The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02 July 2008 21:14
.. Sekeremayi to become
prime minister
BY STEPHEN BEVAN AND SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT IN
HARARE
A newly emboldened Robert Mugabe plans to drum up false charges
of
rape and robbery against MPs opposed to his Zanu (PF) party, to enable
him
to regain control of the parliament.
The president's party lost
its majority for the first time since
independence in March, when the
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) won
most seats in the lower house and
drew level with Zanu (PF) in the senate.
Now, after employing a
terrifying campaign of violence to hold on to
his presidential power, Mugabe
believes he can overturn the MDC majority
with underhand methods including
false imprisonment, kidnap and
intimidation, designed to make them forfeit
their seats.
'A number of MDC members of parliament will be trapped and
charged
with offences like rape or theft,' said a Zanu (PF) source. 'If they
are
convicted for six months they will be forced out of parliament and
Mugabe
will order more by-elections and again use terror to win
them.
'Even after three months, many MDC legislators are expected to be
out
of parliament because they will either run away from threats of arrest
or be
convicted.'
Under Zimbabwean law, MPs who do not attend
parliament for 21
consecutive days must give up their seats.
'They
are trying everything, including arresting and incarcerating MDC
MPs so they
go to prison for longer than they are allowed to be absent,'
said Alec
Muchadehama, a leading human rights lawyer. 'Most of the MDC MPs
are
actually in hiding. They say that if they come out into the open they
are
liable to be kidnapped and they will disappear so there has to be a
by-election in their constituency.'
So far, at least 10 newly
elected opposition MPs have been arrested on
spurious charges in what the
Zanu (PF) source confirmed is a carefully
worked out strategy.
Mugabe has already lodged legal challenges to the results in 53
parliamentary seats, claiming implausibly that they were rigged by the
opposition. However, the courts are likely to throw out those challenges on
the grounds they were filed too late and in the wrong places - just as they
did when the MDC attempted to force re-runs in some of the seats won by Zanu
(PF).
If any seats are recontested, Mugabe will employ the same
brutal
tactics used in the presidential election to ensure victory.
'We have been ordered to start work immediately after the court
decisions to
ensure election re-runs are conducted as soon as possible,'
said a Zanu (PF)
source, who added that the courts have been instructed to
expedite the
cases. He said the ruling party would regain control of the
parliament
within six months, even if it meant '2008 would be called the
year of
Zimbabwean elections'.
Although Zanu PF and the MDC won equal numbers
of seats in the upper
house
or senate, the president can appoint
another 33 members, including
provincial governors and tribal chiefs.
According to the source,
Mugabe will further consolidate the party's grip on
power by creating the
new position of prime minister, which will be given to
Dr Sydney Sekeramayi,
another loyalist now serving as defence
minister.
Only then, said the source, will he feel secure enough to
retire in
favour of a chosen heir. - First published in The Telegraph
The Times
July 3, 2008
James Bone in New York and Jonathan Clayton in
Johannesburg
Pressure was mounting last night for the key role of mediating
an end to the
crisis in Zimbabwe to be taken out of the hands of Thabo
Mbeki, the
President of South Africa, whose "softly softly" approach to
Robert Mugabe
has been condemned worldwide.
The UN's push for greater
involvement came amid mounting frustration with
the failure of current
mediation efforts. The United States pushed for Mr
Mugabe and other
ring-leaders of election abuses in Zimbabwe to be slapped
with a worldwide
travel ban and the freezing of their assets.
Diplomats said that the UN
was considering a shortlist of leading African
politicians, including the
former UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, to help
negotiate a political
settlement in the country.
Other possible mediators include the former
Nigerian President, Olusegun
Obasanjo; the former President of Mozambique,
Joaquim Chissano; and
President John Kufuor of Ghana.
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Mugabe
At a meeting in Egypt on Monday, the African Union stopped short of
condemning the fraudulent re-election of Mr Mugabe but approved a resolution
calling on him to negotiate with Morgan Tsvangirai, the opposition leader,
who pulled out of the run-off poll after a campaign of violence against him
and his supporters.
Mr Mugabe returned to Zimbabwe yesterday aware
that even neighbours such as
Botswana, which publicly urged his expulsion
from the AU, were turning
against him. Mr Tsvangirai kept up the pressure on
the international
community. He again rejected the AU decision to keep Mr
Mbeki, who is the
official mediator of the Southern African Development
Community (SADC), in
sole charge of efforts to resolve the political
crisis.
Speaking to reporters at his home in Harare, Mr Tsvangirai said
that the
Opposition would not participate in talks unless an additional
mediator was
appointed. "Our reservations about the mediation process under
President
Mbeki are well known," said Mr Tsvangirai, who leads the
opposition Movement
for Democratic Change (MDC), which just failed to win an
outright victory in
a first poll.
"Unless the mediation mechanism is
changed, no meaningful progress can be
made toward resolving the Zimbabwe
crisis," he said.
Mr Mbeki, 66, dispatched some of his closest advisers
to Harare to push for
talks. South Africa has yet to recognise Mr Mugabe's
re-election but has
distanced itself from the European Union's condemnation
of the poll. Mr
Mugabe, who has frequently pulled the wool over the eyes of
Mr Mbeki, will
have a harder time from a United Nations or African Union-led
team.
Diplomats say that the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki Moon, plans to
discuss
the possible appointment of a new mediator with Mr Mbeki when both
men are
in Japan next week for the G8 summit. He will also consult Jakaya
Kikwete,
the Tanzanian President and the AU's current chairman.
As
the search for a new mediator intensified, US diplomats circulated a
proposed blacklist of 12 names as an annexe to a proposed resolution that
would take the symbolic step of imposing sanctions on Zimbabwe for the first
time since independence in 1980.
Mr Mugabe is named as the "head of
government responsible for activities
that seriously undermine democracy,
repress human rights and disrespect the
rule of law". Constantine Chiwenga,
the commander of the Zimbabwean Army;
Augustine Chihuri, the police chief;
Perence Shiri, the head of the air
force; and Gideon Gono, the central bank
governor, are named on the list,
circulated by the United
States.
Also included are Patrick Chinamasa, the Justice Minister; George
Charamba,
Mr Mugabe's spokesman; Emmerson Mnangagwa, the Rural Housing
Minister; and
Happyton Bonyongwe, the chief of the Central Intelligence
Organisation.
US diplomats held more talks in New York last night to
round up the votes
necessary for adoption of the resolution by the 15-nation
council, possibly
next week.
South Africa, Russia and China oppose
the sanctions and are backed by Libya,
Vietnam and Indonesia. Burkina Faso
is the key ninth vote needed by the
Western bloc. A Western diplomat said
yesterday that Burkina Faso was
"holding up well". The resolution will be
adopted if it is backed by the
necessary nine votes, unless it is vetoed by
China or, less likely, Russia.
A diplomat from a country that opposes the
resolution predicted that China
would be reluctant to cast its veto because
of the Olympics.
Zim Online
by Cuthbert Nzou Thursday 03 July
2008
HARARE - President Robert Mugabe's government has begun
installing new local
government councils that will see the opposition take
control of all major
urban municipalities in Zimbabwe.
The opposition
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party already controls
the House of
Assembly after defeating Mugabe's ruling ZANU PF party in
combined
presidential, parliamentary and local government elections in
March.
Mugabe lost to MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai in March but won a
presidential
run-off election last week in which he was sole candidate after
Tsvangirai
pulled out because of political violence. That victory allows
Mugabe to rule
Zimbabwe although local authority in the capital Harare and
all other major
cities will be in opposition hands.
"Taking of oath
of office for the newly elected councillors started on
Tuesday in Harare,"
Local Government Minister Ignatius Chombo said. "The
exercise will be
replicated in other councils throughout the country before
this weekend. We
delayed the swearing in ceremony to allow for the
presidential
election."
However Chombo did not cite the law which he used to postpone
installation
of new councils which, in terms of the Urban Councils Act,
should be done
within 48 hours after election of new councillors.
In
addition to Harare, where the MDC won 45 of the 46 wards that were
contested, the opposition party won with overwhelming margins in the cities
of Bulawayo, Mutare, Masvingo Chitungwiza, Kwekwe and Chinhoyi.
The
opposition party also made significant inroads into rural areas where it
won
several council seats at the expense of ZANU PF.
In Harare, prominent
lawyer and chairperson of the Voluntary Media Council
of Zimbabwe, Muchadeyi
Masunda, was elected the capital's ceremonial mayor,
taking over from
Michael Mahachi who has been the chairman of a commission
appointed by
Chombo to run the affairs of the council.
Councillor Emmanuel Chiroto,
whose wife was murdered by suspected ZANU PF
militia in the run-up to the
June 27 second presidential election run-off,
will deputise
Masunda.
MDC spokesperson Nelson Chamisa said on Wednesday that the
opposition party
hoped that Mugabe's government would not interfere with the
daily operations
of local councils, as Chombo did four years ago when he
removed the
MDC-backed executive mayor of Harare Elias Mudzuri and his
entire council.
Since then the capital has been run by
government-appointed commissions
accountable to Mugabe and his party and not
to ratepayers.
Chombo also removed the mayors and councillors of Mutare,
Gweru and Kwekwe
accusing them of mismanagement but analysts said the
removals were merely a
ploy by the government to retain control of urban
councils through the
backdoor.
Zimbabwe last year scrapped the
position of executive mayor for urban
councils. Ceremonial mayors, who are
either elected councillors or anyone
owning property within a respective
municipality, now preside over urban
councils. - ZimOnline
Independent, UK
By
Basildon Peta in Johannesburg
Thursday, 3 July 2008
After
"winning" the controversial presidential run-off last week, Robert
Mugabe is
focusing his sights on regaining control of parlia-ment, were he
trails the
opposition by about 10 MPs, The Independent has learnt.
The fear among
some sources in Zimbabwe is that he will attempt to achieve
this with a
campaign of targeted assassinations of opposition MPs.
Mr Mugabe is
assured of a comfortable majority in the upper house, the
Senate, via a
constitutional provision that will allow him to appoint an
extra 33 senators
from his ruling party.
The opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai yesterday
rejected proposals for a
government of national unity headed by Mr Mugabe.
"A government of national
unity does not address the problems facing
Zimbabwe or acknowledge the will
of the Zimbabwean people," he said in
response to an African Union (AU)
resolution.
He said that any talks
should be based on the outcome of the elections on 29
March, which he won,
and not the run-off on 27 June "won" by Mr Mugabe.
The MDC leader also
reiterated his position that any talks must be centred
on negotiating a
transitional authority that will run the country until
fresh democratic
elections are held.
Mr Tsvangirai also spurned any talks with Mr Mugabe's
regime until a
full-time AU mediator is appointed to replace Thabo Mbeki,
the South African
President, whom the MDC accuses of bias towards the Mugabe
regime. The MDC
leader criticised the AU for its failure to declare the
run-off on 27 June
illegitimate and for not acknowledging his party as the
winner of the
elections on 29 March.
A senior member of the Zimbabwe
National Army, who is sympathetic to the
opposition, said the MDC was
wasting its time if it believed it could
achieve change in Zimbabwe through
talking to Mr Mugabe. "Zimbabwe will be
forgotten again and Tsvangirai will
lose the limelight," said the official.
"Unlike before, he [Tsvangirai] has
a few African governments willing to
lend him a sympathetic ear should he
opt for other options to tackle Mugabe.
The ball is in his court."
Independent, UK
By Daniel Howden in Harare
Thursday, 3 July
2008
He has whipped strangers with barbed wire and hit them with iron
bars. He
has stood by while old men were beaten half to death, as he chanted
songs
glorifying the violence.
Gibson became one of Robert Mugabe's
foot soldiers when the 84-year-old
President turned an election into a
guerrilla war. He is one of thousands of
members of the armed youth militias
who have turned on their own people in a
vicious campaign of looting,
torture and murder. But now Gibson is risking
his life to tell his story. He
was forcibly recruited into the campaign of
terror and now he can see no way
out. Not yet 25, his life is now completely
"alien" to him he says. There is
no end in sight, even now the elections
have come and gone and the terror
tactics have succeeded in overturning the
opposition's first round lead and
returned Mr Mugabe to office.
"I have no idea when it will stop. We have
been told we must go door to door
finding the MDC persons. Maybe tonight,
maybe in two, three days' time."
It started just a month ago at dusk when
Gibson was sitting on the pavement
outside a shopping centre in Warren Park,
a dirt poor area of Harare. He was
confronted by a gang of 30 youths wearing
the colours of Mr Mugabe's ruling
Zanu-PF party.
Armed with whips and
sticks they attacked everyone indiscriminately. "They
beat us like animals.
Like we were defenceless schoolchildren."
In the mêlée there was one
figure who stood out. An older man in a Zanu
T-shirt, wearing an army beret
and a silver pistol in a holster. A
self-declared "war vet" he was the one
issuing threats in all directions.
"He was shouting 'If the MDC wins I'm
going to kill everyone,' and 'if you
vote MDC you vote for
war'."
Everyone was ordered to the local primary school. There were more
beatings
there, and the songs started. All-night sessions, or pungwes,
chanting party
slogans and songs from the liberation war of the
1970s.
Dissenters were beaten "thoroughly", blows from bars, sticks and
whips that
would often leave the victim broken and
unconscious.
Slogans had to be memorised. "I would chant 'War' and the
answer was 'Right
now'."
As the second round of the presidential vote
neared, the chant became: "27
June, Mugabe is in office!" The answer was:
"27 June, Mugabe is in office!
By force!"
People were told to bring
any MDC paraphernalia they had to the meetings.
T-shirts would be burnt,
suspected opposition voters would be forced to
renounce their vote and swear
oaths of loyalty. Many had to sign in twice a
day to keep track of their
whereabouts.
Now trained and "re-educated" the new Zanu youth militia was
ready to be
sent on "patrol", roaming the streets of their home area after
dark,
stopping anyone not attending the pungwes or just walking in the wrong
direction. Anyone who didn't know the chant would be savagely
assaulted.
Gibson tells his story in an urgent manner but the tone is
flat, as though
reciting a report of events, stripped of all feeling. Pushed
to recall
feelings as well as facts his expression changes, his eyes
water.
"For someone to be scared of me, to hit people, is completely
alien." He
repeats this word "alien" and then becomes angry.
Last
week he was given a sjamboek for the first time, an improvised whip
made
from recycled rubber with knots of barbed wire. It is light to hold, he
says, and inflicts horrendous damage. "You can't hit someone with barbed
wire," he insists, although he has.
"I feel like I'm being forced to
kill someone. But I have to do it because
if I don't, it will be me
next."
He cannot be sure whether he has seen people die. He remembers a
man, a
known opposition supporter, being tortured. "He was really beaten and
when
they stopped he wasn't moving. "I was thinking, what if that was my
brother?"
Others, he says, have begun to enjoy it, some of them have
started to
believe what they are chanting.
"They think they're in a
war. They are crazy."
Their patrols are often raids. Last Monday, their
"mission" was to loot a
fuel depot, stealing 250 litres of diesel. Local
beer halls are forced to
donate dozens of crates and the militia are
encouraged to drink it before
going on patrol or missions. This diet is
supplemented by smoking dagga, a
form of marijuana.
Gibson says that
he tries to warn people what is in store if he can. "When
it starts, there
is nothing I can do. Even if I know the person, even if it
was a close
relative, I can't help."
Pungwes, patrols, beer, fear, beatings and
chanting, this is how Gibson has
been "reborn" as a Zanu believer. It was a
reluctant birth into a life he
now hates. "I can't go home, not for more
than a few hours. Every night I
have to sleep at the base."
The
militias are not paid anything but beer and dagga.
Gibson has a wife and
a baby, a girl of two months, born between the first
round of the
presidential election, and the run-off on 27 June. "I have a
wife and a
child," he says in despair. "That child needs to eat something."
The
family had scraped a living from petty trading but now there is no time
for
that. At night they are sometimes fed sadza, a maize porridge, but
eating
brings guilt.
"You can't eat. Your child, your baby, is hungry. To eat
well while your
family is hungry, it is pointless."
The stolen
minutes at home can be equally painful. "My wife, sometimes she
thinks I'm
not enough of a man. You know the things ladies say. "But then
she cries and
is sorry, she knows what will happen if I don't go.
"If I was alone I
could run. If we could just run away... But in the rural
areas it's
worse."
What does he think of the liberation hero, the 84-year- old
leader whom he
chants for? "He's destroying our future. We are not doing
anything
productive. I've got nothing. In the shops there is
nothing."
What will happen to Gibson? "I don't know," he says. "Maybe
I'll die."
Names have been changed to protect identities
Yahoo News
Wed
Jul 2, 3:56 PM ET
UNITED NATIONS (AFP) - A US draft resolution would slap
a UN arms embargo on
Zimbabwe as well as financial and travel sanctions on
President Robert
Mugabe and 11 of his aides, according to the text seen by
AFP Wednesday.
The text also demands that the Harare government
"begin without delay a
substantive dialogue between the parties with the aim
of arriving at a
peaceful solution that reflects the will of the Zimbabwean
people as
expressed by the March 29 (first-round presidential)
elections."
The US draft would require all member states to take the
necessary measures
to prevent the direct or indirect supply, sale or
transfer to Zimbabwe..."of
arms or related material of all types, including
weapons and ammunition,
military vehicles and equipment, paramilitary
equipment and spare parts."
The text, not yet formally introduced in the
15-member Security Council,
would also impose a travel ban and an assets
freeze on Mugabe, Reserve Bank
Governor Gideon Gono, Justice Minister
Patrick Chinamasa and nine others for
their role in abetting the
state-sponsored violence against the opposition,
repressing human rights or
undermining democracy.
The draft is virtually certain to be watered down
as South Africa, the
principle mediator in Zimbabwe's domestic political
crisis, and
veto-wielding China, a key ally of Harare, oppose its tough
provisions.
US Ambassador to the UN Zalmay Khalilzad said he was
continuing
consultations on the text Wednesday, adding: "We should be in a
position to
introduce something (formally) relatively
soon."
Khalilzad also told reporters that the Security Council would hear
a
briefing on Zimbabwe developments next Tuesday.
He said the
15-member council would hear from UN Deputy Secretary General
Asha-Rose
Migiro, who attended the just-ended African Union (AU) summit in
Egypt.
AU leaders on Tuesday adopted a resolution that called for a
power-sharing
deal with the opposition.
Council members were also to
be briefed by Haile Menkerios, an UN assistant
secretary general for
political affairs who sought to mediate an end to the
crisis in Zimbabwe
last month and held talks with Mugabe ahead of the June
27 one-man runoff
election.
Tsvangirai on Wednesday rejected calls to form a national unity
government,
saying it would not solve the country's crisis after Mugabe's
widely
condemned one-man election.
He said such an arrangement would
merely accommodate Mugabe after much of
the world had labeled his regime
illegitimate.
Tsvangirai defeated Mugabe in the first round of the
presidential election
on March 29, but official vote totals showed him just
short of an outright
majority.
The opposition leader subsequently
pulled out of last Friday's run-off,
saying nearly 90 of his supporters had
been killed and thousands injured in
violence he blamed on pro-Mugabe
militia.
Daily Express
Morgan
Tsvangirai wants a new mediator for the unity talks
Wednesday July
2,2008
Zimbabwe's political leaders have clashed over whether to talk
about how to
resolve the country's crisis as the US called for UN sanctions
against
President Robert Mugabe and his officials.
Speaking to
reporters, opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai said his party
would not
participate in talks about forming a governing accord with Mr
Mugabe's
government unless a mediator was appointed alongside South African
President
Thabo Mbeki.
On Tuesday, an African Union summit reconfirmed President
Mbeki as Africa's
mediator, even though Mr Tsvangirai has repeatedly
rejected him, accusing
him of pro-Mugabe bias. Mr Mugabe has praised
President Mbeki.
"Our reservations about the mediation process under
President Mbeki are well
known," Mr Tsvangirai, head of the opposition
Movement for Democratic Change
(MDC), said outside his home in
Harare.
