VOA
By Peta Thornycroft
Harare
27 January
2006
Six years after instituting a policy of nationalizing
white-owned farms and
evicting their owners, Zimbabwe's government has begun
to seize white-owned
land in urban Harare.
Some 200 workers were
rounded up by police and forced out of their homes
last week. The workers
lived and were employed on Gletwyn, a large property
in the midst of several
wealthy suburbs, 14 kilometers east of the city
center. Many of them had
lived there all their lives.
Gletwyn is an old farm, incorporated into
the city of Harare in 1996. The
owners, two brothers, planned to subdivide
the land into a new suburb, but
would continue to grow specialist crops,
such as corn seed.
Police arrived before Christmas and said they were
going to build houses for
themselves on Gletwyn. Ian Ross, 68, said the
police started harassing and
evicting hundreds of workers from their
homes.
"They arrived to evict the workers, which they did piece by piece,
village
by village, compound by compound. They were loaded onto police
trucks in the
rain, which most of the time arrived without fuel," he said.
"They forced
workers to buy fuel for them. They took them to various parts
of the
country. They were basically dumped, they lost all their furniture,
saturated in the rain, but within days they all started to come back with a
reed mat, a couple of blankets, a pot. They came back to work, but were
hounded day and night. They moved into sheds, where they could sleep. The
guys moved in to chicken runs; they were living like rabbits, like little
rats in a hole."
Ross, one of the owners of Gletwyn, went to court
this week to try and stop
the police action against the workers.
Mac
Tembo, 46, is a workshop manager who has worked at Gletwyn for 25 years.
He
says he was sent back to his rural home, Nyampanda on the border with
Mozambique, but returned days later. "I want to work," he said. "I have
got more problems. I want to sort my problems. I [have] got children [who]
go to school, and we haven't got food at Nyamapanda. If Mr. Ross goes,
myself, I will go to Nyamapanda. If Mr. Ross is here, I myself will be
here."
Tembo says he was kidnapped by state security agents Tuesday
and taken to
Harare central police station to answer questions about stolen
and destroyed
agricultural equipment, which he said was taken by thieves
roaming the land.
A property firm with ties to the government, Divine
Homes, also says it has
rights to Gletwyn. It is marketing 600 units on
behalf of the government,
arguing that Gletwyn is public property as it is a
white-owned farm.
A Divine Homes company official said this week there
were no title deeds
available for the units, but that this will "sort itself
out over time."
Deputy Finance Minister David Chapfkika is listed as
chairman of the
company. He was not available for comment this week, nor
were ministers in
charge of land affairs or local
government.
Earthmovers operate at Gletwyn daily, chewing up fields with
huge graders
and bulldozers, destroying borehole pumps, pipes and water
reservoirs,
laying down crude, muddy roads, in no apparent
order.
Last week they bulldozed workers' homes, cooking huts and thatched
sheds
workers built to store possessions.
Gletwyn is urban land and
was exempt from nationalization until 2002, when
the law was changed to
allow the government to take any land, not just
white-owned
farmland.
John Worsley-Worswick heads the advocacy group, Justice for
Agriculture. He
says the ruling ZANU-PF party has nearly finished taking all
white-owned
farms and so now has had to move to urban areas. He says Gletwyn
was an
obvious target, as it is well developed.
"It's the first full
wholesale attack on a huge tract of land that is
already in the city limits,
it goes beyond chaos. It's not a default
anarchy, it's by design," he
said. "The party have designed this anarchy to
be exactly what it is
today."
Ian Ross went to court again Friday, seeking an order restraining
police
from further intimidating or evicting workers on Gletwyn. He says
the
application succeeded but he adds he is not at all certain he will be
able
to remain at his home.
Zim Online
Sat
28 January 2006
HARARE - Zimbabwe's Media and Information
Commission (MIC) has put on
hold the accreditation of all journalists from
one of the country's few
remaining independent newspapers, demanding that
the newspaper retract a
story it published last year.
Fifteen
journalists at the privately owned Zimbabwe Independent were
yesterday
shocked when they were turned away from the MIC's offices in
Harare where
they had turned up - by appointment - for accreditation.
Under the
government's tough Access to Information and Protection of
Privacy Act, all
journalists must be accredited by the government-appointed
commission for
them to practise. Media houses also have to obtain licences
from the MIC for
them to operate. The accreditation is renewable every year,
while the
publishing licences are for two years.
MIC chairman
Tafataona Mahoso did not explain to the Zimbabwe
Independent journalists why
the commission was not ready to accredit them
yesterday but told them to
"ask Raphael Khumalo", the newspaper's chief
executive.
"We
were turned away by the MIC although one of their officials had
asked us to
come to their offices for accreditation yesterday morning," a
reporter at
the paper said. "Mahoso only said we should see Mr Khumalo for
an
explanation."
The MIC however registered journalists from the
Independent's sister
newspaper, the Standard. The two papers are owned by
Johannesburg-based
publisher Trevor Ncube, whose passport was last year
seized by Zimbabwean
authorities to prevent him from leaving the
country.
Ncube, who had had to sue the government to get his
passport back,
also owns South Africa's Mail and Guardian newspaper and all
his papers are
highly critical of President Robert Mugabe's
rule.
Khumalo confirmed that the MIC had not accredited journalists
from the
Independent but said there was no problem between his firm and the
commission, adding that the MIC had rescheduled accreditation of the
journalists to sometime next week.
He said: "I can confirm that
the guys (Zimbabwe Independent
journalists) were not accredited this week.
The programme was re-scheduled
to next week as MIC has an administrative
issue to sort out. The guys will
be accredited possibly by next
week."
Mahoso refused to discuss the matter saying his commission
treated all
applications for accreditation by journalists in
confidence.
"If there is an issue with the Zimbabwe Independent
journalists or any
other journalist or any media player as a matter of
policy we do not make a
public issue until such a time we deem it
appropriate. We treat all
applications in confidence," said
Mahoso.
But officials at the MIC said Mahoso had told Khumalo
during an
emergency meeting yesterday which was also attended by the
Independent's
acting editor, Joram Nyathi that the paper had to retract a
story it
published last year first before its journalists could be
considered for
accreditation.
The Zimbabwe Independent last
year published a story on the
resignation of MIC commissioner Jonathan
Maphenduka, who fell out with
Mahoso over his alleged refusal to grant an
operating licence to the banned
Daily News newspaper.
Mahoso
claims Maphenduka did not resign as per procedure because he
had not handed
in his resignation letter to the Information Minister, who
appoints the
commission.
The Independent has been asked to retract the story and
put it in
Mahoso's view. It has not done so yet.
The MIC has
closed down four newspapers in three years, including the
Daily News, the
country's biggest independent daily at the time of its
closure in September
2003.
In December, Mahoso threatened to withdraw the licence of
another of
the country's biggest independent papers, Financial Gazette,
after the paper
had refused to retract a story it had
published.
The paper had reported that the MIC originally agreed to
grant a
licence to the Daily News and then changed its mind under pressure
from the
Central Intelligence Organisation. The Financial Gazette finally
gave in and
published the retraction last week.
The decision by
the MIC to withhold accreditation of journalists from
the Independent came
as journalists, their representative organisations and
human rights lawyers
attending a workshop in Harare called for the
disbandment of the commission
and the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe
saying the two organisations
suppressed media freedom.
"These two organisations have done more
harm than good to the
journalism industry in Zimbabwe (BAZ)," said John
Masuku, the director of
the Voice of People broadcasting firm, who is on
remand on charges of
violating the Broadcasting Services Act
(BSA).
The government accuses Masuku and four other VOP directors
of owning
broadcasting equipment and operating broadcasting services without
licence
from the BAZ as is required under the law. Masuku, who faces up two
years in
jail if convicted, denies the charge.
Veteran
journalists and former editor of the banned Daily News on
Sunday, Bill
Saidi, said the dissolution of the MIC and the BAZ should be
followed with a
repeal of other laws and regulations that placed immense
fetters on
journalists.
The Harare workshop was organised by the Zimbabwe
chapter of the Media
Institute of Southern Africa. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Sat 28 January 2006
HARARE - The Law Society of Zimbabwe
(LSZ) on Friday accused the
government of attempting to intimidate lawyers
and undermine the rule of law
after President Robert Mugabe's spokesman,
George Charamba wrote a newspaper
article attacking a prominent human rights
lawyer.
In a statement released to the press on Friday, LSZ acting
president
James Mutizwa said Charamba's attack on award-winning lawyer
Beatrice Mtetwa
last week was calculated to instil fear in lawyers and
undermine the
independence of the legal profession.
"Such an
attack undermines the independence of the legal profession
which is so
critical to the independence of the judiciary," said Mutizwa.
Mtetwa, a fearless human rights lawyer, has been a pain in the neck
for
Mugabe's government after successfully representing journalists and
opposition politicians in the courts over the past six years.
