Mail and Guardian
Harare, Zimbabwe
03 March 2007
08:28
A senior director in the Zimbabwe government has been
arrested
at Harare International Airport for allegedly trying to smuggle
diamonds,
reports said on Saturday. William Nhara, who is also spokesperson
for the
ruling party for the Harare province, is still in police
custody.
"We confirm that he [Nhara] was arrested on Thursday
at Harare
International Airport in connection with the illegal possession of
diamonds," police spokesperson Wayne Bvudzijena told the state run
Herald.
"He is also alleged to have attempted to bribe a
police officer
when he was arrested."
The value of the
diamonds was not disclosed.
Nhara attempted to bribe the
police officer with $700, the
report said.
The daily also
quoted unnamed police sources as saying Nhara was
detained at the airport
where he had escorted a Lebanese woman who is
believed to have been
travelling to South Africa with the precious stones.
According to central bank governor, Gideon Gono, Zimbabwe is
losing $40 to
$50-million every week through the smuggling of precious
minerals.
Recently, a Harare magistrate was nabbed
together with seven
other people in the western town of Mhangura where they
were allegedly
panning for gold.
Gold deliveries in 2006
was 10,96 tonnes, down from 13,45
tonnes, owing to a combination of factors
including, lack of equipment,
reduced exploration and illegal trading and
smuggling.
In January, authorities vowed to press on with a
crackdown on
illegal gold and diamond miners that has seen the arrest of
nearly 31 509
people since November and left miner one
dead.
Police have recovered 3,6kg of gold and 7 868 diamonds
since the
blitz was launched in November. - Sapa-AFP
Zim Standard
By Caiphas Chimhete
TATE
security agents guarding diamond fields in Manicaland have
unleashed a reign
of terror, shooting and assaulting villagers arrested for
illegal mining in
the area, The Standard was told in Marange last week.
Their
actions, so far unreported, have prompted village heads and
businesspeople
to call for an independent inquiry into what they allege are
human rights
abuses on a daily basis.
Police, some on horseback, Central
Intelligence Organisation (CIO)
agents, and youth militia have flooded the
area, declaring the mining fields
of Chiadzwa"no-go areas".
Only local people are allowed to go beyond Bambazonge Business Centre,
about
20km from Chiadzwa on the Mutare road.
But even then, they still
have to produce identity cards or explain to
the Operation Chikorokoza
Chapera officers what they seek in the area.
When The Standard
arrived at the centre on Wednesday, it heard
grotesque tales of human rights
abuses by the state security agents.
The villagers said at least
three people have been shot in Marange
while several others have been
severely assaulted.
Although The Standard news crew was prevented
from entering Chiadzwa,
it tracked down some of the people allegedly
brutalised by the security
agents.
Twenty-three-year-old Modern
Chibururu of Marange said he was shot in
the left knee.
Chibururu said he was lucky to have survived. "They were spraying
bullets as
if they were in a war zone but only one hit me in the knee. I
think God
intervened."
It was on 28 January around midnight, he said, when
the police
surrounded the field and threw a "search light" into the air,
sending over
30 illegal miners scurrying for cover.
"We started
to run in different directions and they were firing and
ordering us to stop.
After a few metres, I felt a sharp pain in the knee and
fell down,
bleeding," said Chibururu.
When he fell down, he said, the police
assaulted him severely and
forced him to limp on one leg for one and half
kilometers to their camp,
with blood dripping from his injured
knee.
"They are very cruel. Although I was in pain, I saw some
miners being
assaulted; they were wailing like toddlers," he
said.
Chibururu was taken to Marange Clinic and later transferred
to Mutare
general hospital.
A medical report from the clinic
confirms he was shot and shrapnel
from the bullet is still lodged in his
knee since he has failed to raise
money for the operation.
Chibururu's sickly mother, 57-year-old Edith, says she has nothing to
her
name except a few chickens, and is devastated.
"I expected him to
look after me and these other kids but now he is
crippled," she
said.
Edith said she had to sell her six chickens and two guinea
fowls to
raise money for her son's medication.
She only managed
to pay $18 000 for X-ray and $30 000 for pain
killers.
Another
victim of the bloody diamonds, William Mwaziyangeyi (26) of
Nemaramba in
Chimanimani could barely walk. He thought he would not be able
to walk again
after being assaulted by the police.
"Some people fainted as they
assaulted us. As they beat us, they
forced us to sing Gushungo haana mhosva,
(Gushungo (Mugabe's totem) is not
to blame)," he said.
The song
composed, by Hosia Chipanga, exonerates President Robert
Mugabe from
Zimbabwe's current economic problems
After the assault, Matsvina
said he was taken in by sympathetic
villagers who offered him sanctuary
until he recovered four days later and
managed to limp home, over 30 km
away.
But village heads and businesspeople in the area are not
happy and are
calling for an investigation.
A local
businessman, who refused to be named, said: "What is happening
here needs
investigation because I don't think senior government officials
approve of
this."
To avoid the beatings, a number of the illegal diamond
miners now buy
their way into the diamond fields. One miner, who requested
anonymity, said
they pay the security agents $10 000 to enter the protected
areas.
But when they have finished they share the spoils with the
officers.
"Every person surrenders half of what they would have
managed to get,
so they can be allowed in again next time. Mai Mujuru
vachasvika rave zuru
(Mrs Mujuru will find her mine claim
empty)."
For easy identification, the mining fields are known
locally as KwaMai
Mujuru, KuMbare and KuMabhohera.
Police
spokesperson Wayne Bvudzijena said he had not received any
report of abuses
in Marange.
"But there is an operation against illegal miners. Talk
to Inspector
Banda, he is in charge of the operation."
Banda
could not be reached for comment.
Zim Standard
By Kholwani
Nyathi
BULAWAYO - Zanu PF has started purging provincial
leaders opposed to
President Robert Mugabe's plans to remain in office until
2010, ahead of a
crucial central committee meeting later this month, party
officials toldThe
Standard yesterday.
The central committee
meeting will consider a controversial resolution
on the election
harmonisation, seen as Mugabe's ploy to remain in office.
Mugabe's term
expires next year.
The resolution failed to garner unanimous
support from all provinces
when first tabled at the party's conference in
Goromonzi last year.