"Unless the mediation team is expanded... and the mediation
mechanism is
changed, no meaningful progress can be made towards resolving
the Zimbabwe
crisis. If this does not happen, then the MDC will not be part
of the
mediation process," he said.
The opposition "as the winner of
the last credible elections on March 29
2008, should be recognised as the
legitimate government of Zimbabwe," he
added.
Mr Tsvangirai came in
first in the first round of presidential voting in
March. Electoral
officials said Mr Tsvangirai did not take 50% of the vote,
however, and
scheduled a run-off against second-place finisher Mr
Mugabe.
State-supported violence against opposition members forced Mr
Tsvangirai to
withdraw days before Friday's run-off. Mr Mugabe held the vote
anyway and
was declared the overwhelming winner on Sunday.
Meanwhile,
a draft resolution the US wants the UN Security Council to
consider proposes
freezing the financial assets of Mr Mugabe and 11 of his
officials and
banning them from travelling.
The draft also demands that Mr Mugabe's
government immediately begin talks
with the opposition. The US is president
of the Security Council this month.
Newsweek
It just got tougher for Zimbabwe to
print banknotes. So how do people cope
in a country where even a bus ride
costs billions?
By Rod Nordland | Newsweek Web Exclusive
Jul 2, 2008 |
Updated: 4:07 p.m. ET Jul 2, 2008
Harare-John Robertson, a
Zimbabwean economist, went to the dentist yesterday
with a painful tooth
that needed urgent work, but before he could get it
done, he had to arrange
payment. His choices were these: Either he could pay
in Zim dollars, in
which case he'd need a bag of them, because the bill for
his dentistry was
$1.3 trillion, plus the limit for cash withdrawals from
his bank account was
only $25 billion daily. Or he could pay by check on his
Zimbabwean bank
account, in which case, since it takes a week to clear the
check and the Zim
dollar is plummeting in value, he'd have to write the
check for double the
amount, $2.6 trillion. Or he could just go out and find
foreign exchange,
either South African rand or U.S. dollars, about $50. "My
only choice was to
go out and find some foreign exchange."
"The figures for this economy are
just unbelievable," says Robertson. He
reckons the current inflation rate,
comparing this June to last June, at
somewhere between 8 million and 10
million percent. Others, such as the
Financial Gazette, a Harare newspaper,
have put currency inflation at 32
million percent-at the current rate of
increase. Regardless, the numbers are
so astronomical that it's hard to
imagine just how Zimbabweans manage to
cope. With commercial agriculture in
collapse since the nationalization of
white-owned farms, 40 percent of the
economy is down the tubes. In addition,
harvests this year were only 10
percent of what was expected, due to drought
and lack of inputs; the Food
and Agriculture Organization expects that 5
million people will need food
aid by September. The mining sector is
similarly troubled, particularly
gold, and its biggest platinum mine-the
largest in the world-has voluntarily
stopped production due to the unrest
surrounding the election. Shelves in
the stores and markets are nearly
empty, particularly of foodstuffs, but of
nearly all goods. "It's very odd,"
says Jonathan Moyo, an independent MP and
Mugabe's former information
minister. "The shops are empty but fridges and
pantries are not empty."
Somehow, at least in the capital and other urban
areas, people do seem to
manage. Largely this is because of the 4 million
people who have fled to
neighboring countries, 3 million to South Africa,
the remainder to Botswana
and others. "Zimbabwe no longer has any exports
except its most valuable
product, its people," says a Western diplomat.
"This has become a remittance
economy and a barter economy." Foreign workers
send hard currency home, and
many Zimbabweans travel to places like Botswana
to do their shopping-in
bulk. The government doesn't try to stop that,
because it collects duties in
the form of hard currency, which it
desperately needs, on items they bring
back. "The entire economy of cities
like Bulawayo has just been shifted
across the border, to places like
Francistown," said the diplomat. "This is
lunacy that passes for
policy."
Meanwhile the government just keeps cranking out currency in
greater and
greater quantities, meaning it simply keeps decreasing in value.
The Reserve
Bank of Zimbabwe's solely owned subsidiary, Fidelity Printing
and Refining
Limited, now works 24 hours a day, seven days a week, churning
out bills of
up to $50 billion. In addition, according to diplomats here, a
German
company, Giesecke and Devrient GmbH, prints about half of the
government's
currency and also supplies all of its banknote paper. "Stop the
supply of
money, and it will stop this government in its tracks," said
another Western
diplomat. Actually, that just happened today. A spokesman
for Giesecke and
Devrient, Hieko Witzke, contacted by telephone at the
company's offices in
Munich, Germany, said the company had decided to
immediately stop supplying
Zimbabwe as the result of a recent request by the
German government. "We
decided to cease deliveries to the Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe yesterday," he
said. "We have taken the decision in response to an
official German
government request and international calls for sanctions
from the European
Union and United Nations." He refused to comment on
reports here that the
Zimbabwean government had not yet paid the company for
the paper and
banknotes it has been supplying.
The Zimbabwe
government was alarmed enough by the pressure on its currency
that it
announced today that it would allow depositors to withdraw $100
billion a
day from their accounts, and added that it was taking measures to
reduce the
supply of money. It may not have much choice. Robertson, the
economist, says
the Reserve Bank has plates for a new currency, without all
the zeroes,
which it could issue-but it's an open question whether it could
print the
replacement bills quickly enough to do a massive devaluation,
especially
without the German company's help.
"You can rig an election," says
political scientist John Makumbe of the
University of Zimbabwe, "but you
can't rig an economy, which will say,
ah-ha, the holes are still leaking.
How long can they go on? I don't think
they can survive very long, lop off
all the zeroes, the zeroes would crawl
right back in. They're trading in
fiction, anyone can see that."
For years now, observers of the Zimbabwe
scene have been talking about
reaching the tipping point when the economy
just collapses entirely and the
currency becomes as worthless as Weimar
Republic paper-they were saying that
back in the late '90s, when inflation
was "only" 40,000 percent a year. "I
don't think in Africa you get a tipping
point," said an economist at a
Western embassy. "The formal sector just
slides into the informal sector,
but what happens is the government loses
its ability to raise revenue."
Robertson takes the view that sooner or later
it has to come to an end. "The
tipping point will come when the people with
the guns say don't even think
of paying us in Zimbabwean dollars, we want
foreign exchange. We want
something we can actually spend."
In the
meantime, though, the government goes to extreme measures to make
sure that
won't happen. Favored government officials and ruling party
members are
given the right to import cars and other goods duty-free, and to
buy foreign
currency at the government's official rate-now less than half of
the street
or black-market rate. Fuel, too, prohibitively expensive here
now, is also
sold to government officials at concessionary prices, a
fraction of the
market value. "It's a form of asset stripping," says
Makumbe. "They're
looting the country." So in Harare, there are, considering
the economic
crisis, an astonishing number of late model SUVs and luxury
cars.
Over at Fidelity Printing and Refining, on George Drive in the
Msala
Industrial Area in Harare, the unmarked plant had a line of such cars
out
the gates and a quarter-mile down the road-to buy subsidized fuel from
the
Reserve Bank's pumps.
Another move the government has made to
try to raise hard cash has been to
monopolize gold production, requiring all
gold miners, big firms and
individual panners to sell their gold to the
government at rates far below
world prices. That gold is either refined at
Fidelity or, more recently,
diverted to another Reserve Bank-owned company,
Aurex, where it is made into
jewelry in order to maximize the return from
it. But the result of this
policy has been a catastrophic fall in gold
production, from a ton a month
to only 350 kilograms (about 770 pounds) a
month now, according to
Robertson, which he says is the lowest level since
1907.
A visit today to Aurex's plant and its retail gold outlet store in
the
village of Ruwa, about 20 miles east of Harare, was instructive. Entry
to
the gold store is by invitation only, but wrangling one isn't that
difficult
for buyers with foreign exchange. Aurex is on a road in an
isolated
industrial estate, the turn indicated only by a signpost reading
"Liquorland." Behind high walls and double electronic gates, the buildings
sprawl over a large compound. But inside the gold store, there's an
astonishing paucity of gold on sale, mostly a few thin chains and slight
rings, all only 9 karats. "It's the situation," a clerk said. The only other
customers were two Reserve Bank employees, who explained they were taking
advantage of the 10 percent discount they get for buying gold. "It sounds
like people are hedging their bets by getting in first," says
Robertson.
Moyo says it's unsurprising that Zimbabwe is wildly printing
paper. "It's
fire-fighting, what anyone else in a similar situation would
do." Such moves
have been made necessary, in his view, by the sanctions on
Zimbabwe and by
denial of credit facilities to it by international
institutions. "No one
wants to lend money to this country," he says. "I
don't know any third-world
country that would survive this kind of
pressure." Just possibly, it won't.
With Tiffanie Wen in London
The Scotsman
Published Date: 03 July 2008
By HAMISH
MACDONELL
SCOTTISH POLITICAL EDITOR
THE Church of Scotland Moderator,
David Lunan, today backs direct
intervention in Zimbabwe by other African
countries - even including
military action - to oust president Robert Mugabe
from power.
Writing in The Scotsman, the Rt Rev Lunan, who took over as the
Moderator of
the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland earlier this
year, says
something has to be done to end the suffering in the southern
African
country.
The Moderator is adamant that intervention should
not come from the West or
from former colonial powers, insisting that it is
up to African countries to
take the lead.
But he said that, if other
African nations do decide to intervene militarily
to remove Mugabe and
re-establish democracy, then he would give that action
his full
support.
Mr Lunan says: "A lasting solution can only come from within the
southern
African region. Even as we condemn the violence, and call on our
own
government to act, we recognise that Western-led action will only make
the
situation worse.
"We support intervention led by Africans to
solve an African problem. We
call on our government to back African
involvement, even if that includes
direct intervention."
The
Moderator's strong comments came as Gordon Brown hit out at Mugabe's
"blood-stained" Zimbabwean regime and branded last weekend's election result
a "travesty".