But last Sunday, the lawyer was at the receiving end of powerful jabs
from
Charamba in the state-controlled Sunday Mail newspaper. Writing in the
paper, Charamba warned that Mtetwa was "wriggling into the belly of the
beast".
Charamba also attacked Mtetwa for challenging the tough
Access to
Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) that has been
used to shut
down four newspapers since 2003.
"There is ample
evidence to show that dissenting elements within the
legal fraternity
hatched a plot to simply overwhelm the government through a
series of
challenges to AIPPA, most of them sponsored by the West that
decorates
Mtetwa," said Charamba.
The law society said the remarks by
Charamba amounted to intimidation
and harassment of lawyers.
The Zimbabwe government has fought a bruising battle against the
judiciary
since 2000. Several judges and lawyers have left the country in
frustration
after the government replaced independent judges with a pliant
bench. -
ZimOnline
Zim Online
Sat 28 January 2006
HARARE - Each of her hands tightly
wrapped up in old plastic for
protection, Eugenia Mushambi carefully sat her
patient - who suffers from
AIDS - on the goatskin mat. The delicate task
completed, she slowly turned
around to speak to us.
"I have
been a village health worker for the past 11 years but I can
promise you
things have never been this desperate," Mushambi said.
Spreading
out her plastic-wrapped hands she lamented: "We no do not
have gloves to
protect us from contracting diseases during our work, we are
also no longer
getting uniforms and I do not know the last time I received
drug supplies
for patients."
A village health worker in the rural district of
Chimanimani in
eastern Zimbabwe, Mushambi, 51, is one of a fast dwindling
breed of
dedicated community workers, credited with helping make health
accessible to
even the remotest village but who now face "extinction",
thanks to a severe
economic crisis gripping the southern African country for
the last six
years.
The economic crisis, worsened by acute
food shortages threatening a
quarter of the 12 million Zimbabweans, has
spawned shortages of electricity,
fuel, essential medical drugs and just
about every basic survival commodity
because there is no hard cash to pay
foreign suppliers.
With President Robert Mugabe's cash-strapped
government forced to
divert resources to the importation of key commodities
and to servicing
mounting debts to the International Monetary Fund, other
areas and needs not
considered immediately critical have
suffered.
Among these have been the village heath workers who now
have to go
with virtually no support from the authorities in Harare. This,
ironically
at a time village health workers are most required to help combat
increasing
malnutrition-related diseases because of hunger and not to
mention a
burgeoning HIV/AIDS crisis that is killing at least 2 000
Zimbabweans every
week.
"You know, we even used to get bicycles
from the Ministry of Health to
use to travel around the villages," Mushambi
said, a distinctive yearning
for the good old times unmistakable in her
voice. And then in a much subdued
and drier tone she added: "That was then,
nowadays you have to organise
your own transport to visit the
sick."
The lack of gloves, drugs and other material support aside,
Mushambi
said the little allowance the government pays health workers was
most
disappointing even for those like her still wishing to soldier on with
their
work for the good of their communities.
For example, as
of December last year, a village health worker was
getting an allowance of
Z$15 000 (US15 cents) a month, which is not enough
to buy half a loaf of the
cheapest quality bread.
"Their (health workers) allowances are too
low although their workload
has almost doubled because they now double as
home-based care givers (for
AIDS patients)," said Itai Rusike, the director
of health promotion
non-governmental organisation, Community Working Group
on Health (CWGH), who
spoke to ZimOnline in a separate
interview.
In the early 80s, there were about 9 000 community
health workers
across Zimbabwe and they formed the backbone of the country's
health
outreach programme. Today they are only about 500 village health
workers
left in the field at a time when, according to Rusike, community
health
workers are in critical demand to help villagers in remote areas cope
with
the HIV/AIDS pandemic.
"Most people who fall ill in the
cities and towns end up in rural
areas and it is these health workers who
take care of them," Rusike said.
"They now carry the country's health
burden," he added.
Health and Child Welfare Minister David
Parirenyatwa conceded the
community health workers were getting a raw deal
from the government. But he
said the government had not neglected the
village health workers saying
their plight in fact reflected wider
"challenges" confronting Zimbabwe's
public health sector as the country
grapples its worst ever economic crisis.
Once the envy of many in
the developing world, Zimbabwe's public
health sector has virtually
collapsed after years of mismanagement and also
because there is no hard
cash to import medicines and equipment.
Most state hospitals cannot
prescribe anything other than simple
aspirin while the majority of the best
skilled doctors and nurses have fled
the country to seek better
opportunities abroad. And those that remained
behind in government hospitals
seem to spend more time either striking for
more pay or moonlighting in
Zimbabwe's thriving informal business sector to
raise cash.
But
Parirenyatwa, himself a medical doctor, said his department was
doing its
best to restore Zimbabwe's public health sector to its former
glory As part
of the effort to rebuild the state health delivery sector, the
government
would soon review and improve the conditions of community health
workers,
who are the principal health outreach agents.
"We have also since
revised their allowances and they are now getting
Z$1.4 million a month,"
Parirenyatwa said.
The new allowance might still not be enough to
buy much in Zimbabwe's
hyperinflationary environment but it is an
acknowledgment by the government
of the sacrifice that Mushambi and her
fellow community health workers are
making. Hopefully it will encourage them
to keep up the good work. -
ZimOnline
Xinhua
www.chinaview.cn 2006-01-27
02:05:45
HARARE. Jan. 27 (Xinhua) -- The World Food Program
(WFP) has
started bringing in more food to Zimbabwe after an agreement with
the
government late last year, WFP said on Friday.
Under
the agreement, the world body promised to provide
300,000tons of food relief
to the drought-stricken southern African country.
Although
correct figures were not immediately available, WFP said
the food aid
program, which had already started prior to the agreement, had
been treated
as a matter of urgency with large amounts of food having
already been
distributed to the needy.
WFP country representative, Kevin
Farrell, said they would
endeavor to provide 300,000 tons of food before the
next harvest.
"We have been reasonably successful so far. We
need to continue to
mobilize more food," said Farrell.
More
than 1.9 million people in 32 districts in the country
received a total
20,000 tons of food between November and December alone,
WFP
said.
According to the Zimbabwe Rural Food Security and
Vulnerability
Assessment, about 2,9 million people in rural areas are in
need of food as
of mid-last year.
The Southern African
Development Community (SADC) region is facing
a serious food deficit
affecting some 9.71 million people in Botswana,
Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia,
Zambia, Zimbabwe and Angola.
A SADC analysis of the situation
indicates that only South Africa
has improved its cereal output, producing
56 percent of the region's total
maize output. Enditem
Xinhua
www.chinaview.cn 2006-01-27
01:33:01
HARARE, Jan. 27 (Xinhuanet) -- A group of civil
servants has
formed a business union in a bid to beat the harsh economic
environment that
has seen the majority of workers struggling to survive in
Zimbabwe.
Known as the Civil Servants Business Union of
Zimbabwe (CSBUZ),the
body seeks to economically empower workers in the face
of the hyper
inflationary environment.
Union deputy
chairman, Misheck Kanotunga, said salary increments
were failing to address
the challenges faced by civil servants, as they
could not match the increase
in the cost of living.
"We want to empower civil servants and
those in the retirement
zone to be able to look after themselves in the
harsh economic environment,"
he said.
With a membership of
over 100 and currently based in Harare, the
union plans to expand its base
to all the country's districts.
The inflationary environment
has seen the cost of living
skyrocketing with the poverty datum line (PDL)
estimated to be around 17
million Zimbabwean dollars (17 U.S. dollars) per
month.
However most workers, including civil servants who
recently got a
salary adjustment of around 230 percent, still fall way below
the PDL.
With prices of basic commodities and medical services
having gone
up by over 1,000 percent as at the beginning of this year,
salaries are not
matching the rocketing cost of living in the
country.
Inflation is estimated to peak at around 800 percent
by March and
this likely to see further increases in the cost of living.
Enditem
[ This report does not
necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]
JOHANNESBURG, 27
Jan 2006 (IRIN) - Zimbabwean NGOs said they were
"disappointed" that the
African Union (AU) had failed to acknowledge a
resolution passed by its
rights body, criticising the Harare regime.
The AU summit in Khartoum,
Sudan, which concluded this week, declined to
take up the resolution tabled
by its African Commission on Human and
Peoples' Rights (ACHPR), saying the
Zimbabwe government had not had time to
react.
"We understand that
the government has to be given time to respond, but at
least the summit
should have noted the report," said Tor-Hugne Olsen,
international office
coordinator of the Zimbabwe Human Rights Forum, a
coalition of 17 Zimbabwean
NGOs.