The party then took the unusual step to defer
its adoption, mandating
Zanu PF structures to discuss resolutions before
they are considered by the
central committee later this month.
But sources said a number of provinces have joined Mashonaland East
and
Harare provinces in opposing the 2010 harmonisation resolution.
In
a desperate bid to whip the provinces into line before the central
committee
meeting, the Zanu PF commissariat led by Elliot Manyika last week
began
dissolving provinces opposed to Mugabe's "manoeuvres".
Bulawayo
province, after discussing the election harmonisation, is
said to have taken
"a stand against Mugabe".
It turns out the province endorsed the
controversial proposal ahead of
the Goromonzi conference but changed its
stance after "appreciating what it
entailed".
Last week Manyika
wrote to the Bulawayo provincial leadership telling
them to prepare for
fresh elections in the next two weeks.
He did not give any reasons
for "dissolving the executive". The letter
seen by The Standard is dated 21
February 2007 and copied to Zanu PF
chairman, John Nkomo and the secretary
for administration Didymus Mutasa. It
instructed the executive to prepare
for elections on 11 March.
Provincial chairman Mcloud Chawe was
given the letter by a messenger
soon after a Zanu PF meeting early last
week.
"Our stance on the ZINWA take-over could have angered the
leadership
but the bigger picture is that we were contemplating changing our
position
on the harmonisation of elections," said a party official who
requested
anonymity.
On Friday, Zanu PF provincial spokesman,
Effort Nkomo, confirmed they
had been told to prepare for elections in the
next two weeks.
But he hinted that his executive would not give up
without a fight.
"We had an emergency meeting yesterday (Thursday)
after we received
the letter from Manyika and we resolved to write back to
him and ask for
reasons why the province is being dissolved," Nkomo
said.
"The meeting resolved to seek clarification from Manyika
because he is
the one who on 29 May 2005 told us that we had become a
substantive
executive until 2009 when elections in the other provinces are
due."
Nkomo said they were taken aback by the letter because "as
far as we
are concerned we are the only executive in Bulawayo in recent
history that
has posted positive results by winning by-elections and also
had an MDC
councillor, Stars Mathe, defecting to us."
But Nkomo
did not want to speculate on whether they were being
punished for taking a
stand against Mugabe. "That cannot be the issue
because we are entitled to
our views as a leadership."
Mutasa said he could not comment on the
issue "because I am not the
one who wrote the letter".
However,
repeated efforts to raise Manyika on his mobile phone were
unsuccessful
while John Nkomo was said to be in South Africa.
Between 2004 and
2005, Zanu PF had no substantive provincial
leadership in Bulawayo after its
chairman, Themba Ncube, was expelled from
the party after he allegedly took
part in the infamous Tsholotsho
Declaration.
Last week Mugabe
revealed in a ZBC interview that he feared that the
proposal to harmonise
elections had sparked fierce opposition because some
people wrongly thought
that he wanted to prolong his term.
Zim Standard
BY WALTER
MARWIZI
SEKESAI Makwavarara, the chairperson of the illegal
commission running
Harare yesterday said she would defy the High Court order
declaring her
commission illegal and serve out her fourth term at Town
House.
A day after Justice Lawrence Kamocha ruled her commission
"unlawful,
null, void and of no force and effect", a defiant Makwavarara
said only
Ignatious Chombo would remove her.
Chombo is the
Minister of Local Government, Public Works and Urban
Development.
Makwavarara said: "We are working. Can we be
stopped by these silly
things?"
Asked if she was not defying a
court order, Makwavarara quipped: "Only
the Minister (of Local Government,
Public Works and Urban Development) can
stop me from working."
Makwavarara, who has enjoyed Chombo's protection despite a groundswell
of
opposition from disgruntled residents, said she was not in Harare when
the
judgement was passed on Friday but would chair a commission meeting
tomorrow.
"We have an urgent meeting of the commission on
Monday - phone me
afterwards," she said.
Chombo could not be
reached for comment yesterday but Sternford Moyo,
who represented Nomutsa
Chideya, warned commission members who decided to
administer the city
without lawful authority risked being sued by residents
in their individual
capacities.
Moyo said: "Individuals who continue to stubbornly
mismanage the
affairs of the city, knowing at law they have no lawful
authority, expose
themselves to serious litigation from residents. The
decisions they make
open themselves individually for damages, expose the
city to the possibility
of not being able to function legally. Their
decisions or resolutions are
open to challenge on the grounds that they are
illegal."
Commenting on the likelihood of an appeal by the
commission against
the judgement which sanctioned Chideya's resumption of
his job at the Town
House, Moyo said the commission was illegal; hence it
had no power or
authority to do such a thing.
"Before they do
that, they should consider whether they have the
authority to do so. An
illegal body cannot go to court. For a city such as
Harare, the capital city
of a state, to be controlled by an illegal organ is
highly scandalous. In
fact, it is the height of lawlessness," said Moyo.
"They are going to court
to protect their positions. It's an abuse of
council funds and the appeal
process."
The Standard understands that buoyed by the judgement,
Chideya on
Friday reported at his office briefly and told the Chamber
Secretary
Josephine Ncube that he had taken the afternoon off. He said he
would come
to work on Monday. This is said to have caused panic at Town
House.
Yesterday, Chideya said: "Justice has prevailed. I would
like to thank
the Almighty, pastors and prayer groups for their support. I
am sure with
their support we will prevail under the
circumstances."
Precious Shumba, the spokesperson of the Combined
Harare Residents'
Association, welcomed the ruling but expressed concern
over Chombo's failure
to obey court decisions in the past.
Zim Standard
BY OUR
STAFF
BULAWAYO - Dreaded Central Intelligence Organisation
(CIO) agents on
Friday confiscated anti-Zimbabwe National Water Authority
(ZINWA) placards
before hounding civil society activists protesting the
proposed take-over of
the management of Bulawayo water by the government
parastatal.
This happened at a meeting addressed by Munacho Mutezo,
the Minister
of Water Resources and Infrastructural
Development.
Mutezo was about to address the Bulawayo Press Club
but the function
was hijacked by Zanu PF activists and CIO agents. The
meeting was moved from
the Press Club at Palace Hotel to Rainbow Hotel where
the ruling party was
in charge.
Civil society activists who
have criticised the proposed take-over of
the city's water were ejected from
the meeting by menacing security agents
and Zanu PF activists for allegedly
interjecting during Mutezo's speech.