Mugabe was re-elected as President of Zimbabwe last
weekend in an
uncontested election after his rival, Morgan Tsvangirai,
withdrew warning
that his supporters risked getting killed if they went out
to vote.
The decision by Mr Lunan to speak out so forcibly and to back
military
action, if that is the decision by other African nations,
represents a
significant step for the Kirk. But the Moderator feels so
strongly about the
situation in Zimbabwe because he has heard repeated
stories from church
colleagues in the southern African country and knows
that, without some form
of intervention, the suffering and brutality will
continue.
He says: "Just as in years past a passion for justice has
united southern
Africans to bring down the racist Federation of Rhodesia and
Nyasaland and
the apartheid regime in South Africa, so today we look to the
leaders and
people of southern Africa to bring an end to the monstrous
oppression being
endured by the people of Zimbabwe."
And he adds: "We
believe that action can be taken which will restore the
hope of the people
of Zimbabwe.
"Responsibility for that action lies with all of us, with
people of good
will here in the UK, and in the West, and especially with
Zimbabwe's
neighbours in Africa."
Brown in pledge on
sanctions
GORDON Brown hit out at the uncontested presidential election
during Prime
Ministers Question's yesterday.
Mr Brown told the
Commons that the "only credible" election was the earlier
one, in which the
opposition "MDC recorded a victory".
He welcomed the African Union's call
for an end to violence and mediation,
before setting up a "transitional"
government in the country.
"Having talked to the UN Secretary General
this morning, I think it's right
that the UN send an envoy to
Zimbabwe.
"In the absence of real change we will step up our sanctions
and ask other
countries to do so," he warned.
"We will press for
tough action on Zimbabwe at the Security Council later
today. We will do so
at the G8 in the coming days."
The Scotsman
Published Date: 29 June 2008
By Kenny
Farquharson
THE cacophony of high-minded criticism aimed at Zimbabwe's Robert
Mugabe was
suddenly cut short last week, albeit only for a short
while.
Just as the rhetoric from the White House, Downing Street
and Brussels was
reaching a new peak of righteous outrage, opposition leader
Morgan
Tsvangirai published a heartfelt plea in a number of western
newspapers. It
contained this phrase: "The people of Zimbabwe need the words
of indignation
from global leaders to be backed by the moral rectitude of
military force."
Military force? Ah. The governments of the West stopped
in mid-denunciation.
Tumbleweed blew across the floor of the United Nations
Security Council
meeting room in New York. Is the UN or Nato really prepared
to come to
Tsvangirai's aid and use military force to help oust Mugabe? Not
a chance.
The request for help is couched in what seems like reasonable
terms: "We do
not want armed conflict. (but] we need a force to protect the
people. Such a
force would be in the role of peacekeepers, not
troublemakers. They would
separate the people from their oppressors and cast
the protective shield
around the democratic process for which Zimbabwe
yearns."
Tsvangirai is calling the West's bluff. Given the rhetoric of
recent years
from Washington and London about the need to depose despots and
bring
democracy to benighted corners of the world, the message coming from
the
Zimbabwean opposition is a simple one: prove to us that these are not
empty
words; prove to us that the West cares about these principles even
when
there is no oil at stake; prove to us that you are not
hypocrites.
What Tsvangirai suggests is a peace-keeping force, but, of
course, it
wouldn't be as simple as that. Any western military force
deployed by the UN
or Nato would be taking one side in what would quickly
become a civil war.
It wouldn't be a straightforward question of isolating
Mugabe and a few
henchmen.
Inevitably, any western intervention would
justify the Mugabe propaganda
that opposition to his rule is the residue of
British colonialism and a
symptom of the racist view that the white man
knows best. Most pertinently,
while Mugabe and his generals control the
army, force would be met with
force, bringing about a bloody conflict on a
scale as yet unseen by
Zimbabweans.
Last week Paddy Ashdown suggested
an African Union force, with western
support, could intervene if the
violence worsened. But African leaders show
no sign of having the appetite
for such an operation.
For people like myself who supported military
intervention in Kosovo,
Afghanistan, and (having been misled about the
evidence on WMDs) Iraq,
Zimbabwe poses a moral dilemma. I believe it is
sometimes justified to
breach national sovereignty. There's no doubt in my
mind that the
international community should have intervened militarily in
Rwanda in 1994.
So why not Zimbabwe in 2008? The only answer is cruel and
calculating - but
unavoidable. In Rwanda, what the world was faced with was
genocide. In
Zimbabwe, the killing has been widespread and appalling, but
not nearly on a
Rwandan scale.
Back in 1981 at some international
conference or other, Mugabe was chatting
to Winnie Ewing, the grande dame of
Scottish Nationalism. She complained to
him that the SNP was not doing too
well in whipping up nationalist fervour.
Mugabe had some words of wisdom to
impart. "That's because the people of
Scotland are not yet sufficiently
oppressed," he said.
After so many murders, rapes, incarcerations and
beatings, it seems a cold
judgment to say that the people of Zimbabwe are
not at this moment
"sufficiently oppressed" to justify a military invasion
to secure and
enforce democracy. Yet this is the international community's
verdict on
Tsvangirai's heartfelt appeal. It's hard to argue
otherwise.
So what is to be done? Last week brought the first encouraging
signs that
cracks were appearing in the Harare regime. There were reports
that senior
colleagues of Mugabe were making overtures to the opposition
about doing
deals to save them from persecution if a new government took
over. Could the
regime collapse in on itself, taking Mugabe with
it?
The West takes a gamble every time it hopes that the internal
dynamics of a
troubled country will result in its despotic leader being
deposed. Sometimes
this succeeds - Ceausescu in Romania and Milosevic in
Serbia were both
ultimately brought down by their own peoples. But more
often this is a
gamble that fails, or goes awry. When Nato forces expelled
Saddam Hussein
from Kuwait in 1991, hopes that the Iraqi opposition could be
relied upon to
topple him proved overly optimistic. They underestimated the
brutality with
which Saddam could identify and punish dissent. Worryingly,
in Zimbabwe last
week, Mugabe's security forces were trying to identify
which members of the
regime had been putting out feelers to
Tsvangirai.
What of the other options? It's hard to endorse the sanctions
regime
currently being demanded by all sides. True, there is some
satisfaction to
be gained from depriving the regime's senior figures of the
right to
international travel, foreign bank accounts and a British education
for
their children. But the experience of Iraq is that broader economic
sanctions only serve to further impoverish the already pitifully poor.
Zimbabwe demands our attention. But history tells us to take care in
responding to the cry that "something must be done!"
Daily Nation, Kenya
Story by LOUIS MICHEL
Publication Date: 7/3/2008 THIS
WEEK, ROBERT MUGABE fired a shot at the
international community, saying its
members "could shout as loud as they
like" but that it wouldn't make a blind
bit of difference to election plans
in the country since it was for the
people to decide.
It is very unnerving to find myself agreeing,
even if it is just in
part, with Mugabe. Democracy is, indeed, the voice of
the people being heard
and respected. It's just that he has chosen to muffle
that democratic voice.
Let's not forget that opposition MDC leader
Morgan Tsvangirai won the
first round of elections back in late March.
Mugabe and his cronies may like
to think that such a resounding call for
change can just be forgotten amid
the chaos and bloody terror of present day
Zimbabwe - but it cannot. The
people of Zimbabwe will not forget. We will
not forget.
SATURDAY, MARCH 29, MARKED THE first day of the end of
this regime.
Mugabe's posturing as a hero of anti-colonialism which once
earned him
popularity in Zimbabwe and in Africa is fooling no one any more.
African
voices of democracy and justice are being heard.
And
let me also calmly point out to Mr Mugabe that the international
community
has no need to shout because the truth can be heard even when it's
a
whisper.
The truth is that the international community will
continue to stand
united with the people of Zimbabwe with actions and not
just words. The
ordinary citizens of Zimbabwe want and need the
international community to
maintain pressure on Mugabe and his
cronies.
One of the clearest signals of our intentions to do so
would be to
publicly commit to a post-Mugabe assistance plan in union with
our African
partners.
Of course, there are several scenarios
that could play out, including
that of some form of transitional government.
When that time for change
comes, the only guarantee is that any future
legitimate government will face
an incredibly daunting task of rebuilding a
state that has been brought to
its knees.
Millions are on the
brink of starvation - a situation made worse by
Mugabe's recent decision to
prevent European Commission life-saving
humanitarian aid from being
distributed.
The economy is gasping for its last breath. The
inflation rate is out
of control, unemployment is the norm rather than the
exception. And despite
all this, I sincerely believe Zimbabwe has the
potential to recover from
this crisis.
The European Commission,
on behalf of the EU, is the most important
donor towards the people of
Zimbabwe providing more than 90 million euros in
aid last year that targeted
areas from emergency food aid to basic needs in
the health and education
sectors.
Let me assure the citizens of Zimbabwe that we are ready
to help when
change comes - no matter what it takes.
Within the
framework of the European Development Fund, the European
Commission stands
ready with at least 250 million euros available to assist
in the
stabilisation of the country. This funding could focus on supporting
hospitals, schools or on the farming sector that was once the pride of the
nation.
Of course, we would work with our partners within SADC
and the African
Union to identify other key areas of the economy needing our
financial,
structural and programmed support.
One key area will
be ensuring significant debt-relief to free any
legitimate government of the
massive debts accumulated by the Mugabe regime.
These are just some
of the practical reasons why I would encourage the
rest of the international
donor community to make it clear today that it is
ready to provide
substantial and immediate assistance to Zimbabwe in the
wake of a transition
towards democracy.
BUT THERE IS A MUCH MORE FUNDAMENTAL and
politically rooted reason
that the international community must continue to
signal its solidarity
towards the citizens of Zimbabwe.
Right
now, the people on the streets of Harare or in the countryside
need to know
that there is a vision for their future and that any
transitional government
will get the support that it would so inevitably
need. These ordinary people
need to know that their lives can get better
once again. These people need
hope.
Such open declarations may also just help to rekindle a
spirit of
belief among Mugabe supporters that there is an alternative to the
brutal
violence being inflicted on their fellow men and women. In short,
even they
may once again be able to believe that they can be part of
building a
brighter future for their country.