The ACHPR's resolution noted its concern over the "continuing
deterioration
of the human rights situation" in Zimbabwe, and expressed
alarm at the
number of people displaced by the official clean-up campaign,
Operation
Murambatsvina, which the government said was aimed at clearing
slums and
flushing out criminals.
A UN report estimated that the
operation left more than 700,000 people
homeless or without a livelihood
after kicking off in May 2005. The candid
resolution urged the government to
end the evictions and called for action
against those responsible for the
policy.
It said the Zimbabwean government should "respect fundamental
rights", such
as freedom of expression, association and assembly, and repeal
or amend
"repressive legislation", including the Access to Information and
Protection
of Privacy Act, the Broadcasting Services Act and the Public
Order and
Security Act.
The government was asked to cooperate with
the African Commission Special
Rapporteur on Refugees, Asylum Seekers and
Internally Displaced Persons in
Africa, and allow a fact-finding mission to
investigate the impact of the
clean-up operation. Last year the rapporteur,
Bahame Tom Nyanduga, attempted
to gauge the impact of the operation, but had
to leave the country without
completing his mission after his visit was
deemed "unprocedural".
The ACHPR also urged the AU to renew the mandate
of the AU Envoy to Zimbabwe
former Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano to
investigate the impact of
the clean-up operation.
According to the
official Herald newspaper on Thursday, Zimbabwe had
indicated that it was
"keen to open dialogue" with the ACHPR, and Patrick
Chinmasa, the Justice,
Legal and Parliamentary Minister, had held a meeting
with the rights body at
the AU summit. He was quoted as saying that the
government wanted to "clear
the air".
Mail and Guardian
Harare, Zimbabwe
27 Jan 2006
17:42
A Zimbabwean court on Wednesday charged two twin brothers
with
indecent exposure for walking around in goatskin loincloths while
claiming
to be divine messengers preaching about creation.
Tapiwanashe and Tafadzwanashe Fichani (22) were arrested on Wednesday
while
walking with only codpieces in a busy shopping centre in the posh
Harare
suburb of Mount Pleasant.
They were then brought before a Harare
magistrate's court for
"appearing in a public place without wearing such
articles of clothing as
decency, custom and circumstance
require".
Magistrate Mishrod Guvamombe remanded them in custody to
February 2
and ordered a psychiatric examination.
The twins
claim they received a divine order to shed conventional
apparel for goatskin
flaps and abandon the comfort of their family home in a
posh suburb to sleep
in a chicken run.
The twins, who also admitted smoking marijuana,
said they were on a
mission to preach about creation. They were first
arrested two weeks ago,
but they were set free after paying a fine. --
AFP
IOL
January 27 2006
at 08:22AM
Khartoum - An African human rights commission has
criticised the
continent's worst rights offenders, including Sudan and
Zimbabwe, in a
report analysts say marks a "coming of age" for the
organisation.
The African Union's commission issued candid reviews
of Ethiopia,
Eritrea, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of
Congo in the
report, obtained by Reuters on Wednesday.
Those
countries said they wanted a chance to reply before the report
became
public, ensuring it remained confidential.
"If the African Union is
to have a strong voice it has to foster
constructive criticism, not bury
it," said Reed Brody from the New
York-based Human Rights
Watch.
The report expressed concern at "the
intimidation of independent
judges and the interference of the executive in
the judiciary" in Zimbabwe.
It also expressed alarm at the number
of people displaced because of
government demolitions and urged Harare to
immediately stop the policy which
has made 700 000 people
homeless.
It condemned Eritrea for arbitrary arrests and long
detentions of
former ministers, journalists and parliamentarians, and
demanded their
immediate release.
In Ethiopia it called for the
release of political prisoners and said
it "deplored the death of civilians
during confrontations with security
forces". It also urged an inquiry into
the clashes over elections last year.
Summit host Sudan, snubbed
for the chairmanship because of atrocities
in its western Darfur region, was
urged to immediately cease all attacks on
civilians and to support aid
workers trying to feed two million refugees.
Sudan should fully
co-operate with the International Criminal Court
(ICC), which is probing
alleged war crimes, the commission said.
Sudan says it will not let
ICC investigators enter Darfur.
The AU is reluctant to criticise
members, but at a summit this week it
elected judges for an African human
rights court and fought a fierce
diplomatic battle not to allow host Sudan
to become its head, showing it
would no longer ignore
atrocities.
One AU official said this report was a challenge to
member states and
proof the rights commission was a serious
organ.
"Here we see how sensitive our member states are to
criticism, but the
commission is finally fulfilling its mandate and
challenging them," said the
AU official, who declined to be named because
the report was not yet public.
"The states will get their chance to
comment but then the reports will
be released," he added.
Brody
said this was a sign of maturity in the AU rights commission.
"The
African commission is coming of age. Now it is the African
Union's turn to
do so," he said.
Mail and Guardian
Harare, Zimbabwe
27 January 2006
11:21
Zimbabwe's National Security Minister, Didymus Mutasa,
has
warned that "the net will soon close in" on journalists he claims are
threatening national security, a state-controlled newspaper reported on
Friday.
"It is sad to note that there is a crop of
journalists who are
selling the country to the enemy by writing falsehoods,
with the intention
of agitating violence in the country," Mutasa told the
Manica Post, which is
based in the eastern city of
Mutare.
"They should be warned that the net will soon close
in on all
those involved in these illegal activities," he
added.
His comments came days after six trustees of the
independent
Voice of the People (VOP) radio station were charged under
Zimbabwe's tough
broadcasting laws. Mutasa said VOP, which broadcasts its
programmes into
Zimbabwe via shortwave, was operating
"illegally".
"These are media houses that are churning out
falsehoods on a
daily basis about the country and government. We will not
sit on our laurels
and watch people undermining the country's security," he
said.
Zimbabwean authorities have had a testy relationship
with the
private media for several years.
Shortly after
his contested reelection in 2002, President Robert
Mugabe signed the Access
to Information and Protection of Privacy Act into
law. Under the laws,
foreign reporters are barred from working permanently
in Zimbabwe, while
local journalists must be licensed by a state commission.
Dozens of reporters have been arrested and four private
newspapers closed
down. Critics have called for the repeal of the laws, but
Mugabe's
government says they are necessary to protect Zimbabwe against a
hostile
campaign by Western media.
Mutasa told the Manica Post that
reporters are "driven by the
love for the United States dollars and British
pounds, which they are paid
by the foreign media houses to peddle
lies".
In a chilling warning, the newspaper said that
although some of
the journalists use pseudonyms, "government had since
identified them from
their closets". -- Sapa-dpa
The Herald (Harare)
January 27,
2006
Posted to the web January 27, 2006
Harare
GOVERNMENT has
blacklisted several A2 farmers for channelling subsidised
fuel obtained from
the National Oil Company of Zimbabwe (Noczim) to the
black market at the
expense of agricultural production.
The blacklisted farmers have -- with
immediate effect -- been barred from
accessing fuel under the Noczim
facility while the Government launches
investigations into the activities of
several other farmers.
However, those who used the fuel for its intended
purpose will continue to
benefit from the scheme.
Energy and Power
Development Minister Retired Lieutenant-General Mike
Nyambuya yesterday
confirmed the rampant abuse of the subsidised fuel
facility. "There are some
farmers who have been getting the fuel and putting
it to good use while
others have been abusing the facility.
"Some we have blacklisted and they
will never be provided with fuel under
the facility again," he
said.
The fuel facility was introduced two years ago with the Government
allocating 50 percent of all petroleum imports to farmers with the aim of
bolstering agricultural activities countrywide.
Rtd Lt-Gen Nyambuya
said he was going to recommend to Cabinet a more
foolproof system to replace
the existing system.
"But for the time being, the existing system will
continue to function
subject to the availability of fuel until Cabinet makes
a decision."
Farmers, Government ministries and departments buy fuel from
Noczim at $11
000 per litre for diesel and $13 500 per litre for petrol. The
gazetted open
market price is $22 300 per litre of petrol and $20 800 for
diesel
respectively.
A litre of petrol is, however, fetching up to
$120 000 on the parallel
market.
Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor Dr
Gideon Gono has openly condemned the
rampant abuse of the fuel facility. In
his 2005 Fourth Quarter Monetary
Policy Review Statement on Tuesday, Dr Gono
said Noczim was saddled with a
$1 trillion debt as farmers allocated fuel
for agricultural purposes were
diverting it to the parallel market in return
for a quick buck.
Meanwhile, Noczim has started importing fuel on behalf
of individuals and
companies who have access to foreign currency in a bid to
improve supplies.
A Noczim official said a litre of fuel would be selling
at US$0,80 ($72 200
at the interbank prevailing rate) while individuals can
import up to a
maximum of 5 000 litres of fuel at any given time.
The
official added that clients would be required to deposit their hard
currency
in Noczim's Zimbank Foreign Currency Account. Deliveries would be
made three
days after payment.