Among those forced out of the
meeting were Busani Ncube of Bulawayo
Agenda, Mbuso Fuzwayo and Qhubekani
Dube both of Ibhetshu Likazulu who
recently organised a "Gukurahundi
memorial".
Ncube, Dube and Fuzwayo also claimed that the State
security agents
wanted to arrest them for leading calls for resistance to
the take-over of
the city's water management.
The posters
confiscated by the state security agents sought to rally
Bulawayo residents
against the take-over of the city's water management.
Some of them
read: "No to ZINWA" and "ZINWA water causes death".
Last week the
colourful posters were pasted in strategic areas across
the
city.
In his address, Mutezo was at pains to defend the ZINWA
take-over of
the management of water and sewer reticulation from local
authorities,
saying the government had realised the councils were failing to
upgrade the
infrastructure.
Zim Standard
BY OUR
STAFF
HARARE residents have reacted with revulsion to plans by
the illegal
Commission running the affairs of the capital to force residents
to install
security lights at the gates to their properties in medium and
low-density
suburbs.
The residents said the commission which
has failed to install street
lights, collect refuse and to cut the tall
grass in Harare was abandoning
its responsibilities.
The Harare
Commission which is made up mainly of Zanu PF officials is
chaired by
political turn coat, Sekesai Makwavarara. The High Court ruled on
Friday
that her commission was illegal.
However, it has already approved
the proposed new by-laws which will
force residents to install security
lights at their gates.
In high-density suburbs, general lighting is
provided through tower
lights while street lights have been used to light up
medium and low-density
suburbs.
The draft by-laws read: "Every
occupier shall, at his own expense,
provide, erect and maintain front
perimeter security lighting on his
property. Every property shall be
illuminated by a minimum of two perimeter
security lamps at each side of the
gateway to the premises."
Property owners who fail to install
security lights will be fined by
the Harare municipality.
Precious Shumba, the spokesperson for the Combined Harare Residents'
Association, said in an interview with The Standard: "Since the proposals
cannot be effected now, we urge all residents to lodge their objections with
the Municipality. The illegal commission has realised that it has no money
to fund its operations and that is why it now wants to cede its
responsibilities of providing street lighting to already over-burdened
residents."
Jimmy Tembo, who owns a house in the medium-density
suburb of Westlea,
was livid with the decision taken by the unelected Zanu
PF commission
members.
"The failures that we have witnessed in
Harare are a reflection of the
rot and inability of the central government
to do anything about the
collapse of service delivery in all sectors of the
Zimbabwean society."
Tembo added: "The reason why we have
commissioners who make
anti-people decisions is because they were appointed
by Zanu PF and Local
Government minister, Ignatious Chombo. Commissioners
are therefore
answerable to Zanu PF and not the people of
Harare."
Duncan Kasirori who built his house in Westgate
low-density suburb
said he was equally appalled by the Harare Commission's
decision.
"Right now we do not have any street lights, making some
sections of
our neighbourhood very dangerous for home owners and their
families. If the
Zanu PF commissioners feel the areas have not become safe,
then they should
assume their responsibilities and provide adequate street
lighting in the
affected areas. As responsible property owners, we would
naturally put in
place adequate security measures to protect our families
and properties,"
Kasirori added.
Another home owner in Tynwald
said based on the proposed by-laws; it
was evident that the government
appointed commissioners had not done any
research on the issue.
The resident, an expert on providing home security, said the street
lighting
was the most effective form of ensuring crime free neighborhoods.
"Where street lighting is adequate, we have very effective security
measures
that can be employed. One of these is to keep the house in the dark
and
install what are known as motion sensors which would flood the area with
light as soon as any movement of burglars or intruders is detected. The
advantage with such devices is that they save electricity unlike flooding
the property with lights for the entire night."
However, Harare
Municipality Public Relations manager, Percy Toriro,
allayed the residents'
fears.
"The issue has not been concluded. After this, the next
stage is for
the proposals to be discussed where residents will be consulted
and they
will have an opportunity to indicate their willingness or
non-willingness."
On fears that the commission could ignore the
residents' views and go
ahead and implement the proposals, Toriro said: "The
normal procedure is
that residents' concerns are taken into
account."
Zim Standard
By Godfrey
Mutimba
MASVINGO - Two men from Chivi, facing charges of
undermining and
insulting President Robert Mugabe by implication in a song
"Bob is sterile",
were freed after a Masvingo magistrate found insufficient
evidence on which
to convict them.
Gibson Murinye (36), and
Collen Mwachikopa walked out of the Masvingo
Magistrates' Court free men
after magistrate, Daisy Mugobo declared there
was not enough evidence to
show they had insulted Mugabe.
Mugobo said such cases had been on
the rise in Masvingo but police
were failing to produce sufficient evidence
to lead to convictions.
"Police should find sufficient evidence in
such cases before they
bring the accused here," said Mugobo.
Outlining his defence, Tongai Matutu of Matutu Kwirira & Associates,
for
the defendants, said merely mentioning the name "Mugabe" or "Bob"
without
specifying the first name of a person should not be considered an
insult
against the President.
"The two did not specify which Bob or Mugabe
they were referring to in
this matter. There are several Bobs and Mugabes;
how does the State witness
know whether they were referring to Leo, Sabina
or Chief Mugabe? Are they
saying all matters of infertility or of
reproductive health are related to
Mugabe?" said Matutu.
The
lawyer then turned the tables when he said it was the police
themselves who
were making serious allegations that the President was
sterile.
Mugobo acquitted the two and urged the police officers who arrest
suspects
in such cases to bring enough evidence to the courts.
According to
the State case, on 15 November last year, the two men
were allegedly driving
and drinking at Chivi growth point when they met a
female friend who asked
to be taken to her home.
It was on their way to her place that they
broke into a song, which
the State alleged insulted the
president.
They were stopped by a police officer who claimed he
heard them
singing "Bob hauna vana tora vana vaPamire udzorere kumhuri yavo,
Mugabe
chibva pachigaro chero ukauya wakabata pfuti hatikendenge.(Bob you
have no
children, take Pamire's children and return them to their family.
Mugabe
leave the presidency; even if you come for us with guns, we don't
care)."
Titus Taruvinga prosecuted.
