saw white farmers
being forced off
their farms, causing major food shortages.
The IMF board's decision will
be reviewed in six months and if Zimbabwe has
not demonstrated any
improvement is expected to formally vote on its
expulsion from the
institution. - Sapa-AFP
Why pick on Robert Mugabe?
Human rights are being abused in many
Commonwealth countries
Kate Allen
Friday December 5, 2003
The
Guardian
The Commonwealth's combined population of 1.7 billion people
make up 30% of
the world's population. It should be a beacon for the
protection of human
rights in a globalising world. The Commonwealth took a
stand against
apartheid in South Africa, and now is not the time to debase
this precedent
by turning a blind eye to the undermining of basic human
rights in many
member states.
The spiralling human rights crisis in
suspended member Zimbabwe will grab
most of the attention of Commonwealth
leaders at the heads of government
meeting in Nigeria this weekend. This is
to be expected when there were more
than a thousand reports of torture at the
hands of the police and security
services last year. President Mugabe must be
sent a clear message that
arbitrary detention, torture and systematic
repression are at odds with the
Commonwealth's vision of democracy, the rule
of law and good governance.
However, leaders must also look at how other
members have trampled on basic
freedoms in their rush to join the so-called
"war on terror", have attacked
the right to seek asylum, and still permit
cruel punishments and executions.
Is it any wonder that Mugabe has got the
message that human rights
violations will not be challenged?
It is
important that Commonwealth members do not use the "war on terror" as
an
excuse to erode human rights. Unfortunately, many have introduced
legislation
allowing them to arrest suspects and detain them without charge,
and to
deport those they deem a threat. The right to a fair trial has
been
undermined.
In India, the Prevention of Terrorism Act has granted
the police much wider
powers of arrest than previously, and allows them to
detain "political
suspects" for up to six months without charge or trial.
Police in Gujarat
are using the legislation to arbitrarily arrest and
imprison men from the
Muslim community. Almost 400 men were detained between
March and May, and
there are reports of Muslims being held incommunicado,
with incontrovertible
evidence of torture. The legislation has provided a
convenient vehicle for
discrimination and persecution.
Our own
government made the UK the only country in Europe to derogate from
the
European convention on human rights in order to rush through the
2001
Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act. It has used it to imprison
14
foreign nationals for up to two years without charging them or bringing
them
to trial. They face the prospect of remaining in detention indefinitely
on
the basis of secret evidence that they have not been allowed to see
and
therefore cannot challenge. These "security measures" are undermining
the
credibility and viability of basic legal safeguards.
The clampdown
on the right to asylum has seen the Australian government's
"Pacific
solution" set of policies enable it to hold for months scores of
people, who
have been recognised as refugees, in detention centres - a
policy branded by
a UN delegation as "offensive to human dignity".
Similarly, the new asylum
bill in the UK threatens to criminalise those
seeking asylum.
Despite
all Commonwealth members' theoretical commitment to protect
individuals'
human rights, member states including Jamaica and the Bahamas
hand down death
sentences, while Nigeria permits punishments that include
stoning and
flogging. When I was in Uganda in October, where torture is
endemic, I heard
about a worrying increase in the use of torture by the
police, including
battering suspects' knees and elbows, precisely to do
long-term damage. A
commitment to protecting individuals' rights would see
President Museveni
using the same leadership to eliminate torture as he has
been recognised for
showing in tackling the Aids epidemic.
In 1991, members of the
Commonwealth signed up to the Harare declaration,
which pledged all
governments to work for "just and honest government" and
to protect "the
liberty of the individual under the law [and guarantee]
equal rights for all
citizens". When the government of Zimbabwe sees the
flagrant disregard for
basic human rights protection in other countries, the
message it gets is that
the Commonwealth is not serious about these
commitments - and there will be
no consequences if you disregard them. The
result is that Mugabe believes he
is safe to continue his crackdown on all
critics of the
government.