"Free deliveries will be made for people living in
Harare and Mutare while
others will have to collect their consignments at
our depots," said the
official.
Fuel shortages had become so severe
that even essential services such as
ambulances and refuse collection have
been crippled.
Many companies and individuals have resorted to importing
their own fuel to
keep their vehicles on the road.
African News Dimension
Friday, 27 January 2006,
By Gift
Phiri
SEED Co Ltd, the country's leading seed producer, says it
expects seed
production to decline further this year due to the dearth of
agricultural
inputs. "There will not be a drought in Zimbabwe this year but
seed
production will be hampered by the shortage of agricultural inputs,"
Pat
Devenish the chief executive of Seed Co said.
SEED Co Ltd,
the country's leading seed producer, says it expects seed
production to
decline further this year due to the dearth of agricultural
inputs.
"There will not be a drought in Zimbabwe this year but
seed production
will be hampered by the shortage of agricultural inputs,"
Pat Devenish the
chief executive of Seed Co said.
Firms
involved in the agricultural sector have been facing viability
problems due
to unavailability of basic inputs like fertilizer, owing to
pricing
distortions and an acute foreign currency crunch.
TSL limited
(TSL), involved in tobacco farming and inputs
manufacturing, reported in its
financial results for the year ended October
31, 2005 that tobacco
production is likely to decline in the forthcoming
season due to these
constraints.
Devenish said Seed Co would still press ahead with its
regional
expansion programme, but would reconsider its footprint and
withdraw from
countries where profitability was impaired.
"We
are currently moving into East Africa and recently established an
operation
in South Africa. We are also rationalizing our operations in
countries we
are performing well," Devenish said.
He added that Seed Co was yet
to settle a US$15 million debt owed to a
Botswana bank to finance the
operations of its entity based in that country.
"The loan will be
paid in due course from the proceeds of seed we sold
to the
government."
Devenish said the operation in Botswana is currently
breaking even and
has been positioned to fund operations in other regional
markets.
Seed Co also runs operations in Malawi, Mozambique and
Kenya and is
listed on the Zimbabwe stock exchange. The firm's share price
closed at $40
000 per share, having put on $4 000.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
The Daily Mirror Reporter
issue date
:2006-Jan-27
FORTY policemen - with a mandate strictly to enforce
discipline within the
ranks of the force following rampant cases of
corruption and disobedience -
graduated at Morris Depot in Harare
yesterday.
Speaking at a pass-out parade for the officers, the acting Officer
Commanding Harare Province, Assistant Commissioner Edward Siwela, said the
exercise was meant to nip the problem in the bud.
After receiving
numerous reports of indiscipline, Police Commissioner
Augustine Chihuri set
up a board of inquiry into the complaints in 2003.
That board confirmed his
worst fears, prompting the introduction of a
programme to train a group of
policemen to stamp out the rot.
"The findings of the board of inquiry plainly
indicated an increase in the
incidences of indiscipline. It was also
established that inadequate
supervision was among the prime causes of such
deterioration in levels of
discipline. It is against this background
therefore that the Harare province
embarked on this sergeant
discipline training programme,"
Siwela said.
He said there had, however,
been a decrease in recorded cases of
indiscipline in the police force from
163 to 106 cases for 2004 and 2005
respectively.
Siwela said among other
duties, the graduands were to ensure that junior
officers maintained high
levels of discipline in their conduct.
The senior police officer stressed
that the exercise was open to everyone in
the police force and not
restricted to men alone.
He said men in the force had dominated the pioneer
stream because respective
stations forwarded their names.
The graduands
underwent a three-week training programme in Harare and Shamva
covering
areas of discipline, cane drill, foot and arms drill, supervision
and
leadership, delegation, service planning, human rights and corruption.
The
sergeant discipline officer can be identified by a leather strap running
diagonally across the body from the shoulders.
There were plans, said
Siwela, to introduce discipline officers among the
senior ranks.
Siwela
said police officers had on several occasions appeared before
disciplinary
boards on indiscipline charges ranging from disobedience to
corruption.
A
number of police offices have been arrested and appeared before the courts
on corruption charges. Most of the cases recorded include theft of exhibits
and soliciting bribes.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Givemore
Nyanhi
issue date :2006-Jan-27
THE Zimbabwe dollar this week
nose-dived against the US dollar on the
parallel market when it depreciated
by at least 40 percent from around $100
000 to $140 000.
This is inspite
of the encouraging performance of the four-month old
inter-bank exchange
rate system that has seen the Zimbabwe dollar depreciate
significantly in a
race to catch up with parallel market rates, and render
them
useless.
Prior to the latest movement in parallel market exchange rates, one
US
dollar was fetching an average of about Z$100 000.
This week's
movement in the parallel market rates shows that the local
currency has
depreciated by at least 40 percent, a movement that is expected
to widen the
gap between the improving inter-bank rate that is on course to
breach the
Z$100 000 to one US dollar rate by the close of this week.
Yesterday the
inter-bank mid rate averaged around $99 000 to one US dollar
at most banks,
up from less than $96 000 at the beginning of the week.
The inter-bank system
is the shorter name for the liberalised tradable
foreign currency balance
system (TFCBS), that was introduced last October
and saw the dollar
depreciate by 131 percent from the government determined
rate of $26 000 to
$60 000.
Since then, the liberalised official inter-bank system has been
steadily
depreciating against the US dollar.
Economists and financial
commentators lauded the movements of the dollar in
the last four months,
pointing out that this would help in stamping out the
exorbitant black
market rates.
In addition, the movements would benefit the export sector by
giving them
more viable returns on their products and resultantly spur the
country's
export receipts.
However, the gap between the inter-bank
exchange rate and the parallel rate
widened this week, just days after the
central bank bank governor, Gideon
Gono, presented the last quarter monetary
review statement for 2005.
According to illegal foreign currency dealers that
thrive at infamous spots
such as the Road Port Terminus in Harare, the new
rates came into effect
this week.
"We are selling at between $140 000 and
$150 000 for one US dollar but
business has not been good since the police
have been carrying out
operations against us in the last two weeks," an
illegal foreign currency
dealer said.
Some two weeks ago, more than ten
plainclothes members of the Zimbabwe
Republic Police (ZRP) launched a
massive operation at Road Port, where more
than 100 people, including
illegal foreign currency dealers, were rounded
up.
Economist Farai
Dyirakumunda yesterday said one of the possible drivers
behind the surge in
parallel rates was the demand and supply mismatch of
foreign currency in the
country.
"There is a high demand for foreign currency and little supply
available.
Dealers are putting a premium above the inter-bank rate and this
results in
depreciation," Dyirakumunda said.
Another economist at a
leading discount house in Harare said the rate was as
high as $160 000 for
one US dollar and attributed this to high inflation
projections of about 800
percent in the first quarter and the general
shortage of foreign currency in
the country.
"Though we cannot say the monetary policy triggered the latest
movement of
the greenback on the parallel market, the absence of serious
initiatives to
generate more foreign currency and high inflation projections
have helped
push the US dollar up," the economist said.
"Most companies
are hard pressed for foreign currency to bankroll their
operations and they
cannot help going to the black market and secure the
hard currency ahead of
others in light of the high inflation projections."
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
issue date :2006-Jan-27
THE government is prepared to
engage Western countries in dialogue to mend
relations that have been
strained since the country embarked on the Land
Reform Programme in 2000, an
official said yesterday.
Foreign Affairs permanent secretary, Joey Bimha,
said this while outlining
Zimbabwe's foreign policy to students attending
the Joint Command and Staff
Course at the Zimbabwe Staff
College.
"Zimbabwe is not opposed to engaging our erstwhile friends to
resolve our
differences," he said.
The government was prepared to discuss
with any Western country which
accepted that its differences with the
British government were a bilateral
issue and had nothing to do with the
political situation in the country, he
added.
Any country that wanted to
engage Zimbabwe had to accept that the Land
Reform Programme was a reality
and was irreversible, he said.
Bimha said the desire to protect the country's
independence, sovereignty and
territorial integrity had largely guided the
foreign policy agenda.
The pursuit of a policy of national reconciliation to
achieve peace and
stability, uplifting the standards of living of all
Zimbabweans and
exercising control over the natural resources, including
land, were also
paramount.
"The principles of the sovereignty of states,
non-interference in the
internal affairs of other states, peaceful
settlement of disputes and the
right to self-determination were critical to
Zimbabwe's foreign policy,"
Bimha said.
Since 2000, the main priority of
the country's foreign policy has been to
resist attempts by the United
Kingdom and its allies to interfere in its
internal affairs.
The Land
Reform Programme had had far reaching ramifications in relations
between
Zimbabwe and the UK, beginning with refusal by the government of
Prime
Minister Tony Blair to fund the exercise as agreed to by his
predecessors at
the Lancaster House Constitution talks in 1989.