Cases of citizens
being dragged to court for insulting the president
are on the rise in the
country.
Zim Standard
By Kholwani
Nyathi
BULAWAYO - The government is quietly evicting
"unproductive"
newly-resettled farmers in Matabeleland South to make way for
former white
commercial farmers in yet another bizarre twist to the chaotic
land reform
programme unleashed in 2000.
Last week, it emerged
that in a case to be heard in the High Court in
Bulawayo, two new farmers
evicted from the prime farming area of Esigodini
are seeking an urgent order
declaring their evictions unlawful.
Edward Mangena and Malaki Mpofu
say Matabeleland South governor,
Angeline Masuku, ordered their eviction
from Plot Number 2 of Lot 32 and 33
Essexvale Farms after she accused them
of underutilising the properties.
Ninno Flamino, a commercial
farmer who runs Wilsgrove Farms, in the
same area, took over the two plots.
But Mangena and Mpofu in their
application argue that they were evicted
without a lawful court order and
want to be reinstated.
The
first respondent is Flamino while Midard Khumalo, the Umzingwane
district
administrator, is the second, and the officer-in-charge of
Esigodini police
station, an Inspector Ndlovu is the third.
Other respondents are
Governor Masuku, National Security, Lands, Land
Reform and Resettlement
minister, Didymus Mutasa and Kembo Mohadi, the
Minister of Home
Affairs.
Mpofu and Mangena want the respondents interdicted from
interfering
with the occupation, use and possession of their plots. They
want Flamino
and Khumalo to pay the costs of the suit.
In their
founding affidavits, the two say they were allocated the land
in 2001 under
the fast-track land resettlement programme by Khumalo.
Stella Mary
Coulson was the previous owner of the farm.
Their problems started
in 2003 when Masuku visited the farms during
the rainy season and accused
them of underperforming. She ordered them to
hand the properties to
Catherine Stone of High Acres and Flamino.
Through their lawyer,
Sindiso Mazibisa of Cheda & Partners, Mangena
and Mpofu argue the
governor's order was illegal. They allege that following
the order Flamino
destroyed their crops and caused their arrest after which
they spent 10 days
in custody in Esigodini.
They were acquitted by a
magistrate.
"In 2004 we applied for loans through Agribank, which
were granted in
varying amounts. The Governor once again froze our accounts
and had us
denied the loans in a bid to have us forcibly evicted from the
farms to pave
way for Mr Flamino," they allege.
In July 2005,
Flamino allegedly came to their plots, cut the locks,
took away engines,
disconnected water and went to ZESA offices to disconnect
their electricity
supplies and converted the account into his own.
The two farmers
approached Mutasa to intervene in the dispute and the
minister reportedly
assured them they were protected by law from any
eviction.
But
they have since been dumped at South Lean Farm, also in Esigodini
where they
have no offer letters from the government.
Mangena and Mpofu argue
they cannot engage in farming at their new
plots because there are no proper
"facilities to engage in agriculture".
At the time of going to
Press the respondents had not filed opposing
papers.
The
government last week expressed increasing frustration at new
farmers
allocated land in a haphazard manner who are failing to perform.
Zim Standard
By Nqobani
Ndlovu
BULAWAYO - A deputy minister confirmed last week he had
barred
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) councillors from distributing
grain in
his Insiza constituency.
Andrew Langa of the
Environment and Tourism ministry, said: "Yes, I
have said they should not
get maize from the GMB (Grain Marketing Board)."
A pro-Senate MDC
spokesman accused Langa of engaging "in politics of
the stomach"in a
desperate attempt to revive his party's "waning political
fortunes".
The Arthur Mutambara-led MDC won four wards in the
district and Langa's
order is seen as punishment for the villagers who did
not vote for the
ruling party.
Insiza is one of the districts
hardest hit by drought in Matabeleland
South and food shortages have become
perennial. Langa reportedly told a
meeting at Sibasa Hall in Insiza last
week that MDC councillors should not
be involved in the sourcing of maize
from the Grain Marketing Board.
His wife, Clara,is the manager of
the Insiza GMB depot but she was not
immediately available for
comment.
Councillors with the assistance of village heads, chiefs
and the
district administrator (DA) compile lists of starving villagers
which they
pass on to the GMB, which in turn allocates the grain according
to
requirements.
But Langa said that should now be left to Zanu
PF councillors, village
heads, chiefs and the DA.
Observers in
Insiza said this was not the first time Langa had been
accused of sidelining
MDC supporters in the distribution of food relief.
Pro-Senate MDC
spokesperson for Matabeleland South, Thandeko Zinti
Mnkandla, condemned
Langa's behaviour saying he was engaging in "politics of
the stomach" in a
desperate bid to revive his party's waning support.
"We believe
that Langa is implementing a national policy of the ruling
party where
people are denied food because of their party affiliation.
Zanu-PF has no
support and it is pursuing the cruel politics of the stomach
to get
support," Mnkandla said.
"Food is a basic right for all and this
action shows how corrupt,
cruel and diabolic Zanu PF is. But we are not
going to forget those that are
using food as a political weapon. They will
have to account for their
actions."
Thousands of people are
likely to face starvation in Matabeleland this
year following widespread
crop failure in the drought-prone provinces.
International aid
organisations have in the past warned the government
of President Robert
Mugabe against using food as a political weapon.
Zim Standard
By
Kholwani Nyathi
BULAWAYO - President Robert Mugabe celebrated
his 83rd birthday at
Gweru's Mkoba Stadium last weekend, publicly firing the
usual salvos at the
Movement for Democratic Change and the British
government - but few of them
are likely to have any impact on the intended
targets.
Not surprisingly, he accused them of trying to topple him
from power,
which was old hat as well. But other denunciations appeared to
be aimed at a
new group of "enemies" - the "enemy within".
Birthday messages displayed at the stadium and the uneasy atmosphere
at the
top table could have sent mixed signals about the real "enemies", the
people
uppermost in Mugabe's mind as he contemplates the future of what even
he
must now consider his shaky presidency.
One poster read "Mugabe for
2010", but was inexplicably removed from
the stadium before the celebrations
got underway.
Another poster said "Succes-sion politics not ouster
politics" and
drew the attention of many observers. It seemed to shift the
identity and
location of the architects of "regime change" from foreigners
to Zimbabweans
in Shake Shake building in Harare, not London or
Washington.