As Zimbabwe lies
battered and bruised from the fist of Mugabe, the
country must know that it
is surrounded by friends ready to come to its aid:
whether from the region
of SADC, across the African Union or, of course,
here in
Europe.
Mr Michel is the European Commissioner for Development and
Humanitarian Aid
The Herald, UK
HARRY REID
July 03 2008
The tyrant Mugabe has emerged
from the Sharm el Sheikh summit with his power
and standing enhanced rather
than diminished. Despite the ingenuous hopes of
so many western commentators
- and not a few politicians - that Africa's
leaders would turn against him
and isolate him, the 84-year-old showboated
craftily, playing his role as a
venerable liberation hero to perfection.
Of course he had his critics,
including the leaders of Nigeria and Botswana,
but he fended them off with
eloquent appeals to African solidarity. His real
enemies were western
colonialists, out- siders, mischief-makers and
meddlers. Why on earth would
his African friends and colleagues wish to
encourage such
people?
Lord Malloch Brown, Britain's Minister for Africa, and a key
member of
Gordon Brown's government "of all the talents" was a marginal
figure at the
summit. To those who would listen, he said he wanted Mugabe to
be kept out
of any proposed power-sharing settlement. He said Mugabe had to
be
completely removed from power if Zimbabwe was to receive aid from
Britain.
Such bluster played right into the old rogue's
hands.
advertisement
So, in the west we have more confusion and
hand-wringing, of the kind that
has attended President Mbeki of South
Africa's soft diplomatic treatment of
Mugabe. Even the saintly Nelson
Mandela, the west's favourite African, has
been criticised for being too
tardy and too mealy-mouthed in his
condemnation of Mugabe.
Robert
Mugabe is a monster who has waged war on his own people. He has no
moral
legitimacy whatsoever, and scant political legitimacy. Yet President
Bongo
of Gambia summed up the general mood at the summit when he said: "He
was
elected and he took an oath. He is here with us. He is the President and
we
cannot ask him more."
And so Mugabe was hugged and fawned over by many of
Africa's leaders, even
as the violence in Zimbabwe
continued.
Zimbabwe's plight will soon be discussed by the UN Security
Council. But you
may be sure that China, for one, will resist any serious
attempt to take
action against Mugabe's regime. This is realpoltik. It may
not be pretty,
but it is the way the world is.
When Churchill and
Roosevelt convened at Yalta early in 1945 they were
joined by Joseph Stalin,
whose colossal crimes against humanity make Robert
Mugabe look like an
innocent. But the US and the UK could not have defeated
Hitler without the
support of Stalin's troops. The Russians were magnificent
and indomitable
allies.
They were also sometimes cruel beyond belief, and the Russian
forces
committed many atrocities. Their leader was a man who, before the
war, had
within Russia unleashed genocide, enslavement, mass murder, torture
and rape
on a scale that was beyond belief. In 1937 and 1938, every tenth
Russian
vanished during the "great terror". For Stalin, the problem was how
to get
rid of the corpses. Before Hitler did, Stalin hit on gassing as a
convenient
means of mass execution. Then, unsurprisingly, he became an ally
of Hitler.
By the time the US joined the war, Stalin had switched sides.
With amazing
speed, the dreadful tyrant became transformed into good old
Uncle Joe,
America's friend.
The man who sat down, as a feted equal
and ally, with Churchill and
Roosevelt at Yalta was the same man who had
unleashed unlimited terror on
his own people through the 1930s. Roosevelt
never really read him. Roosevelt
died in April 1945, shortly after Yalta,
convinced that the US Army would
soon be able to demobilise and quit Europe
altogether. He had no idea how
determined Uncle Joe would be to hold on to
all the territories he had
acquired in the period when he was Hitler's ally.
Stalin saw himself as the
main man among Hitler's conquerors, and he was
probably right.
Simone de Beauvoir, the great French writer, said: "There
were no
reservations in our friendship for the USSR. The sacrifices of the
Russian
people proved that its leaders embodied its wishes."
This was
all too typical. Even today, when there is no doubt about the scale
of his
assault on Russian civic society, Stalin still has many admirers and
apologists in the west. It is the same with Mao Tsetung, another tyrant who
committed crime after crime against his people. There are idealistic and
political reasons for this. Some western intellectuals seem able to forgive
Mao almost anything. But there is a more superficial and yet more worrying
tendency. Many people seem to adore monsters, so long as they do not have to
suffer under them. History is often relatively kind to the seriously bad
guys.
Fascination with them becomes obsessive, and almost transmutes
into a kind
of grisly veneration. So it is with Hitler. Few would admit to
admiring him,
but many are so utterly fascinated by his evil campaigns that
they regard
him with a kind of awestruck respect.
The other day I was
talking to a historian about young people's apparent
lack of interest in
history, including recent history. I asked which figures
of the twentieth
century might spark their interest. Hitler, he replied.
What about
Roosevelt? I asked. I was told that I must be joking.
If we go further
back, we see the same syndrome. Henry VIII was a brute, a
sadistic butcher
who, among many other crimes, put down the Pilgrimage of
Grace, a noble and
well-meaning Catholic rebellion that affected most of
northern England, with
a savage mixture of duplicity and sustained
bloodthirsty
brutality.
Today he is regarded as a great historical figure and treated,
in the public
mind, with something close to affection. Compare him to his
father, Henry
VII, a notably good king, who ended the Wars of the Roses and
far-sightedly
sought an alliance with Scotland that he thought might just
bring perpetual
peace. But Henry VI was a dull man. His virtues were many,
but virtue is
regarded as boring.
Napoleon Bonaparte is still
worshipped, and not only in France. He rampaged
round Europe in his crazed
quest for bloody glory and conquest, and boasted
that he "spent" 20,000 men
a month. No matter: he remains, for many, the
ultimate hero.
There
are exceptions. The likes of Pol Pot and Nicolae Ceausescu seem to be
regarded with near unanimous revulsion. But compared to Mao and Stalin, they
were minor figures.
To return to Mugabe, I am not saying that history
will be kind to him, but
it might be kinder than we presently imagine. He
may well be remembered as a
freedom fighter rather than the oppressor of his
own people.
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02
July 2008 21:55
. while Williams, Mahlangu and Matinenga rot in
jail
HARARE - With almost as much indecent haste as he inaugurated
himself
as president, against the wishes of the people of Zimbabwe, the
leader of
military junta, Robert Mugabe, has declared a blanket amnesty that
will free
hundreds of Zanu (PF) thugs who may have been convicted for
state-sanctioned
violence in the aftermath of the March 27
elections.
General Notice 85A/2008 - Clemency Order No. 1 of 2008
covers the
violent period before and after the March 29 poll, up to June 16,
11 days
before the fraudulent presidential runoff election last
Friday.
MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa said there seemed to be selective
application
for political prisoners. Hundreds of MDC supporters,
who dared to
defend themselves against attack by the militias and were
arrested and
thrown into prison, have not qualified for the amnesty under as
yet unclear
circumstances.
Civic groups have also condemned the
move, saying it was further
evidence of the junta's rejection of the rule of
law. More than 100 MDC
members have been killed in the attacks, 500 are
missing, and more than
200,000 have been driven from their homes. 20,000
homes have been burnt
down. Thousands of others have been raped and
brutalised, and the violence
continues.
Political prisoners such as
WOZA leaders Jenny Williams and Magodonga
Mahlangu, and newly-elected MDC
MP, advocate Eric Matinenga, remain
incarcerated - accused of breaching the
peace, denied bail for more than
five weeks despite the fact that their
crime is normally punishable by a
fine - if convicted.
The police
routinely do not react in cases of Zanu (PF) thugs
attacking MDC supporters.
They always respond if MDC members try to repel
such attacks.
A
prison officer at Chikurubi Maximum Prison said there were specific
orders
that MDC prisoners do not qualify for the amnesty.
But former Justice
Minister Patrick Chinamasa denied the pardon was
meant for Zanu (PF)
supporters only saying the amnesty, set to see a total
4,998 prisoners
released, was aimed at easing overcrowding in jails.
Throughout his
nearly 30-year reign, Mugabe has routinely pardoned
politically motivated
acts of violence perpetrated country-wide by his
supporters in the lead up
and aftermath of elections - which have always
been characterised by
state-sponsored terror against perceived opponents.
This is despite
hollow assurances before every election by the police
commissioner that his
force would not tolerate political violence. The
routine pardons make a
mockery of this, ensuring that Zanu (PF) militias
understand that they will
not be punished for obeying instructions to kill
and maim the
opposition.
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02 July
2008 21:54
BY CHIEF REPORTER
HARARE - As Robert Mugabe swore
to uphold the constitution and respect
the laws of Zimbabwe at his
inauguration on Sunday, MDC supporters were
being brutalised and forced to
flee their homes in Buhera South, where a
woman was brutally murdered by
Zanu (PF) militants at a torture camp at
Mutiusinazita under Operation Red
Finger.
'Blacklisted' villages' food supplies have been cut off while a
vicious crackdown on the remaining white commercial farmers has continued.
Scores of reports of incidents of rape, torture, kidnap and arson continued
to flow in this week, according to human rights groups and the MDC.
Observers say the wave of terror far exceeds the brutality witnessed
before
June 27.
In Mberengwa East district alone, in the Midlands province,
dozens of
MDC supporters have fled in the face of reprisals and four were
abducted
June 21 and are still unaccounted for.
Human rights groups
applied to the UN and the Red Cross for tented
villages to be set up in
Harare, where the majority of people have fled, but
they were turned down.
Tents that had been erected by the UNHCR at the South
African embassy, where
refuges had sought shelter, have been removed on the
instructions of Sydney
Mhishi, the acting permanent secretary in the Social
Welfare
ministry.
President Mugabe's campaign against white farmers has also
intensified
dramatically. Two leading commercial farmers in the Chegutu
area, Ben Freeth
and Mike Campbell were abducted and beaten unconscious by
Zanu (PF)
militants soon after Mugabe's inauguration. Campbell, 75, his
wife, Angela,
66, and their son-in-law, Ben Freeth were taken to a pungwe,
one of the
thousands of indoctrination meetings where people must chant
pro-Mugabe
slogans and viciously brutalized in front of 50 Mugabe loyalists.