Bimha said the British
government has, however, sought to internationalise
the dispute by making
false allegations of human rights violations and bad
governance and has
secured solidarity from the European Union, Australia,
the United States,
Canada and New Zealand.
However, the rest of the international community has
seen behind the
smokescreen and had refused to condemn Zimbabwe. New
Ziana
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
The
Daily Mirror Reporter
issue date :2006-Jan-27
HARARE commissioners
yesterday condemned the quality of water in the capital
and took to task
senior council employees on what they were doing to improve
the
situation.
The issue was raised at a full commission meeting following
concerns raised
by the council's Education, Health, Housing and Community
Services and
Licensing Committee in a meeting held on Monday.
The
Zimbabwe National Water Authority (Zinwa) took over the management of
bulk
water supply last year and is now responsible for its purification
before it
is sold to Harare and other dormitory towns.
In their report, the committee
recommended: "That the attention of the
commission be drawn to the water
crisis and the urgent action be taken to
alert the relevant ministry on the
water problem."
This followed a report on December 8 last year that the water
was failing to
meet World Health Organisation (WHO 1993) and the Standards
Association of
Zimbabwe (SAZ 1997) standards.
Commissioner Viola Chasi
said the problem had not been solved since last
November.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Patience Nyangove in Marondera
issue date
:2006-Jan-27
MARONDERA Municipality is yet to take measures to stop raw
sewage from
flowing into the town's main water supply dam, Rufaro.
A
survey conducted by The Daily Mirror yesterday found that effluent was
still
flowing into the dam and little if anything
was being done to rectify the
anomaly.
Residents have been complaining that the portable water was not
suitable for
domestic use, alleging it foamed when boiled and that algae
could be seen
when it settles.
According to the residents, effluent
started spilling into the dam when a
sewer pump at Chicago Pump Station
broke down some years ago.
As a measure to force the local authority to
address the problem, the
Zimbabwe National Water Authority (Zinwa) last year
took the council to
court to answer charges of pollution.
The council
pleaded guilty and sentence is expected to be passed on January
31.
"We
have resorted not to pay rates until the council does something to
improve
the situation.
"Why give our money to them when nothing meaningful to improve
our well
being is being done," said an irate Mavis Muzanenhamo from
Dombotombo
suburb.
Another resident from Nyameni Township urged the
government through the
ministry of Local Government, Public Works and Urban
Development to
intervene.
"Minister Ignatius Chombo should crack the whip
on the council as he has
done to other local authorities.
"Where is all
our money going to when services are not improving," said Abel
Mupamhanga in
response to high increases in rates against a background of
poor service
delivery.
Zinwa manager for Mazowe catchment area, which covers Marondera,
Jerry
Gotora declined to comment saying that it was prejudicial as the
matter was
still before the courts.
"I can not comment at the moment as
the matter is still to be finalised in
the courts," Gotora said.
Efforts
to get a comment
from the town's executive mayor Raphel Chimanikire and town
clerk Josiah
Musuwo were in vain at the time of going to press yesterday.
The speech that Gono delivered about economy did manage too fool many a people including MDC.
The speech was well crafted by ZANU itself to let Gono win support from the masses that he is aware of corruption etc.Now here is how.Here we have one part of ZANU trying to play good by "blaming" some part of ZANU "the chefs" about corruption.Who is fooling who and who is in charge ? And dont forget that this speech was made ata time an IMF team had landed in Harare for talks with Gono and the Finance ministry.So in all sanity do you think Gono was to be heard singing the usual master song of blaming the wst and sanctions for the dilemna we have ?
The most cunning part is where Gono indicates that army Chief urged Gono to feed people so that there wont be an uprising.This was an obvious strategy to let Zimbabweans know that the ARMY was watching , ready and aware of the fact that hunger could push people to a revolt and THAT the army would NOT want to be forced to TURN guns to civilians.This seems to me more of an advance warning."To quote the wisdom of General C Chiwenga, Commander of the Defence Forces, a hungry man is an angry man, and as Zimbabweans, we must pull together to ensure full productivity in agriculture so that hunger is alien to every Zimbabwean," Gono said.
Also knowing the level of ZPF intolerance , surely where would be Gono getting his guts to be that bare ? As a result I take that Gono speech with a lot of salt coz it was well crafted to ease the tension on the masses by creating a false image that "someone" cares and is noticing the problem.
I used to think common sense was common but I guess I was wrong.I was NOT fooled by Gono speech.I dont know about you.You can fool some people some of the times but you can NOT folol all the people ALL the time so goes the saying.
Its a matter of time before the inevitable happens.Hence the advance warning by the Army that it would not like to use guns on hungry Zimbabweans.But also its saddenning that the opposition easily got duped by such an obvious move masterminded ZANU.It come as no suprise that the opposition was easily penetrated and divided without much effort.If this is a reflection of the calibre of leadership in the opposition , then God save Zimbabwe !
Robert Ndlovu
New
York
Zimbabwe Lawyers ofor Human rights
Information
Alert
COMMENT ON
ATTEMPTS BY GOVERNMENT
TO
COMPULSORILY ACQUIRE PROPERTIES IN BORROWDALE
It
has come to the attention of the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) that
the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and Urban Development has
evidenced an intention by the government to compulsorily acquire certain
properties which fall within a designated security area. This area incorporates
a property in Borrowdale Brook owned by the President of
Zimbabwe.
ZLHR
notes that in terms of General Notice 255 of 2004, “A Property in Borrowdale …
and the areas surrounding these premises” were declared protected places in
terms of the Protected Places and Areas Act [Chapter 11:12] (“the Act).
The
description of the property is as follows:
“An
area within the City of Harare bounded by a line starting at the intersection of
eastern edge of Borrowdale Brook Road and the northern edge of Green Valley
Lane; thence along Green Valley Lane in a generally southwards direction to the
north-eastern point of Lot GB 16751/57; thence south-westwards along the
south-western boundary of that property to the north-eastern part at Budleigh
Close to its intersection with the northern edge of Carrick Creagh Road; thence
northwards along the eastern edge of Swallow Hill to the intersection with
Borrowdale Brook Road to the starting point.”
In
a letter dated 11 January 2006, purportedly signed by one L Chimba from the
Valuations and Estates Management Department for the Secretary for Local
Government, Public Works and Urban Development, “The House owner” was advised
that “… your
property falls within a designated security area… As a result this office has
been instructed to enter into negotiations with you, with a view to the
acquisition of the property by Government. We will therefore be contacting you
soon to arrange for an inspection of your property for valuation
purposes”.
It
is clear that this “notice” is as unlawful as it is unprocedural.
The “notice” is
unprocedural, in that any action taken in respect of such a protected area must
be taken by the Minister of Home Affairs and not by the Minister of Local
Government.
It
is further unlawful in that the Act does not provide for the acquisition of
property in such a protected area by the government. At most, the Act allows for
special security measures to be taken to protect against “unlawful damage or
sabotage” and to “control the movement and conduct” of persons in the area, and
only during a time of war, or a state of emergency or where it is reasonably
necessary in the interests of defence, public safety or public order.
In
terms of section 7 of the Act, any order relating to property within the
protected area may only specify:
(i)
the extent of the premises or area declared to be a protected place or
protected area, as the case may be; and
(ii)
the special precautions or measures which shall be taken to prevent the
entry of unauthorized persons or to control the movement and conduct of persons,
as the case may be; and
(iii) any measures necessary for demarcating
the premises or area; and
(iv)
any measures necessary for protecting the premises from unlawful damage
or sabotage.
ZLHR regrets to note a further instance of arbitrary action taken against residents of the City of Harare by a Local Government Minister who continues to act outside the ambit of his legitimate mandate, and with perceived impunity. It is also unfortunate that the government continues its attempts to deprive people of Zimbabwe of their property rights, as well as their right to protection of the law and right to be free from arbitrary state action. Such rights are protected under the Constitution of Zimbabwe, as well as key international human rights instruments to which Zimbabwe is a state party. ZLHR urges the government to refrain from such arbitrary action and reminds public officials to act within the ambit of domestic and international law.
-Ends-
27 January 2006
Khaleej Times
By Mohammmed A. R.
Galadari
27 January 2006
GOVERNANCE is not child's play.
Leaders who have the vision succeed; and
those who act impulsively lead
their people and the nation to difficulties.
Zimbabwe is a good example of
the latter scenario.
Dear readers, those who have backed Robert
Mugabe in recent years may listen
to what Zimbabwe's central bank governor
and the president's own confidant
has to say: it is that the country is
bracing itself for a social and
political upheaval over the issue of food
shortages. Whose making is it?