The heads of government meeting in Abuja must deal honestly
with these human
rights questions. Leaders should make concrete commitments
to draw up human
rights action plans. The meeting is a chance for Zimbabwe's
closest
neighbours, South Africa and Zambia, to commit to putting sustained
pressure
on Mugabe's government. This is essential if Zimbabwe is to
understand that
the Commonwealth is serious about what it said in
Harare.
· Kate Allen is director of Amnesty International UK
VOA
IMF to Review Zimbabwe's Situation in Mid-2004
Barry
Wood
Washington
05 Dec 2003, 02:44 UTC
The International
Monetary Fund says this week's announcement that Zimbabwe
could be expelled
from the multi-lateral lending institution for
non-repayment is more an
appeal for policy reform in the country than a
threat. VOA's Barry Wood spoke
to the IMF official responsible for Zimbabwe.
IMF division chief Doris Ross
says it will be at least 12 months before
Zimbabwe could be expelled from the
organization, an action that would be
unprecedented in recent decades.
Zimbabwe's situation will be reviewed in
mid-2004. Zimbabwe owes the Fund
$233 million and has been in arrears for
over two years.
Ms. Ross is
hopeful that expulsion will not occur and that instead
Zimbabwe's leaders
will take action to arrest the country's accelerating
economic decline, which
has led to severe food shortages.
"We're not looking for leverage," she
said. "We're looking for policies that
will help the country improve its
situation. And certainly a decline of its
gross domestic product - the value
of the production in the country - of 40
percent since 1999 is not a very
good track record for the quality of the
policies that have been
pursued."
Sudan in the mid-1990s is the only other African country to
have faced
possible expulsion from the IMF. The United States Thursday has
endorsed the
IMF stance on Zimbabwe, accusing the country's leaders of
appalling misrule.
IMF African division chief Ross detects some promising
new signs inside
Zimbabwe. She mentions specifically this week's appointment
of Gideon Gono
to head the central bank. He, says Ms. Ross, is expected to
announce the
bank's exchange rate and interest rate policies by
mid-December.
"We are hopeful that this will provide an opportunity for
the government to
announce some specific measures that will help correct the
many distortions
that are in the economic system today," she said. "And that
are acknowledged
as problems by the policy makers."
Ms. Ross says
Zimbabwe's 500 percent inflation rate will worsen over the
next two months.
This week President Robert Mugabe said the country's
practice of having two
sets of interest rates and two exchange rates had
created distortions that
must be corrected. Until recently, the country was
an agricultural exporter.
Now however, more than half of all Zimbabweans are
receiving food
aid.
The Star
Zim at the heart of a great divide
December 5,
2003
Fifty-two leaders of Commonwealth nations were to meet today
in the
Nigerian capital for a summit designed to promote democracy and
development
but overshadowed by the threat of a north-south split over
Zimbabwe.
Traditionally seen as a genteel talking-shop rather than
as a forum
for decisive action, the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting
(CHOGM) is
held once every two years to give the leaders of the former
British colonies
a chance to talk candidly behind closed doors about the
problems of the
world.
But the suspension of President Robert
Mugabe's Zimbabwe from the
body's council 20 months ago, after he
was
re-elected in a poll marred by violence and fraud, has triggered
deep
divisions that threaten to overshadow proceedings.
In the
build-up to this year's meeting in the Nigerian federal capital
Abuja, the
split has taken on the appearance of a quasi-racial divide
between the former
British colonies in Africa, and the "white Commonwealth"
of Britain, Canada,
Australia and New Zealand.
Some African leaders, including South
Africa's President Thabo Mbeki
and Nigeria's Olusegun Obasanjo, have lobbied
for Mugabe to be brought back
into the fold, while Australia's Prime Minister
John Howard wants Zimbabwe
permanently expelled. The three leaders sit on a
Commonwealth troika for
Zimbabwe.
Obasanjo came under pressure
from both sides in the row and made a
last-minute visit to Harare before
deciding late in the day not to invite
Zimbabwe.
The row,
fuelled by anti-Western rhetoric from Mugabe himself, has at
times appeared
capable of splitting the Commonwealth.