The
farmers were doused with water, viciously assaulted and forced to sign a
statement stating they were withdrawing their court challenge.
'They put burning sticks in my mother's mouth. They beat my father on
the
back and on the feet, and with a sjambok,' Freeth's wife, Laura, said.
The Zimbabwean heard that the remaining 280 white farmers have been
told
they must leave. In Matabeleland North, farmers on dozens of
properties
have been handed the same ultimatum, with some deciding to quit
but most
standing firm.
War veterans and youth militia went on the rampage this
week across
most of rural Mashonaland and Midlands province, where Mugabe
enjoys his
strongest support, singling out whole villages suspected of being
sympathetic to the MDC.
In the Midlands area of Gokwe, women and
teenage girls have been raped
by regular soldiers and Zanu (PF) militia,
human rights groups say.
The Zimbabwean could not independently verify
reports that two
children in Tsholotsho, north of Bulawayo, had starved to
death. In Mataga,
lorry loads of maize were said to have been driven from
the area's Mataga
depot to the chiefs' homesteads. It was sold exclusively
to Zanu (PF)
supporters.
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02 July
2008 21:43
HARARE - Zimbabwe propaganda Voice of Zimbabwe (VOZ) radio
station has
upped its propaganda reportage amid reports that the Gweru based
radio
station now broadcasts a repeat of the three hour news and news
analysis of
the previous night every morning.
The VOZ propaganda
radio station has been broadcasting news and news
analysis programmes from
6pm and 9pm. The rest of the day and evening, it
plays chimurenga and
liberation war songs supporting the efforts of
President Robert Mugabe. VOZ
station manager, Shadreck Mupeni confirmed that
the government radio station
has increased its propaganda reportage.
'We would like to offer our
listeners more of such programmes as they
are popular among our listeners
judging by the feedback that we are
receiving,' Mupeni said.
The
propaganda 24 hour radio station was introduced by Mugabe to
challenge
foreign based independent radio stations broadcasting Zimbabwe
news like
Studio 7, SW Radio Africa and Voice of the People.
The changes follow
the suspension of seven journalists at Zimbabwe
Broadcasting Corporation
(ZBC) for sympathizing with the MDC. ZBC boss,
Henry Muradzikwa, has been
replaced with war veteran and fierce Mugabe
supporter, Happison
Muchechetere.
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02 July 2008
21:43
HARARE - Mugabe's inauguration will go down in history as the
most
deranged piece of political satire ever, says the leader of the Inkatha
Freedom Party in SA, Mangosuthu Buthelezi. Every observer mission has
rejected the results. In no way at all did it reflect the will of the
people. The IFP supports the calls from SADC and the Pan African Parliament
observer missions that conditions be put in place for the holding of a free
and fair run-off as soon as possible. This should be made clear to
Mugabe.
Suzanne Vos, an IFP member of parliament, has reported that she
personally witnessed appalling intimidation and violence in various
provinces of Zimbabwe. Vos visited homes where elderly people had been
brutally assaulted because the husband was a supporter of the MDC.
Vos was alone at a polling station at a rural school where the MDC had
requested the presence of PAP observers. During the day, while visiting 18
polling stations in that Ward, MDC party agents had pleaded with the PAP
observers to "protect" them as they feared being murdered on their way home.
Several showed Vos bruises on their bodies.
Minutes before the
ballot boxes were to be opened a group of men
silently entered the polling
station blocking the door and forming a
menacing line in front of the
election officials. Vos said the chief
electoral officer exhorted the men to
leave and quoted electoral law as to
who was allowed to be in the polling
station during counting. He then
pointed to the presence of the Pan African
Parliament observer. The men then
slowly left.
Vos had to
personally intervene with the commanding officer of the
police service in
one area when MDC supporters trying to hold a rally were
threatened with the
riot police - even though they had obtained a High Court
order permitting
them to hold the rally.
Vos had attended a rally held by Mugabe where
he told the audience
that "a ball point pen cannot compete with a bazooka...
the MDC will never
rule this country..."
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday,
02 July 2008 21:43
By Chief Reporter
HARARE - Zimbabwe's
economic crisis has worsened dramatically, hardly
a week after President
Robert Mugabe's fraudulent re-election, adding to the
misery of ordinary
Zimbabweans grappling with 2 million percent inflation.
The crisis-torn
southern African state has seen an upsurge in
commodity shortages and an
unprecedented skyrocketing of prices of basics
since June 27's one-candidate
presidential run-off vote, which returned
Mugabe to power after the
withdrawal his opponent Morgan Tsvangirai citing
violence and restrictions
on his campaigns.
The prices of basics shot up dramatically, with a
loaf of bread now
retailing for ZD25 billion on the black market, the only
market where it's
readily available in the capital.
Shortages of
fuel, both petrol and diesel, also worsened woefully
forcing motorists to
resort exclusively to the black market for supplies.
"It's been quite a
span since we last had petrol here and the last
time we had supplies. On
June 28, we were selling a litre for ZD35 billion,'
a garage attendant said
at a garage supplied by state oil importer NOCZIM.
'The fuel ran out after
minutes of receiving it.'
The government revoked NOCZIM's previous
monopoly on imports a few
years ago, allowing a slew of mostly black-owned
new companies to bring in
their own fuel, but these have been stymied by a
persistent foreign currency
crunch.
Zimbabwe's economy has
successively collapsed since 1999, when key
donors led by the International
Monetary Fund withdrew support over policy
differences with the
government.
Critics say Mugabe, in power since independence from
Britain in 1980,
has crippled a once-vibrant economy through skewed policy
decisions
including the controversial seizure of white-owned commercial
farms for
landless blacks; a programme they say has destroyed the mainstay
agriculture
sector.
Foreign cash inflows are a trickle as exporters
struggle to stay in
business in a harsh climate, and analysts estimate that
foreign exchange
auctions controlled by the central bank are only meeting
about 8 percent of
importer demand.
The foreign currency crisis has
also affected electricity supplies, 35
percent of which state power utility
ZESA has to import from neighbouring
countries.
On June 27 ZESA
said it was facing a power crisis because of a foreign
currency crunch and
lack of spares for maintenance of some of its
generators.
Cash-strapped ZESA has struggled to import enough power from its
neighbours
in past years, leading to frequent power cuts that have disrupted
industrial
production and damaged household appliances after freak
electrical surges
are pumped into domestic appliances when supplies are
restored.
Across poor townships, residents are struggling with erratic water
supplies,
with residents saying they feared an outbreak of disease as
electricity-powered pumps failed to draw adequate water to the
ghetto.
Mugabe denies misruling the country over the past 28 years,
arguing
the economy has fallen victim to domestic and foreign opponents of
his farm
seizures. His re-election is widely expected to wreck the economy
and worsen
the hardships of ordinary Zimbabweans.
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02 July 2008 21:39
BY STAFF
REPORTER
HARARE
The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU)
says it has has learnt
with dismay about the harassment of labour leaders by
Zanu (PF) militia,
supporters and State security agents.
In a
statement, ZCTU said their District Chairperson for Chivhu,
Tinashe Murau,
was seriously beaten up by Zanu (PF) militia just before
run-off election
and had his hand broken. He was beaten after the militia
questioned him
about wearing a ZCTU T-shirt and attending ZCTU meetings.
Forty-six
members of the General Agriculture Plantation Workers' Union
of Zimbabwe
(GAPWUZ) had sought shelter in Harare after being harassed and
beaten by
youth militia. The members included women and children.
The Progressive
Teachers' Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ closed its office
after its officials were
constantly harassed. Unidentified people visited
the PTUZ Treasurer's wife,
claiming that they wanted to take her to 'a
funeral'.
ZCTU
councillor, Rebecca Butau, based in Chegutu was also seriously
beaten and
needed medical attention.
'The ZCTU expects an influx of its members as
they face retribution
from ruling party militia and youths,' said W.T.
Chibebe, ZCTU
Secretary-General. 'We deplore in the strongest terms what
appears to be the
targeting of ZCTU officials and union members.'
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02 July 2008 21:40
JOHANNESBURG
The
solution to Zimbabwe's economic woes does not rest in the hands of
politicians alone, but those working outside the country also have a pivotal
role to play in getting the country back on its feet, an official of the
Zimbabwe Diaspora Development Chamber (ZDDC) said this week.
Economic think-tank ZDDC believes that Zimbabweans living elsewhere
could
contribute significantly towards ending the country's nine-year
economic
recession.
Luke Dzipange Zunga, a Zimbabwean economist living in South
Africa,
said: 'It would be an indictment for Zimbabweans to enter South
Africa or
any other part of the diaspora, and call it quits. Zimbabwe is not
functioning and is pulling the region down. For a region to succeed, every
country must function properly. The politician is not the best source for
economic ideas.
'Despite having a relatively good education,
Zimbabweans have failed
the region. What is needed is a grand strategy,
working together outside
politics.'
He said some Zimbabweans living
outside the borders were too
individualistic to make any meaningful change
to the status quo, yet a
coordinated approach could do the trick. - CAJ
News
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02 July
2008 21:55
Against all our hopes, the useless and woolly AU resolution
this week,
calling for dialogue between Mugabe and Tsvangirai, utterly fails
the people
of Zimbabwe.
June 27 has come and gone and the result of
the election is as many
had predicted - an utterly fraudulent and farcical
presidential election,
culminating in a hasty and undignified inauguration
of Robert Mugabe for his
sixth term against the will of the people of
Zimbabwe.
We applaud Kenya for its principled stance at this week's AU
meeting,
where it called for the African body to suspend Zimbabwe forthwith
- until
such time as credible elections are held and a legitimate, people's
government is installed in line with the will of the people of
Zimbabwe.
Despite Mugabe's unashamed challenge to other African leaders
about
their pointing dirty fingers at him we dared to hope that even at this
late
stage the rulers of Africa will have the courage to follow through with
firm
action against the geriatric tyrant. Africa has had far more than its
share
of thieving, murderous despots - Amin, Mobutu, Mengistu, Taylor,
Bonye,
Banda to name a few - the list is embarrassingly and tragically
long.