Zimbabwe is not just another African
nation. It was held in high esteem in
the past, when it had a strong showing
in many fields. It is mineral-rich,
producing over 40 different types of
metals and minerals, and its platinum
deposits are reckoned to be the
world's largest. It also had a long-held
reputation of being a top exporter
of tobacco. But, all these are not
helping it and its people now.
The
ground reality is that most Zimbabweans live with an average of less
than 60
dollars a month and millions are surviving on food aid. They are
faced with
every conceivable problem in life-namely poverty, a triple-digit
inflation,
joblessness at 70 per cent and power shortage that cripples
agricultural and
industrial activities as also the general life. So much so,
offices remain
hit for several days without power.
Feelings are that Robert Mugabe and
his government are literally pushed to
the wall, not being able to tackle a
crisis of its own making. The economy's
downslide began when he amended the
Constitution six years ago to seize
hundreds of White-owned farms. That saw
the driving out of those who were
strengthening the national economy, even
as they were fattening themselves
with profits from their farm operations.
Empowering natives was a good
slogan, even though that didn't win Mugabe a
lot more of support from his
own people-as was evident in the next
elections.
The fact, as is now well known, is that those who were
bestowed with the
ownership of the lands seized from the White farmers, had
not been equipped
with the expertise to run the farms. The result was that
many farms have
turned themselves into wasteland, affecting the production,
and leading to
the food shortage-a scenario that is worsening now.
Strangely, this is
happening in a land that once boasted of being a
breadbasket for the
continent. So much for Mugabe's leadership
skills.
The Central Bank governor's monetary policy statement makes it
clear that
the country's farm output has fallen by half since the government
started
seizing farms in year 2000. Driving more and more people into
poverty is
definitely not the way to empower people. That the government, as
also the
ruling party, has understood the mistakes is without doubt-which is
why they
have now abandoned the much-publicised farm seizure drive. It is
ironic that
when Mugabe aims high, people fall into further depths. While he
bulldozes
homes and clears slums from the urban landscape in the name of an
urban
beautification drive, the fact is also that more litter piles up on
city
streets, and roads are filled with potholes.
The warning from
the Central Bank chief is that the "country is standing on
the edge of a
cliff, which threatens to irreversibly take us downhill if we
do not boldly
move forward". But, how easy is it to undo what's already
done? How many
generations it would take for Zimbabwe to get back on its
feet and be in a
position to feed its people properly and put the economy
back on the
rails-with or without Mugabe?
Zim Daily
Friday, January 27 2006 @ 12:03 AM GMT
Contributed by: Reporter
Aids service organisations based in
Zimbabwe are set to petition
President Mugabe over the continued failure by
the government in addressing
the HIV and AIDS issue. This comes after
shocking revelation that referral
hospitals such as Parirenyatwa, Mpilo,
Harare and Chitungwiza are failing to
provide ARV generic drugs to people
living with HIV and AIDS. Mary Sandasi,
the director of Women and AIDS
Support Network (WASN) said the government
needed to take the HIV/AIDS
scourge seriously by making the life prolonging
drug
available.
"The government has already declared that the
HIV/AIDS pandemic
is an emergency and therefore the petition is meant to
make sure the
leadership treats the issue like an emergency.", said
Sandasi.
She said the petition would be copied to the Reserve
Bank of
Zimbabwe, the Ministry of Finance, and the Ministry of Health and
Child
Welfare. She expressed fear that people living with HIV and AIDS could
start
developing resistance to ARVs because of interruption to
supplies.
However, in an evasive fashion, the CEO of
Parirenyatwa, Thomas
Zigora, said ARVs were being distributed at the
hospital. "As of now the
Opportunistic Infections Clinic at Parirenyatwa has
a register of up to 250
infants and 300 plus adults who are accessing ARVs.
Those on the register
are getting the drugs", Zigora. Zimbabwe is one of the
countries under siege
from the world's number one killer although recent
reports revealed that the
prevalance rate had significantly gone down.
Zim Daily
Friday, January 27 2006 @ 12:03 AM GMT
Contributed by: correspondent
The opposition MDC has condemned
the continued harassment of
media workers in the country saying this
signifies a new assault on press
freedom in the country. The MDC's
condemnation came as government charged
the directors of Voice of the People
radio station with violating the
notorious Broadcasting Services Act for
allegedly operating an independent
radio station. Just a week ago, police
arrested and detained Mutare-based
journalist Sydney Saize for three nights
in dingy cells in yet another
daylight assault of press
freedom.
"This adds to yet another sad chapter to the death
of press
freedom in the country," MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa said. "The
MDC
condemns the harassment of the families of the VoP journalists and
ransacking of their houses in the name of 'justice.' We exhort the
journalists and directors to remain resolute and committed to the cause of
press freedom regardless of incessant threats harassment and intimidation."
Chamisa said the Mugabe regime's intolerance of media freedom and the
continued violation of the rights of Zimbabweans to receive and impart
information has reached catastrophic levels.
The VoP
radio station has since been closed and becomes the
fifth private media
casualty after the regime closed four other independent
newspapers in a
space of two years. Chamisa said the harassment was part of"state-terrorism"
against the private media in the country characterised by the closure of The
Daily News, The Weekly Sun, The Daily News on Sunday and The Tribune,
leaving thousands of Zimbabweans jobless.
"The ploy is to
make Zimbabweans passive consumers of government
propaganda churned out by
the state-owned media every day," Chamisa said.
"The ploy is to create a
media terrain of government apologists and praise
singers as if that alone
will save the country from the deepening political
and economic
crisis."
Media and Information Commission chairman Tafataona
Mahoso,
whose term was recently renewed, have become perennial media
undertakers
known for killing and burying all media that agitate for
alternative thought
and opinion. Chamisa said his party "commits itself to
its founding values
of media pluralism and respect for press freedom,
fairness and
transparency."
"Zimbabweans yearn for a new
society in which the people's
inalienable rights-such as the right to free
speech-are not impinged by a
paranoid government afraid of its own people,"
Chamisa said. "We will
deliver such a society. A new society in which we
will enable media freedom,
diversity and pluralism. Zimbabwe needs a new
beginning," he said.
African News Dimension
Friday, 27 January 2006, 43 minutes and 3 seconds
ago.
By ANDnetwork Journalist
The Ministry of
Environment and Tourism has expressed concern over the
increase in air
pollution particularly from vehicle and industrial
emissions - a development
which requires the formulation of a policy on
clean air.
The Secretary for Environment and Tourism Mrs Margaret Sangarwe says
the
ministry through the Environmental Management Agency is working on a
programme to monitor air pollution levels in order to abide by the levels
stipulated in the World Health Organization standards.
Zimbabwe
is making considerable strides in industrialization,
urbanization and
economic development.
Unfortunately, these developments have also
contributed to air
pollution; a situation which environmentalists say
requires urgent
attention.
In an effort to map out strategies
to control air pollution,
environmentalists met for the national dialogue on
air pollution which was
organized by Air Pollution Information Network for
Africa.
Speaking on the sidelines of the meeting, the secretary for
environment and tourism Mrs Margaret Sangarwe revealed that more still needs
to be done to control air pollution in the country. So far the government is
in the process of phasing out leaded fuel in line with its commitment to the
Dakar Declaration.
She added that the environmental management
act which makes provisions
for adopting and enforcing environmental
standards with regards to water,
air and soil and other agents which might
lower environmental quality is an
important piece of legislation in the
country's efforts to control air
pollution.
Government is a
signatory to various multilateral environmental
agreements dealing with
pollution including the United Nations Framework for
Convention on Climate
change, the Vienna convention on the depletion of the
ozone layer and
the
And the Montreal Protocol on substances that deplete the ozone
layer.
However, more still needs to be done in the implementation of these
declarations.
Source: Newsnet
January ‘06 Edition FARMERS
IN TOUCH NEWSLETTER Telephone 04
309800/6 Fax 04
309849 E-mail fit@cfu.co.zw or adsa@cfu.co.zw Creating a
network of farmers for the development of farming in
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Happy new year to you
all! Here’s wishing you a positive and
productive 2006. Hope you had a relaxing
and peaceful festive season and are ready to face a new year, filled with new
challenges!! The Farmers in Touch
department is grateful for donations received towards putting together food
hampers for various old age homes and displaced farmers throughout the
country. On behalf of our elderly
farmers, we take this opportunity to thank everyone who contributed to this
cause. Information on
countries outside Progress has been made
with the second tranche. The land has been identified, and each farmer will be
entitled to between 500 and 700 hectares.
We expect the move will take place sooner rather than later. We have put pressure on the decision makers,
and expect that because of this, some of you will be farming in the very near
future. We have already
requested information from those on the Nigerian list and unfortunately not
everyone has responded. We are now sending this information on for initial
selection. If you haven’t already
advised us of your details, we suggest you contact us immediately. Only those who have supplied this information
will be put forward!