But on Wednesday, the body's
secretary general, Don McKinnon, a New
Zealander, played down the racial
angle and said the dispute transcended the
north-south divide.
Asked whether, as Mugabe claimed, there was a white alliance out to
get at
Zimbabwe, he told reporters: "I do reject that.
"I've talked to
just about every Commonwealth leader more than once
over the past six months.
There's a variety of views over how to deal with
Mugabe, there's by no means
a split between Africa and the rest of the
world."
He also said
that the meeting could produce a "very strong statement"
that could help
reconcile the rich and poor worlds on another issue -
trade - ahead of the
next round of World Trade Organisation talks, which
have
stalled.
McKinnon himself could, however, fall victim to the
argument.
Sri Lanka has proposed its respected former foreign minister,
Lakskmi
Kadirgamar, to replace McKinnon, in a move reportedly backed - or
even
orchestrated - by Mbeki.
The delegates will probably be
asked to vote on the challenge during
the weekend's summit, officials said.
Opinion on the outcome was divided
amongst Commonwealth insiders. "It could
be very close," said one.
Along with Zimbabwe, Pakistan will also
be excluded from the summit of
the 54-nation Commonwealth.
The
Muslim country was excluded from the London-based body after a
coup which
brought General Pervez Musharraf to power as president, snuffing
out fragile
democratic rule in the country.
Founded in the wake of the collapse
of the British empire, the
Commonwealth agreed in Harare in 1991 to support
democracy as the guiding
principle of government among its members. And since
then, it has striven to
enforce limited sanctions against members which have
backed away from
democratic rule.
Aside from the very public row
about Zimbabwe, the Commonwealth is
keen to push the poverty alleviation
agenda addressed by the main report to
be put before delegates: Making
democracy work for pro-poor development.
"We see democracy and
development as two sides of the same coin.
Development depends on democracy,"
said McKinnon, unveiling a report which
could serve as a blueprint for new
Commonwealth joint principles of good
governance.
He said that
in too many countries, in the periods between elections,
day-by-day democracy
- a free press, responsive local authorities,
ombudsmen - goes to sleep and
democratic values fail to take root in local
culture.
"That
hibernating democracy will not deliver development to the
people," he
said.
The CHOGM summit was to be declared open today by the body's
symbolic
head, Queen Elizabeth II, and continue until Monday.
Included will be a unique two-day "retreat" in which the leaders meet
behind
closed doors for talks which the Commonwealth secretariat says
"encourages
informal and honest discussions". - Sapa-AFP
The Star
Zanu-PF licks wounds at congress as isolation
grows
December 5, 2003
Masvingo - Robert Mugabe looked
increasingly isolated as his party
gathered in the shadow of a Commonwealth
ban.
Far from the pomp and ceremony of the Commonwealth summit in
Abuja,
Nigeria, Mugabe arrived for the Zanu-PF party conference yesterday
amid talk
that Zimbabwe might decide to quit the 54-member body.
Cheering crowds afforded some consolation to the 79-year-old
Mugabe.
Zanu-PF is meeting in the south of the country at Masvingo,
best known
for the stone ruins of Great Zimbabwe on its
outskirts.
The Zanu-PF conference will focus on the economic
crisis, government
reforms and ways to bolster party structures for
parliamentary polls due
early in 2005. But the Commonwealth is bound to
figure prominently.
Officials said Zanu-PF was likely to give
approval, if Mugabe wished,
to quit the Commonwealth, which suspended
Zimbabwe over accusations of
vote-rigging in his 2002
re-election.
Mugabe accuses "white racists" within the group of
mainly former
British colonies of pursuing a vendetta against him for giving
white-owned
farm land to landless blacks.
"I think there is
going to be a resolution that if the Commonwealth is
going to be an
organisation where there is no respect for national
sovereignty, where a
small group of white racists are going to be allowed to
dictate their wishes
on everybody, then Zimbabwe must not be part of that
Commonwealth," said a
senior Zanu-PF official, who declined to be
identified.
"There
is a very strong opinion now that Zimbabwe must look at
membership in other
organisations." - Reuters