Since last year's Zanu PF con-ference in Goromonzi,
where a number of
provinces believed to be linked to the Mujuru faction
refused to endorse
Mugabe's plans to extend his term to 2010, Mugabe has
spoken strongly
against those already eyeing his post. He has repeatedly
declared that there
is no vacancy.
Vice-President Joice Mujuru,
once considered Mugabe's favourite and
presumably "safe" conte-nder for the
presidency, boycotted the celebrations
a few days after Mugabe reportedly
came short of ruling her out of the
presidential race in a ZBC-TV birthday
inter-view.
Mugabe reportedly accused the Mujuru faction of using
former Zanu PF
secretary-general Edgar Tekere to rubbish him
politically.
His comments were edited out, including his statement
that by doing
what she did, Mujuru had scuppered her ambitions to succeed
him.
Her husband, Solomon Mujuru, turned up alone at the stadium,
about 30
minutes after Mugabe's arrival. The former commander of the army,
regarded
as a kingmaker in the Zanu PF Politburo, looked isolated as he took
his
place next to the President of the Senate, Edna Madzongwe.
Mugabe did nothing to acknowledge his presence, as the spouse of the
Vice-President, as tradition de-mands at such government and Zanu PF
functions.
Instead, he spent consi-derable time heaping praises
on his other Vice
President, Joseph Msika.
He also showered
accolades on the two late Vice-Presidents Joshuam
Nkomo and Simon Muzenda.
But there was no mention of Joice Mujuru.
Jethro Mpofu, a political
ana-lyst, said the atmosphere at the
celebrations was a clear indi-cation
that Mugabe was now feel-
ing "lonely ideologically and physically"
because of the succes-sion
wars swirling in his party.
"Mugabe
has become an op-position within Zanu PF," he said. "It is not
only the
Mujuru faction that does not agree with him but everyone else, save
for the
security apparatus still propping him up. No one agrees with him."
In the ZTV interview, Mugabe reportedly speaks glowingly of Emmerson
Mnangagwa and his role in the liberation struggle in
what observers
said was an indi-cation the veteran leader wanted a
successor who would
protect him after he finally retires.
Zanu PF secretary for the
youth, Absolom Sikhosana, downplayed the
controversy over Mujuru's absence
at Mkoba on Saturday.
He said she had no obligation to attend the
celebrations "as they were
meant for the youth".
Sikhosana, who
led the pre-parations for the communist-style event,
did not want to comment
on messages displayed at the celebrations, insisting
that "the story is that
the celebrations went on very well".
Zim Standard
By
Nqobani Ndlovu
BULAWAYO - Senior Zanu PF officials helped
themselves to donated food
and beasts meant for President Robert Mugabe's
83rd birthday celebrations in
Gweru last weekend.
As a result,
thousands of people reportedly went back home on empty
stomachs,The Standard
has confirmed.
Thousands of people were turned away at Mkoba
Stadium on Saturday
after they were lured to attend the celebrations
organised by the 21st
February Movement with promises of a
"feast".
About $300 million was raised for the festivities while 36
beasts as
well as several tonnes of maize- meal were donated following an
aggressive
fund-raising campaign.
Struggling parastatals were
also forced to donate.
But according to insiders, some of the
donations were hijacked by
ruling party officials in the province. Out of
the 36 beasts, only 20 were
slaughtered and the rest are now reportedly on
two farms in Gweru.
Members of the catering committee, mostly Zanu
PF activists, allegedly
helped themselves to some of the donated food meant
for the guests, sources
said.
Contacted for comment, Cephas
Msipa, resident minister and provincial
governor for the Midlands, confirmed
some of the beasts were at his farm
"for safe-keeping".
A
member of the fund-raising committee admitted he too had some of the
animals
at his farm, again only for safe-keeping, he said.
But the Zanu PF
Midlands provincial chairman, Kizito Chivamba, said he
was not aware that
some of the animals had been taken for safe-keeping.
He said an
audit would be carried out on items used to make the event
a success.
Zim Standard
By Our
Staff
NEW Ziana, a government-owned multimedia company is
paying "peanuts"
to its journalists: $40 000 a month.
And the
shocking news is that the organisation is failing to pay the
journalists the
"pittance" wages on time.
The disclosures were made last week by
disgruntled journalists who
demanded the resignation of the company's chief
executive officer.
Reached for a comment on Thursday, the CEO
Munyaradzi Matanyire said:
"I think . . . Why don't you wait and call me
next week. Everybody is doing
negotiations right now. Our people are
negotiating." He would not respond to
calls for his
resignation.
Apart from the news agency, New Ziana publishes
community papers: The
Gweru Times, Masvingo Star, Pungwe News, and The
Telegraph.
The Harare Post, an ambitious publication targeted at
the Harare
market, dominated by major publications, folded last
year.
The journalists said their $40 000 basic salary was enough to
pay
commuter bus fares for 10 days. Short trips in Harare now cost $2 000
and
they need $4 000 every day in bus fares alone.
The
journalists are much better than receptionists and sales
representatives who
earn $35 000.
At the time of writing, the workers at the New Ziana
had not been paid
their February wages. They said they now spend most of
their time updating
their CVs because they did not see any future of the
organisation, said to
be the brainchild of former information minister
Jonathan Moyo.
Recently, New Ziana property in Bulawayo was put
under the hammer
after the company ignored demands to pay their
$1
million debt to a security company.
The company has been ordered by
an arbitrator to pay its workers 70%
salary increments backdated to March
2005 with an interest of 30% a year.
An arbitrator ruled the
company must give its workers an additional
180% salary increment backdated
to October last year with interest at the
current rate.
New
Ziana, however, appealed against the judgement and the employees
will wait a
little bit longer to get the money.
Zim Standard
BY NDAMU
SANDU
ZIMBABWE is losing between US$40 million and US$50
million a week
through the smuggling of precious minerals, Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe (RBZ)
governor Gideon Gono told a parliamentary portfolio committee
last week.
Gono's disclosure to the Defence and Home Affairs
portfolio committee
amounts to an annual loss of US$2.6 billion, enough - by
some calculations -
to launch the economic turn-around.
Zimbabwe requires between US$2.5 billion and $3 billion a year to put
the
economy on an even keel but was raising only half of that amount.