Surely, now, in this the 21st century, decades after the last
colonial
power departed ignominiously from Africa's shores, we can lay that
ghost to
rest. We no longer need to sit by and watch African women and
children being
raped, starved and killed under the pretext of fighting
colonialism.
Colonialism in Africa is dead and buried - there is a new
mood now.
How long will we allow this tired ghost to shackle us to
desperation and
submission? In fear of the label of colonialism, British and
other Western
governments tiptoe around Africa and its horrors. Africans
live in fear of
this imaginary evil.
This excuse allows both
African and Western governments to remain
inactive. This misdiagnosis of the
real issues at hand - greed, corruption,
tyranny, megalomania - ensures that
the people of Zimbabwe will continue to
be thrashed and cowed into
submission. The beatings and murders will
continue and the desperate cries
of a nation will ring out until African
leaders finally have the courage to
bury the ghost of colonialism and
denounce their autocratic
brother.
The nauseating 'African problem, African solution' rhetoric
should be
seen for what it truly is. A cop out. Africa does not agree that
there is a
problem. Africa is unwilling to deal with the problem and the
world must
become tougher if anything will ever change in Zimbabwe.
Daily Nation, Kenya
Publication Date: 7/3/2008 Once again, the African heads of
State are
gathered at a Red Sea resort in the name of advancing democracy,
development
and security.
In their midst are some of the worst
leaders in the history of
mankind. One of them is definitely Robert
Mugabe.
As that circus in Egypt goes on, our own Vice-President,
Mr Kalonzo
Musyoka, is proposing a power-sharing arrangement in Zimbabwe in
the same
version as Kenya.
As much as I understand that Mr
Musyoka is a politician, it is strange
to assume that the Kenyan example is
the best form of governance.
Kenya actually set a very bad
precedent. No wonder Africa remains
medieval.
Perhaps,
Africans are cursed by God. We overindulges in religion and
politics so much
that we never take time to reflect on our own future.
We never want
to change for the better. Seven years ago, I worked for
an NGO and I visited
villages in western Kenya. The attitude of the common
person is so
disheartening. No one wants to change, and even the most
educated of the
people are no where near the rigidity breaking point.
Everyone
wants to keep the status quo. People seem happy with their
poverty and the
bad governance.
For us to assume that the Western world will help
us, is like milking
a bull. The Western countries are so fed up with Africa
that many people don't
even want to hear about it. Aid has been tripled in
the last 10 years, but
poverty and corruption have tripled in the same
period.
The people who complain of corruption and poverty are
foreigners, not
Africans.
It is important that Africans change
their ways and take drastic
measures towards eradicating poverty and
corruption.
I see Africa under colonial rule in the next 100 years,
because by
that time, we will have died of disease, hunger and war; the
three very
preventable plagues of Africa.
ISAAC
KIPKOECH,
Madrid, Spain.
The Times
July 3, 2008
The ability of Zimbabweans
to struggle on in the face of economic collapse
has astonished many but
hyperinflation may succeed where elections have not,
and finally topple
Mugabe
Catherine Philp in Harare
Moses Chikomba does not care much
about politics. He does not care whether
the land is owned by blacks or
whites. All he cares about is that his $50
billion monthly salary will buy
him just two bars of soap. In three days it
will buy only one.
"What
does the future hold for us?" he asks, clutching the near-worthless
notes
with their eye-popping strings of zeros. "We are all billionaires who
can
afford to buy nothing. That is why I hate that old man."
Robert Mugabe
may have murdered, tortured and beaten his way back into
power. But, as he
begins his sixth term in office, it is a different grudge
most Zimbabweans
hold against him. Hyperinflation is now galloping towards
highs seen only by
the likes of the Weimar Republic and postwar Hungary.
Inflation is 8.5
million per cent and economists believe that it will rise
to more than 100
million per cent by September. The numbers are so large
they are almost
meaningless. For the people of Zimbabwe the everyday
struggle of living with
hyperinflation is all too real.
Moses is one of the fortunate; he works
for foreigners who peg his salary to
the US dollar. As soon as it is handed
over, its value vanishes. His last
pay packet amounted to US$25; now, two
weeks later, it is worth only US$2.
"As soon as I get it, I have to rush out
and spend as much of it as I can,"
he says. "And then there is nothing left
for the rest of the month." They
survive on mealie meal and little else,
food that will keep for weeks.
Moses is paid cash in hand but most
formally employed Zimbabweans are not, a
remnant of the financial
infrastructure that this once wealthy nation still
boasts. In an effort to
curb spending, the Government has imposed limits on
how much money can be
withdrawn from the bank in a day, resulting in long,
snaking queues outside
every bank in town. Three weeks ago the limit was
increasing to Z$25
billion, then about £7.50. Today the exchange rate is
expected to surpass
Z$25 billion to the US dollar.
"Just a few weeks ago, 90 per cent of the
people in this country had never
heard the word billion," another friend
told me. "Now we are wondering what
comes after trillion?" No till in
Zimbabwe is capable of ringing up all
those zeros, so receipts come with
little messages explaining that the
amount due is rather more than it looks.
"Our bill is quoted in mollars -
millions of dollars," the bill at a
neighbourhood Italian restaurant
announces. "Please add six zeros to total
due to get actual amount to be
paid."
One friend says she opened her
yearly broadband bill to find it blank. An
accompanying letter said the
service would be provided free while the
company worked out a "meaningful"
charge. Another friend recounts a weekly
shop costing $514billion, which she
paid for by debit card. The shop till
could only ring up $9 billion, so the
card had to be swiped 57 times.
Many people are forced to use cheques.
Many places, though, refuse to take
them because their value has plummeted
by the time they are presented at the
bank. Restaurants have taken to
printing price lists, separate from their
menus, citing different prices for
cash and cheques, with cheques charged at
twice the cash rate.
A
simple pasta lunch for three yesterday cost $1.3 trillion - for cash. We
gave up trying to add and calculate the zeros and paid in US dollars, a
crime that could land the owners in jail. Dollarisation is, nevertheless,
creeping in, clandestinely. At a well-known butcher's, a nod and wink to the
right member of staff takes you behind the counter and out the back door
where your "greens" are swiped in return for your meat. Even the cigarette
vendors on the street will beg for "greens" now.
Zimbabwe's ability
to struggle on in the face of economic collapse has
astonished many. Without
the flood of remittances from the millions of
Zimbabweans abroad the country
would simply collapse. Many believe it may
yet have only months to last. The
decision of a German paper manufacturer to
stop supplying banknote paper to
Zimbabwe may hasten that moment, if the
Government finds itself unable to
print its way out of the crisis, as it has
done for the past eight
years.
Zimbabwe's beleaguered Opposition hopes that hyperinflation may
yet succeed
in doing what politics has failed to, and topple Mr Mugabe. Two
days before
the election, the opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, told The
Times that
if he could not stop Mr Mugabe, the economy would. "Mr Mugabe can
steal an
election but he has no answers for this crisis," Mr Tsvangirai
said. "I wish
him well."
http://www.echo-news.co.uk
By Mike
Miners
ROBERT Mugabe, the Zimbabwean dictator, has secret police working
on the
streets of south Essex to spy on the 1,000 exiles living here,
according to
a high ranking campaigner.
Stanford Biti, of North
Crescent, Southend, is the brother of Tendai Biti,
general secretary of the
Zimbabwean opposition party, the Movement for
Democratic Change
(MDC).
Tendai was featured on the front pages of the world's newspapers
after he
was arrested on treason charges, which his party says are
politically
motivated.
Speaking to the Echo this week, Stanford
revealed he fears Mugabe's agents
are working on the streets of Southend and
Basildon, spying on MDC members
and reporting back to Mugabe's Zanu PF
party.
He said: "We have more than 1,000 members and supporters of the
MDC in south
Essex and more than 5,000 all over the country.
"But we
do get harassed by the Zimbabwean secret police, even in Southend.
We know
they follow you, make notes and then victimise your friends and
family back
in Zimbabwe."
advertisement
His claims have been backed up across
the UK with other high ranking MDC
members claiming they are being filmed,
spied on and have their meetings
disrupted. Tendai Goneso, treasurer of the
MDC's UK and Ireland branch, said
the campaign of intimidation was "highly
organised and co-ordinated" to
intimidate opponents.
Stanford has
revealed he was arrested near the Zimbabwean capital of Harare,
late last
year, and had to bribe a Zimbabwean policeman to release him so he
could
flee to the UK.
Today, the 38-year-old campaigns tirelessly on behalf of
the MDC in the UK.
He said: "Originally I was a teacher in Harare, but
because I was a member
of the MDC, Robert Mugabe's police ended my
career.
"I went into private business and had a roofing company, but I
had vehicles
and buildings destroyed by the police and I was arrested
several times.
"While under arrest, I was tortured as they beat, punched
and urinated on
me. Eventually, I had to bribe a policeman to release me and
I came to
Southend because I have relatives in the area."
His work on
behalf of his brother and the MDC leader, Morgan Tsvangirai,
takes him all
over the country as he tries to highlight the terror of
Mugabe's
regime.
However, last Friday the president was re-elected in an election
condemned
as a sham by the rest of the world.
Yet while the media did
its best to report the farce, Stanford was receiving
harrowing text messages
from friends, family and supporters in the stricken
country.
Stanford
expects to be back in Southend on Sunday, when he hosts the next
local MDC
meeting.
He claims South Africa will struggle to stage the World Cup in
2010 if the
situation in Zimbabwe remains the same, and hopes the risk to
South African
prestige will force the hand of the country's president, Thabo
Mbeki.
But Stanford still fears for his wife Rudo. He said: "One of my
sons has got
to Australia and the other one is here with me, but the police
took Rudo's
passport so she is in hiding, still in Zimbabwe."
Another
Zimbabwean, Tawanda Chiwara, 33 is exiled in Tintern Avenue,
Southend.