Also ensure that you
are fully paid up as only those paid up members’ names will be put
forward. Contact has been made
with some investors and financiers and we are now awaiting a response. We are hoping to address the financial
constraints farmers face. The exploratory trip
is still scheduled to take place at the end of the month and feedback will be
supplied when available. Employment
Opportunities A
Bulldozer Mechanic to start as soon as possible. Excellent remuneration
offered A
farmer who has experience in different farming techniques and the farming of a
diverse range of crops which includes
oil palm trees, cashews, citrus, mango, avocado, Caribbean nuts, cattle,
plantain, mahogany trees etc is being sought. Experience in bee, chicken, cattle and
goat/sheep farming would be an added advantage. Husband
and wife team with no children to fill vacancies on a dairy farm. This position is to be filled
immediately. Growing
Manager required
with experience in horticultural production, glasshouse and outdoor - Lettuce,
Romaine & Cucumbers. Hydroponic
growing. Some packhouse experience. Good
technical experience (BRC etc).
Supermarket supply experience.
Good agronomic experience -chemicals & fertiliser. Programming (Crop) experience. Versatile.
Good mechanical knowledge & maintenance. Computer familiarity. Willingness to learn and drive the business
and expansion. Budgeting. Complexity. An
Operations Manager is
required to head
up the agricultural division. Responsible for overseeing production from
producers, finances. Person need not
have agricultural or agronomic background but be a good manager of people and
business. Outstanding leadership, commercial, analytical and communication
skills within a multiple supplier environment.
This is a very senior position, with package to
match. Farm
Manager to
be located near Pack
house Manager to
be located near The
position of Estate Manager is available for a large centre based just
outside the CBD. The candidate should be
capable of improving current services supplied to the centre. The manager is required to supervise other
members of staff and have management ability dealing with electrical, plumbing,
repairs and maintenance of buildings. An
all rounder with vision!! Promotions
Manager
to commence as soon as possible. They
will be responsible for event planning for the year with the ability to carry
these plans to completion, advertising, good communication skills etc is
essential. Contact us for further
information Warehouse
Assistant required for a small Manager
wanted as soon as possible for the Middle Sabi area. 160 ha row cropping – maize, soyas
etc The position of Farm Manager is still vacant This
company will appoint someone by February 2006, so if you haven’t already applied
for this position, please ensure that you send us your details as soon as
possible. Logistics
Manager
required to commence as soon as possible.
The incumbent will take responsibility for the internal logistics and
transport functions to ensure the timeous supply and logistical control of
materials within the operations. Various Would like to advise
the visa fees for those traveling to ZW Passport
Holder $
3,000,000 SA Passport
Holder $
3,900,000 GB Passport
Holder $
8,000,000 The above fees are for
single entries, valid for 3 months and are exclusive of our processing
fee. Note that visas may be
submitted at the Nigerian High Commission on Monday – Thursday from
The list of countries
that we are liaising with in regards to agriculture keeps growing and more
recently includes We did promise a
survey would be carried out this year so would appreciate you taking a few
minutes to answer the following questions and return to us. We have kept it brief. We would appreciate
you sharing any ideas you may have that may add value to the
newsletters.
Fiona Dhana,
Manager, Farmers in Touch
JUSTICE FOR AGRICULTURE - January 26, 2006
Email: jag@mango.zw, justiceforagriculture@zol.co.zw
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
The
Zimbabwe National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
requests
that all cases of cruelty or abuse of animals, both domestic and
livestock,
are reported to them.
Recently there has been an increase of deliberate
cruelty to livestock,
but unfortunately many of these incidents are not
reported to ZNSCPA and
we only get to hear about them through a third party
long after the abuse
has taken place.
Cruelty to animals, including
wild life in captivity, is a punishable
offence in Zimbabwe and we are
pleased to report that the Police and the
Courts are dealing swiftly and
decisively with these cases when we present
our dockets to
them.
Whilst ZNSPCA remains totally non-political, we continue to
respond
quickly and professionally to requests for help on farms where the
welfare
of animals is being compromised in any way.
ZNSPCA HQ:
497885/497574
156 Enterprise Rd, Chisipite
Inspectors
Cell:
Glynis: 091 367 260
Simon: 011 630 430
Jimmy: 011 528
449
Justine: 023 306 456
John: 011 867 099
Open Democracy
Wilf Mbanga
27 - 1 -
2006
The Khartoum summit stitch-up over the presidency of
Africa's
leading international body is only the latest episode in a saga of
failure,
says Wilf Mbanga.
"Africans
are angered by the continued unwillingness of African
rulers to deal with
human rights issues. The fact that they held the latest
summit in Sudan in
the first place shows their disdain for human rights",
said Lovemore
Madhuku, chairman of Zimbabwe's National Constitutional
Assembly. "The fact
that they are passing the African Union chairmanship to
a coup leader in
Congo makes them laughable. Where do Africans turn now?"
The
pessimism of dashed hopes has an especially bitter taste. In
July 2002 the
reinvention of the African Union (AU) amid the ashes of the
discredited
forty-year-old Organisation of African Unity (OAU) was hailed
internationally as a triumph. It was seen as a vital leap forward into the
21st century for the "dark continent" - with its tragic millions of
poverty-stricken, starving, diseased peoples, and its elite coterie of
portly, bemedalled, ageing dictators.
Colonialism was
dead and gone. In this one area the OAU had
succeeded. At its founding in
1963, its main goal was to rid the continent
of colonial oppression and
exploitation. Freedom for Africans and
one-man-one-vote were the rallying
cries. Almost four decades on, the
challenge was different, and yet eerily
the same: power concentrated in the
hands of a heartless few, determined to
exploit the many for personal gain.
Was Africa free? How did freedom
taste?
Where did the OAU go wrong? The colonialists had been
replaced
by a new breed of African liberator-heroes, most of whom proceeded
to
plunder the resources of their nations and oppress anyone who dare oppose
them. All pretence at democracy, freedom of expression and the rule of law
was cast aside. Coups, not elections, changed
governments.
The OAU's founding principle of respect for
national sovereignty
became its Achilles' heel - allowing the excesses of
dictators like Idi
Amin, Mengistu Haile Mariam and Robert Mugabe to be swept
under the carpet.
As the hopeful new millennium dawned on an Africa riddled
with war,
corruption, debt and disease, the OAU had become a sick
joke.
Enter the AU. With much fanfare and rejoicing the new
body
proceeded to establish an impressive array of organs and instruments
purporting to deliver human rights to the continent's oppressed
millions.
Wilf Mbanga is founder, editor and
publisher of The
Zimbabwean
openDemocracy publishes
regular, fortnightly extracts from
The Zimbabwean about Zimbabwe's
political, economic and human-rights
situation, as well as other reports and
analysis of life under Robert
Mugabe; see our debate "What future for
Zimbabwe?"
It signified, on paper at least, a new
commitment by African
states to tackle issues of importance to the
continent. The constitutive act
of the AU explicitly espoused the promotion
of "democratic principles and
institutions, popular participation and good
governance" and the promotion
and protection of "human and peoples' rights
in accordance with the African
Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights and
other relevant human rights
instruments".
Most
significant was the agreement by member-states to limit
their sovereignty
with specific regard to respect for democratic principles,
human rights and
the rule of law. "Good governance" and "peer review" were
the new buzz
phrases.
In a further erosion of state sovereignty, the AU
even gave
itself some teeth, allowing it to condemn and reject any
unconstitutional
change of government and to impose sanctions against any
member state for
failure to comply with its decisions and policies. Goodbye
to coups and
counter-coups!
Tragically, it soon became
apparent that the real implications
of all this for ordinary Africans
remained limited and remote.
How the African Union
works
One of the first individual test cases of the new
body's formal
commitments was Zimbabwean human-rights lawyer Gabriel Shumba,
who was
arrested and tortured by the government for defending in court a
member of
the opposition Movement for Democratic Change. The Zimbabwean
judicial
system failed him. He was threatened with death and fled to South
Africa. In
2003 he approached the African Commission on Human and Peoples'
Rights
(ACHPR) directly.
The case was heard at the
ACPHR's court in Banjul, Gambia, in
November 2005. The judges heard Shumba's
testimony, including his claim that
the torture inflicted on him violated
the African charter on rights. But
instead of ruling decisively, the court
deferred its ruling to May 2006.
"Nothing about the AU has
changed but the name", said a bitter
Shumba. "We can only conclude that the
African system, as a legal system to
enforce rights, is hopeless." He said
the only value of appealing to the
commission had been the ensuing
international publicity. He has abandoned
seeking recourse in Africa and has
taken his case to Canada.
A second test case confirms the
pessimists' outlook. This
concerns the long-delayed presentation to the
African Union assembly in July
2004 of the ACHPR's 2002 fact-finding mission
to investigate human-rights
abuses in Zimbabwe. Howls of protests from the
Zimbabwean delegation,
supported by the South Africans, resulted in the
report's adoption being
postponed.