Gono said: "No other country is blessed to the point where precious
minerals
anongonyuka ega (just appear on their own). We are losing between
US$40
million and US$50 million a week through smuggling of gold, diamond
and all
precious minerals."
Gono's stunning revelations corroborated oral
evidence by small-scale
miners to a portfolio committee last month there was
rampant smuggling of
minerals by influential politicians.
He
said the little foreign currency raised was being used to import
other basic
commodities, such as maize and wheat, as well as settling debts
inherited
from previous governors.
"While I am busy looking at yesterday's
debts, I cannot keep pace with
today's requirements," Gono
said.
He was called to the committee after pleas by the
Registrar-General
Office, Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) and Zimbabwe
Defence Forces (ZDF) for
foreign currency to import various
components.
The police require foreign currency to boost their
vehicle fleet, now
a skeleton 1 500 against the 15 000
required.
The defence forces require US$2 million to buy a
numerically-controlled machine for the manufacture of spares. The RG's
office is failing to provide passports and IDs.
Gono told the
committee, in light of the foreign currency crunch
nationwide, he would
attend to the police, ZDF and RG's office needs later.
Zimbabwe is
desperately scrounging for foreign direct investment after
falling out with
the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, among other
institutions.
Zimbabwe's external debt stood at US$4.1 billion at the end of
October last
year while external payment arrears totalled US$2.2 billion.
Only
last week, the IMF said Zimbabwe remained ineligible for aid
under the
Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility-Exogenous Shocks Facility
(PRGF-ESF)
Trust as it had reneged on US$129 million arrears.
Zim Standard
BY OUR STAFF
TELOne has won a wooden spoon from the government's "Look East" policy
as
its US$100 million deal with a Chinese firm flopped after the
government-owned landline provider failed to raise the down
payment.
As part of a deal signed with Huawei Technologies, TelOne
would roll
out 1.6 million subscribers over 10 years and replace analogue
with digital
exchanges.
TelOne technical director Hampton
Mhlanga told a parliamentary
portfolio committee on Transport and
Communications the deal collapsed after
the parastatal failed to raise the
down payment.
"When the agreement was signed, it was based on the
understanding that
we would obtain loans from the Bank of China and Eximbank
China, but it didn't
work out," Mhlanga said.
He said TelOne
had staggered its expansion programme, confining it to
phases. The first
phase results in the issuance of 30 000 lines through a
Code Division
Multiple Access (CDMA) Wireless Local Loop Network. Eight base
stations have
already been installed and Mhlanga said the project "is now
99.9%
complete".
He said the wireless technology system had been tried
and tested in
Kenya, Zambia, Nigeria and a Chinese province with 50 million
people.
He said the wireless technology was cheaper to run compared
to cables,
which local cable manufacturer CAFCA could no longer
manufacture.
Portfolio committee chairperson Leo Mugabe said
NetOne's affairs were
"worrying" as revenue from incoming calls had dwindled
over the years.
TelOne managing director Wellington Makamure told
the committee the
company was a net caller: it was paying out more on
outgoing calls.
Makamure told the committee TelOne had 79 analogue
exchanges, some as
old as 55 years. He said the 72 digital exchanges had an
average age of 15
years.
Zim Standard
BY CAIPHAS
CHIMHETE
THE European Union (EU) has condemned the government
for intensified
crackdown on its perceived enemies and called on the
country's neighbours to
assist Zimbabwe's "suffering" citizens.
Addressing the France-Africa Summit recently in France, the president
of the
European Union Council, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel, expressed
deep
concern over the socio-political climate prevailing in Zimbabwe.
She said the on-going intimidation of political opponents, harassment,
threats against farmers and even destruction of poor people's homes was not
justified in any way.
"I therefore appeal also to Zimbabwe's
neighbours to join us in doing
as much as we possibly can to help the
suffering people there," Merkel said.
South Africa is viewed as a
key player in seeking a solution to
Zimbabwe's socio-political and economic
crisis.
The police last week defied a High Court order allowing the
opposition
Movement for Democratic Change to hold a rally in
Harare.
The police beat up opposition supporters, injuring scores
of them in
the process, as they battled to prevent them from assembling.
They went on
to ban the holding of rallies and demonstrations in Harare and
Chitungwiza
for three months in contravention of the Public Order and
Security Act
(Posa). Under Posa such a ban by the police cannot exceed a
month.
In May 2005, the government razed to the ground thousands of
houses
under Operation Murambatsvina, rendering more than 70 000 people
homeless.
Turning to the continent, Merkel, however, expressed
optimism of
prosperity and economic growth. She was also hopeful that new
structures
that have emerged, such as New Partnership for Africa's
Development (Nepad)
and the Africa Union (AU) would spur the continent's
growth.
"We are witnessing positive signs from Africa in connection
with
economic growth, for example. At more than 5%, this growth is stronger
than
it has been for the last 30 years," Merkel said.
She
however noted with concern the issue of climate protection and the
prevention of global warming, which threatens to inflict great suffering on
African countries.
Other problems, said Merkel, included the
consequences of climate
change, civil war and migration.
"We
are also called upon to summon up the determination necessary to
combat
terrible diseases such as Aids as well as poverty and terrorism,"
Merkel
said.
Zim Standard
TORONTO - From
money transfers to
virtual grocery stores, Zimbabweans in the Diaspora have
been outdoing each
other as they seek ways to provide for families back home
and earn profit in
the process.
Each new venture comes in with
some innovation as the expanding field
of Internet brokers breeds stiff
competition.
One of the new ventures is Traditional Traditions from
Canada. Do not
be fooled by the name; this has nothing to do with culture.
It is, in fact,
a poultry business with its head office and collections in
Toronto, chicken
runs in Nkayi district, distribution centre in Bulawayo and
its market is
spread throughout the Diaspora.
Mark Mkhabela,
the owner of Traditional Traditions is leasing a small
space on his uncle's
land in Nkayi where he raises chickens with the help of
family
members.
"When they are ready for the market, the chickens are
taken to
Bulawayo where they are slaughtered and processed," Mkhabela told
MAP
Feature Service.
People in the Diaspora who wish for their
families to eat chicken and
eggs place orders to Mkhabela in Toronto via
e-mail or the phone.