He said: "I got the chance to leave Zimbabwe on a sporting
scholarship to
the United States and because we did not want to go back
there, my family
and I came here."
Tawanda has been back to his
homeland twice, but on the second occasion was
harassed by the Government
and today is reluctant to say what he does in
Southend.
Today, the
town has a thriving Zimbabwean community.
But Tawanda says whenever they
meet talk is dominated by the escalating
problems in their
homeland.
He added: "They may have a smile on their faces, but it does
not hide the
turmoil underneath.
"Because most, if not all the
people, would go back if the problems were
fixed."
10:34pm Wednesday
2nd July 2008
Owen Bowcott
The Guardian,
Thursday July 3, 2008
The
government is under growing pressure to free scores of Zimbabwean asylum
seekers from detention centres after a court of appeal ruling yesterday
further delayed legal moves to deport them.
Despite the rapid
deterioration of the political situation in Harare, as
many as 11,500
Zimbabweans are threatened with the prospect of removal from
the UK. Many
are penniless, banned from working or receiving benefits.
Yesterday's
ruling involved the test case of a Zimbabwean doctor, known as
HS, who
claims her association with the Movement for Democratic Change
opposition
party means her life would be endangered if she were forcibly
returned.
By staying a full hearing of the case pending the outcome
of a related
immigration application due to go before the House of Lords,
the courts have
added an extended delay to the legal process and further
postponed any
deportations.
About 50 Zimbabwean nationals are held in
immigration detention centres
around the UK. Last month the Guardian
reported that six Zimbabweans,
detained for up to 23 months in Haslar
prison, Gosport, pending their
removal have appealed to Gordon Brown to
release them until it is safe for
them to be sent home.
They claim
they have been facing "indefinite detention" since the escalation
of
violence led to the Home Office decision to suspend all deportations to
Zimbabwe.
Caroline Slocock, chief executive of the Refugee Legal
Centre, which brought
the case, said: "The decision means that refused
asylum seekers from
Zimbabwe continue to have a temporary stay of execution
on forced return but
they live in fear pending the outcome of this
case."
She called on the government to give Zimbabweans temporary leave
to stay
until conditions improve. The Liberal Democrats, whose policy is to
allow
asylum seekers to work, have also called on the government to give
Zimbabwean refugees exceptional leave to stay.
The Home Office said:
"We have no current plans to enforce deportations."
The Zimbabwean
Wednesday, 02 July 2008 21:42
HARARE - Zimbabwe cricket is in a
quagmire. Last week ECB called on
all the ten International Cricket Council
member states to vote for
Zimbabwe's expulsion as a full member of the world
cricket board in the
ongoing two-day annual meeting, set to end July 4, in
Dubai.
Two-thirds majority vote within the ICC board - seven out of 10
votes - will be needed for any resolution to be moved on Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe is part of the ten countries and it has so far won the favor
of
India and Pakistan, who have clearly stated that it will back ZC.
"We
are very clear that we would like to fully support Zimbabwe on the
issue of
full membership of the ICC," Niranjan Shah, BCCI secretary,
recently told
Cricinfo.
The Pakistan Cricket Board, has also made it clear that it
will send
its A team on a tour to Zimbabwe in August as scheduled,
irrespective of any
decision made today.
Zimbabwe will not only
miss next year's edition of the Twenty20 World
Cup, to be held in England
and all other future tournaments but they will
also lose the lucrative ICC
funding and valuable voting rights if the
members around the table in Dubai
rule the country out as a full member of
the world governing board.
'Zimbabwe is a full member of FIFA and we are currently participating
in a
World Cup qualifying campaign; we have a swimming programme which has
produced Kirsty Coventry, a recent winner in the world championships," Ozias
Bvute, Zimbabwe cricket managing director said.
The Times
July 3, 2008
Mike
Atherton
So let us talk not politics but cricket. After all, that is what
Peter
Chingoka and Ozias Bvute want, is it not? Those twin pillars of the
crumbled
edifice called Zimbabwe Cricket, who have presided over a most
disgraceful
decline while all the while enjoying the benefits that
full-member status of
the ICC brings, called upon the international cricket
community this week to
consider only cricketing matters when Zimbabwe's
position at the high table
is discussed. We shall grant them their
wish.
Chingoka called the move to table a resolution on Zimbabwe as
"unethical",
which is like being lectured on fidelity by a sex addict. He
reminded Ray
Mali, whose last act of a thoroughly undistinguished presidency
this was,
that the ICC has agreed in the past that "sport and politics, like
oil and
water, do not mix". The thuggish Bvute, the man responsible for
kicking
Henry Olonga off the team bus after his black armband protest during
the
2003 World Cup, bragged that the "so-called current worries" in Zimbabwe
are
an irrelevance to its cricketing status.
That delicious prefix
"so-called" is all the evidence needed that oil and
water does mix and that
there is an all-too-close association between
Zimbabwe Cricket and Robert
Mugabe's ruling Zanu (PF) party, as outlined
last week by Andy Burnham, the
Secretary of State for Culture, Media and
Sport. "So-called"? Tell that to
the family of Ben Freeth, the farmer whose
horrors at the hands of Mugabe's
henchmen The Times has chronicled in grim
detail this week.
But back
to the cricket. You would think that a full member of the ICC would
need to
have a functioning and competitive cricket team. Not necessarily
world-beating, but functioning and competitive. But Zimbabwe, of their own
accord, have not played a Test match since September 2005. In the past seven
years the team have won one Test match. In 32 one-day internationals since
August 2006 they have won only two, losing 28. The figures reflect the
reality that the Zimbabwe cricket team are a bunch of schoolboys
masquerading as an international side. Most of the good players have
left.
As we have seen this past week, with Ireland thrashed by a
world-record
margin by New Zealand; one-day international status given to a
match between
Bermuda and Canada in King City, Ontario; and Hong Kong and
the United Arab
Emirates involved in games in the Asia Cup with similar
status, the ICC
cares more about the push for globalisation and making money
than upholding
standards.
But while the ICC spreads the gospel far and
wide, its members do not want
much to do with Zimbabwe. England and South
Africa have cut bilateral ties
and India, Zimbabwe's greatest ally, pulled
out of their most recent tour
there on the ground that they could not be
bothered.
And what of the next generation? In the most recent Under-19
World Cup,
Zimbabwe won one match - against Malaysia - and finished twelfth
out of 16
teams. They also failed to send a team to compete in the Clico
under-15
international championship in the Caribbean. The official reason
given for
the absence was a visa problem, but no formal application for
visas was
submitted.
But surely, given the millions of dollars passed
on by the ICC down the
years, there is a competitive cricket structure
within Zimbabwe? Some months
ago Steven Price, a brave freelance journalist
based in Harare, wrote a
series of articles about the state of the game in
Zimbabwe at national, club
and school levels. Collectively, they presented a
disturbing picture of a
sport in a state of decay. Bvute, by the way, had
tried to bully Cricinfo,
the website, into revealing Price's whereabouts in
2005. "What has he got to
be afraid of?" Bvute said when he did not get his
way.
There was a picture of a club ground near Harare called Selous, with
knee-high grass and derelict facilities, a club typical of many others that
cannot afford tractors and mowers to cut the outfields. There is the odd
club in Harare - well connected, of course, and therefore well funded - who
thrive, but players from one of those clubs were sent home from national
practice by Geoff Marsh, the former coach, for wearing Zanu (PF) T-shirts.
In 2005-06, the Logan Cup, the premier first-class competition in Zimbabwe,
was cancelled without notice and this year the Twenty20 competition was
suspended with less than 24 hours' notice.
Some club matches in
Matabeleland were cancelled this year because there
were no cricket balls.
Umpires are scarce, as is basic equipment. Grant
Flower, the former Zimbabwe
batsman, had this to say about domestic cricket:
"I speak to players who
pitch up at games and there are no umpires, they are
struggling to find six
stumps, some wicketkeepers don't have gloves and
there are no lunches or
teas provided and there is no diesel to fuel the
tractors and mow the
outfields." No team, no structure, no hope.
So what has happened to the
millions of dollars given to Zimbabwe Cricket by
the ICC? If only we knew.
On the ICC's website there is a mission statement
of values, one of which,
under the heading "Openness, honesty and integrity",
reads: "We work to the
highest ethical standards. We do what we say we are
going to do, in the way
we say we are going to do it." Presumably, because
the ICC is simply an
amalgam of its constituent parts, these constituent
parts sign up to such
mission statements, too.
But Zimbabwe Cricket has issued no accounts for
public consumption since
2005. When the ICC became suspicious and held an
internal inquiry, some of
its findings were leaked. The leaks were damning.
"It is clear that the
accounts of Zimbabwe Cricket have been deliberately
falsified to mask
various illegal transactions. It may not be possible to
rely on the
authenticity of its balance sheet."
On the back of this,
an independent audit by KPMG was commissioned. Despite
the ICC's mission
statement, this audit has not been released and when the
British Government
asked for a copy it was refused. It has been reported
that the KPMG audit
noted "serious financial irregularities".
A country serious about its
cricket must have administrators who treat the
sport with the respect it
deserves. So we come back to Chingoka and Bvute,
respectively the chairman
and managing director of Zimbabwe Cricket, who
have been instrumental in
leading the organisation into this maelstrom of
bullying, racism and decay.
Any cricketer with the courage to speak out, as
Tatenda Taibu, the former
captain, did in 2005, is hounded out. Taibu left
before returning two years
later. In November 2007, life presidents of
Zimbabwe Cricket were stripped
of their positions so that they could not
cause trouble at the annual
meeting. A purge took place; hand-picked cronies
from the provinces were
unlikely to ask awkward questions.
Last week, Andy Flower, brother of
Grant and the finest player that Zimbabwe
has produced, was collared by
journalists at the Brit Oval. He looked
briefly at the ECB's media relations
man, to check that he was not about to
embarrass the organisation that
employs him as a coach, and gave a withering
verdict on Zimbabwe Cricket's
administrators. "Peter Chingoka is part of
Mugabe's despicable plan and the
fact that he is allowed to prance around
the ICC committee is embarrassing
for the ICC."