"This indicated a
clear lack of political maturity at the AU to
hold member-states
accountable", said Zimbabwean political commentator Brian
Raftopoulos.
"Instead of defending and supporting the work of its own
independent
human-rights institution, the AU assembly chose to accede to the
demands of
the Zimbabwe government. Even when the assembly adopted the
report at Abuja
in January 2005, it did not adequately hold Zimbabwe
accountable."
"What (the assembly) ought to have done was
to publicly express
concern at the human-rights situation in Zimbabwe and
request the government
to commit itself to implementing the recommendations
of the ACHPR. This
would both have allowed the assembly to monitor
implementation of the
recommendations in future and bolstered the confidence
and role of the
commission", he said.
But in November
2005, a commission meeting again raised hopes
that perhaps, after all, the
organisation could make a clear stand in
defence of its own values. On that
occasion, the ACHPR condemned Zimbabwe's
human-rights record and pressured
Harare to stop evicting people from their
homes under the controversial
social-cleansing programme, Operation
Murambatsvina ("drive out the
rubbish").
At the meeting, the commission said it was
"alarmed by the
number of internally-displaced persons and the violations of
fundamental
individual and collective rights resulting from the forced
evictions being
carried out by the government of Zimbabwe". It urged
Mugabe's government to
allow an African Union delegation to visit Zimbabwe
on a fact-finding
mission. The report also called on the Harare government
to repeal several
repressive laws, to stop the forced evictions immediately
and to allow "full
and unimpeded access to international aid to help the
victims".
So far, so good. The problem is that afterwards,
nothing
happened - no follow-up, no enforcement mechanisms, no redress. The
AU's
fine words are little consolation to Zimbabwe's hungry, oppressed
people.
Sudan's price
Such
incidences of internal division, weakness, and loss of
nerve are helpful in
understanding what happened - or did not happen - at
the African Union
summit in Khartoum, Sudan on 16-24 January 2006.
Only thirty
of the fifty-three African state leaders attended
the summit. Several of
them will not even sit in the same room as their
putative continental
partners with whom they are engaged in bitter border
struggles or outright
wars; the enmity between former comrades, Eritrea's
Isaias Afewerki and
Ethiopia's Meles Zenawi, is only one such example.
The host
country would normally assume the chairmanship for the
ensuing year. In
Khartoum, however, Chad accused Sudan of hosting rebels
trying to unseat the
N'Djamena government; while other African leaders
charged Sudan with being
responsible for a crisis in its Darfur region that
has killed hundreds of
thousands of people and rendered millions homeless.
There, an
under-resourced African Union peacekeeping force of 7,000 attempts
the
impossible job of relieving a human disaster.
The unseemly
brawl over the chairmanship was resolved by
postponing Sudan's assumption of
the chairmanship of the AU until 2007. This
year, the union will be headed
not by Sudan's own president Omar al-Bashir
but Denis Sassou-Nguesso,
president of the Republic of the Congo
(Congo-Brazzaville). While the
leaders were squabbling, the United Nations
Food and Agriculture
Organisation (FAO) announced that 43 million Africans
would need food aid
this year - which is would cost $2 billion to supply.
Meanwhile, Ugandan
rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo were killing
eight UN
peacekeepers; and insurgents in Nigeria's oil-rich delta were
launching a
wave of attacks on public and commercial buildings.
The
Khartoum leaders were too busy quarrelling to address such
issues. Their
rivalries and twisted priorities eclipsed discussion of such
vital issues as
war and peace, famine and starvation, oppression and
freedom, unity and
economic development. Just like its predecessor, the
African Union had
failed the people of Africa.
News24
27/01/2006 18:18 -
(SA)
Harare - Members of a popular church sect in Zimbabwe are
refusing treatment
for the deadly cholera disease, claiming God will heal
them, said reports on
Friday.
Reports said police had to be called in
to confront members of Johanne
Marange Apostolic sect in the eastern Buhera
district, after an outbreak of
cholera.
The disease, which spreads
easily during the rainy season, had already
killed at least 14 people in
Zimbabwe.
Three of the victims were from Harare, where the authorities
had closed down
a popular fruit and vegetable market in a desperate bid to
stop the spread
of the disease.
Zimbabwe's deputy health minister
said the government would deal
"ruthlessly" with anyone trying to frustrate
its efforts to control the
disease.
Conventional forms of
medicine
Edwin Muguti said: "Those who resist medical attention,
especially during
this time of an outbreak of a life-threatening disease,
should face the full
wrath of the law."
Apostolics, who were well
known for their distinctive all-white clothing and
their practice of
gathering in the open to conduct their rites, were opposed
to conventional
forms of medicine.
Cholera broke out at Murambinda, a small settlement in
Buhera at the end of
the year. Health officials had been running cholera
awareness campaigns in
the area, but met resistance from the sect
members.
The reports said: "They (the officials) successfully penetrated
various
sections of the community until recently when they met a lot of
resistance
from members of the Johanne Marange church."
The Apostolic
church was estimated to have about three million followers in
Zimbabwe -
about one quarter of the population - but they were split into
many
different sects.
Reuters
Fri
Jan 27, 2006 10:44 AM ET
By Mateus Chale
MAPUTO (Reuters) - U.S. Internet
mogul Greg Carr has committed up to $40
million of his own cash to help
rebuild a game park in Mozambique which he
hopes to restock with animals
from elsewhere in Africa.
Carr, former chairman of Prodigy Internet and
Boston Technology, told
Reuters on Friday he wanted Gorongosa National Park
in central Mozambique to
recapture its place as a leading eco-tourism
destination in southern Africa.
The park, which lies at the southern end
of Africa's Rift Valley, was
largely destroyed during Mozambique's 16-year
civil war that ended in 1992.
The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Carr
Foundation has managed the 3,770 sq
km (1,455 sq mile) park for a year under
an agreement with the government,
which it is seeking to extend to at least
30 years, wildlife
conservationists say.
"I have committed personal
funds in excess of $30-to-$40 million (to develop
the park)," Carr told
Reuters in an interview.
He said he was looking for other foreign
partners to fund the park, which is
also supported by the U.S. Agency for
International Development.
"Gorongosa has the potential of being one of
Africa's most important tourism
destinations," said Carr, whose foundation
dedicated to human rights, the
environment and the arts was created in
1999.
"This year we will begin a re-introduction program to bring some
animals to
the park, so once again the ecosystem can be complete," he
said.
Rehabilitating the park -- including construction of a 6,000
hectare (23
square mile) sanctuary where animals are expected to breed --
will be
concluded by the end of rainy season in March.
The Carr
Foundation is in talks with animal relocation companies in Africa
to source
some species in Mozambique and neighboring countries such as
Zimbabwe and
South Africa, he said.
"The good news is that there are a lot of animals
now. We have almost 300
elephants, we do have a lot of antelope and fabulous
bird life," Carr said.
"For tourists there is a lot to see now but there
are still some other
species that are in very low numbers such as buffalo
and zebra," he added.
Sadly though, animals such as roan antelope,
cheetah and black rhino which
once inhabited Gorongosa were no longer to be
found, Mozambican wildlife
officials said.
Mozambique has undertaken
a program to improve infrastructure in its parks
as well as increase animal
numbers in some areas substantially diminished by
poaching and the civil war
-- in an operation that has usually included
moving transferring animals
from other existing facilities.
Since 2002, Mozambique has transferred
some 5,000 different animals to the
Limpopo National Park, one of its newer
animal reserves.
At least another 2,500 animals have been transferred
from the adjacent
Kruger National Park in South Africa to Limpopo --
part of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park that straddles Mozambique,
South Africa and Zimbabwe.
In the last four years, Mozambique, which
has dedicated some 15 percent of
its total area to conservation regions, has
created two national parks and
two reserves.
From: "Justice for Agriculture" <justiceforagriculture@zol.co.zw>
Sent:
Friday, January 27, 2006 9:06 PM
Subject: JAG Open Letter Forum
TO
ALL MEMBERS OF TREDAR ASSOCIATION
The sale of the Banket property has now
taken place and final dissolution
of the association is to take
place.
As you are all aware, with inflation at about 25% per month, the
value of
these funds will not be maintained indefinitely.
The current
value of the net assets is the equivalent of approximately
us$10 000.
Disbursement of this balance amongst 350 members will be a
minimal amount.
Your Trustees and Finance Committee have agreed to donate
this money to the
Farm Families Trust to assist former commercial farmers
in
distress.
Please contact Jean Simon on erewhon@mweb.co.zw if you have any
queries.
If you need financial support please contact Richard Brooker at
The Farm
Families Trust on brookwal@zol.co.zw
Yours
sincerely
Tredar Trustees
Tredar Finance Committee