"I immediately relay the order to Bulawayo
where they have to deliver
the chickens and/or eggs to the homes of
customers within 24 hours otherwise
the customers will be entitled to get
their order free," said Mkhabela.
He said orders were coming at an
average of 50 a month and from people
as far field as Australia, UK and the
US. - MAP Feature Service.
Zim Standard
Comment
ONE reason why the acting Police
Commissioner could not name
politicians involved in illegal gold mining
activities is because they
apparently enjoy immunity from prosecution, while
the failure of an RBZ
official to identify the culprits suggests lack of
confidence in the
law-enforcement agencies' capacity to offer protection to
whistle blowers.
Last month the Deputy Commissioner of the Police,
Godwin Matanga,
while acknowledging before a Parliamentary Portfolio
Committee that there
were senior people involved in illegal gold mining
activities, was reluctant
to identify them.
A senior RBZ
official, Mirirai Chiremba, who also testified, asked for
the media to be
excluded during presentation of evidence. It was not that
the official did
not want to warn the culprits -the police have the
information. It was the
fear of daring to name where the police chief quaked
in his
boots.
The two incidents are an indictment on the police and a loud
statement
on levels of corruption in Zimbabwe. They, in part, explain why
the
Leadership Code of the early 1980s could not be implemented and why the
work
of the Anti-Corruption Commission could prove stillborn. They also
explain
why the government's whistleblower scheme has not turned up
spectacular
findings. They also render the Ministry of Anti-Corruption a
public
relations exercise, for the consumption of the gullible, or to
hoodwink the
international community.
Former Kenyan president,
Daniel arap Moi, tried the same trick when
his regime was embattled but
everyone, including the international
community, saw through the
sham.
It is disappointing the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee did
not ask
for written names of the culprits - because the police have them. It
is
hardly likely that a top police officer could have bluffed the committee
or
that he could concede that there were senior people involved in illegal
activities without evidence to back up his charges.
The
Committee should have insisted that he produces the evidence which
formed
the basis of his testimony. Otherwise the Committee is arguing its
irrelevance.
Most of the small-scale miners who appeared before
the committee were
genuinely scared for their lives, yet no protection was
extended to them.
Adding to the concerns of the small-scale miners
is the fact that
despite identifying the Secretary for the Ministry of
Environment and
Tourism, no effort appears to have been made by the law
enforcement agencies
and the Anti-Corruption Commission to move in swiftly
to interrogate her.
This confirms fears that the inertia is intended to
allow the trail to go
cold, thus allowing the culprits ample time to cover
up.
The government should therefore not expect Zimbabweans to take
it
seriously when it says it wants to tackle corruption
head-on.
Which is the greater evil, victims of the government's
failure to
provide sufficient urban housing (Murambatsvina) or those who are
bleeding
the economy?
Zimbabwe has become one large enterprise
for senior Zanu PF
politicians to pillage and plunder. The case of the
agricultural support
facility clearly demonstrated who the main looters
were. Today they are the
same people at the forefront of illegal mining
activities, in which only the
small fry gets caught while the big fish go
scot-free.
If the government really wanted to put a stop to
corruption it could
do so, but that is not in the interests of those ruining
this country.
That is why there is a deliberate strategy to do
nothing about the
discovery of diamonds at Chiadzwa in Marange area of
Manicaland when
Zimbabwe suffers from an acute shortage of foreign currency
and there is no
attempt to facilitate formal mining of the diamonds so the
country can begin
to benefit from the sale of the stones.
Zim Standard
Sundayopinion By
Bill Saidi
INFORMATION is power: an extremist feminist
organisation, through a
shrewd use of IT, convinced potential members God
was a woman and created
Man by accident.
But once She had
decided She couldn't de-create him, She resolved to
punish him, by
condemning him to eternal servitude to Woman.
Information is power:
the Holy Bible is the most well-read book in
living memory, but Christianity
has still not penetrated the most populous
country in the world -
China.
Information is power: Mao's Little Red Book may have been a
bestseller
while he lived, but it can't be today. The Holy Bible might just
pip it in
China.
What would the Catholics, the Anglicans. the
Pentecostals, the
Baptists, the Methodists, the Presbyterians, the Amish and
the Mormons do
with all those former communists?
Information is
power: Every day on ZBC-TV, the government newspapers
are provided with free
advertising, which is denied to the independent
papers. The Herald, the
government conglomerate's standard-bearer, ought to
be the largest-selling
newspaper in the region, but it isn't.
Which goes to prove that
although information may be power, when it is
in the hands of megalomaniacs,
it can be as impotent as expired Viagra.
Which happened to The
Herald, at the height of the popularity of The
Daily News, oh, eons ago . .
. it now seems.
The government mouthpiece's circulation dropped so
dramatically, the
mandarins in Shake Shake building were tearing out their
hair with hysteria.
But I digress: after the destructive Operation
Murambatsvina was
unleashed on a half-starved, half-employed and
half-healthy urban population
in 2005, a government apologist moonlighting
as a journalist of integrity
tried to sell me this incredible story: the
International Monetary Fund had
told the government it could be back in
their good books if it cleaned up
Harare's central business district and
allowed legitimate business to
prosper, unencumbered by the shady methods of
the flea markets.
Why, I asked, wouldn't the government make the
most of this veritable
bonanza of a PR coup?
The counterfeit
journalist was stumped. Once again, I thanked the
Greek goddess of the good
journalist for rescuing us from a fate worse than
. . .
There
must be a goddess of the good journalist - Greek, Roman,
Polynesian,
Zimbabwean, or Ukrainian - who cares? There are patron saints
and goddesses
for doctors, Formula One racing drivers, pimps, politicians,
mountain
climbers, sex workers, palmists, soothsayers, fakirs, gamblers,
fire-eaters,
levitators - people who levitate? - and secret agents like
James Bond and
Mata Hari. Why not for journalists?
For instance, after the 2000
parliamentary elections, would-be
do-gooders swarmed the editorial offices
of The Daily News.
Their pitch went something like this: how was
this paper going to
sustain its sales, now that the elections were over? No
more politics, they
said.
One proposal: go for crime and sex,
great, big pictures of women with
big . . . something or the other. That
always sold papers. Look at The Sun,
in Britain, with their famous Page
Three Girl.
The Sun is still the largest-selling daily in the UK
and their formula
has worked wonders for circulation.
The
people who buy that paper are no different from the people who buy
newspapers in Zimbabwe . . . men full of machismo.
The
difference? The men overseas have more money than their Zimbabwean
counterparts. Yet when you consider how Zimbabweans are able to make ends
meet in the face of hyperinflation and the lowest wages in the civilized
world, they have to possess a talent, or the help of the Mongolian goddess
of victims of megalomania.
Others offered this: change
allegiances - as if we had other
allegiances apart from the truth
(honest!)
What they proposed was quite simple: confess you backed
the wrong
horse but had now come to your senses and realised there was no
alternative
to Zanu PF.
There was one teensy-weensy problem:
would Zanu PF believe us? At what
bend, on this Road to Damascus, did we see
the light? They would ask
menacingly.
It was always possible
that Zanu PF, the old masters of Tamba
Wakachenjera, would string us along,
let us believe they believed we had
indeed seen the light, and then WHAM!
When we least expected it, they would
come at us with guns blazing, and
subject us to the worst humiliation we had
ever endured.
After
that, none of us would ever enter journalism again.
But that
Tibetan goddess of good journalism came through again. It
took the huge
hammer of AIPPA to shut down the paper, in the end.
I often wonder
what would have happened if the owners had taken the
advice of the phony
do-gooders, and chosen the soft-core porn route.
But we live in a
country where the leadership, although professing to
be Christian, is so
intolerant of any form of dissent it makes you wonder
why they allow the
opposition to sit in the same Parliament with them.
Then you look
more closely at the opposition and you realise why. At
some stage during
their existence since 1999, the MDC struck fear in Robert
Mugabe's
heart.
Today . . . they need the Eskimo goddess of opposition
parties to help
them.
Zim Standard
sundayview by Gideon
Chitanga
The recently announced higher and
tertiary fees structure, as
publicised in the State media recently is
misleading. In fact, it is an
attempt to create an impression that the
government is keen on making
education not only affordable to everybody,
but, also to sustain a fallacy
that it seeks to maintain higher standards of
education, hence the reference
to Zimbabwe's education role and status
within the Sadc region.
It is clear that the increase in fees by 2
000% is out of the reach of
many guardians. The majority of students come
from impoverished rural areas;
their parents' incomes, if any, do not
automatically increase with the turn
of the year since such parents are not
in formal employment.
Zimbabwe's crisis has destroyed both the
formal and informal sectors
of the economy. Consequently most parents are no
longer in formal
employment. Given that the same guardians have to pay
school fees and levies
(primary and secondary), nearly amounting to the same
amounts, the new fees
for tertiary and higher education are wildly out of
reach for many potential
graduates and their guardians.
It is
astounding that the government did not gazette food and
accommodation fees,
leaving it to the discretion of individual institutions
yet these are the
most expensive and are pegged at more than Z$500 000.
Education has
not only been commercialised outrightly and made a
luxury, but the system
has become bluntly discriminatory against the poor.
Where does government
expect the students to live and what will they be
surviving on during the
course of their studies?
Food, accommodation, transport and books
(exercise and texts)
constitute the most expensive aspects of education.
Factor in the currently
sky-rocketing rate of inflation and the subsequent
rapid increase in the
price of basic commodities - and everything is
absolutely out of reach of
many students. By gazetting tuition fees only,
the government is abdicating
its duties of protecting the poor and
vulnerable of our society and making
education realisable by all.
Incidentally it is the poor who need education
most in order to change their
fortunes.
The worsening deprivation among students at colleges and
universities
has made the institutions breeding grounds for prostitution and
all sorts of
corruption as students desperately struggle to eke out a
living, while
continuing with their studies.
Students expose
themselves to HIV and Aids, rape and all forms of
violence. In the extreme,
most students have dropped out at a rate more than
the modest 31,5% that the
Zimbabwe National Students' Union (ZINASU) has
recorded.
One of
the State's publications reports that Masvingo Polytechnic
College is
deserted. As education becomes too expensive, students take
greater risks,
illegally skipping the border into South Africa, Botswana and
Mozambique, to
perform menial jobs.
Can any Zanu PF and or government official
stand up and brag about
Zimbabwe's educational role and status within the
Sadc region? We have an
educational crisis - a national disaster - which the
government is refusing
to acknowledge.
A visit to any
institution of higher learning today will show that
students live four to
six in a single room and walk about 30km to and from
college every day, on
empty stomachs. They also have to scrounge like
everybody else for basics,
which are in short supply. This is no fiction.
Anyone concerned can come to
Masvingo and confirm this with students who
stay at Runyararo West, Rhodene
and in the farms close to Nemamwa Growth
Point, where they are crammed in
ramshackle structures, reminiscent of
shanty towns - without running water,
ablutions or lighting.
How are students expected to study and how
can the education system
produce a polished global academic under these
circumstances? Clearly, these
conditions are not conducive for any kind or
level of study. They actually
speak volumes about how much our education
system and standards have
plummeted.
* Gideon Hlamalani
Chitanga is ZINASU Vice-President
Zim Standard
reflections
with Dr Alex T
Magaisa
A few weeks ago, I wrote in these pages
applauding the speech given by
the Judge President, Justice Makarau, my old
mentor. I found her stance
remarkable, particularly in view of the brouhaha
surrounding the purchase of
a luxury vehicle for Governor Gono by the RBZ.
It seems that the pleas of
the judges have been heard, which is all very
well for them, but one hopes
that the thrust of Justice Makarau's speech is
not lost in the stampede to
gratify and regale the men and women of the
law.
Whilst responding to the plea of judges, some of whom were
clearly
becoming pauperised is to be commended, there is understandable
disquiet at
the objects of gratification that have been provided, when the
operational
aspects of the justice system, including the needs and
expectations of the
impecunious foot-soldiers - the clerks, messengers,
interpreters, require
urgent prioritisation.
But the greatest
uneasiness arises from the perception of the hasty
response as an attempt to
mollify judges with material possessions and the
consequent hazard it poses
to the autonomy of the judiciary.
Today, I would like to relate a
story - one that will be familiar to
the judges, to my colleagues in the Law
or anyone who has had the pleasure
of reading Constitutional Law, and many
Zimbabweans who lived during the
colonial period after UDI. It will also be
very familiar to the generation
of politicians currently in charge of the
country's affairs, because they
were adversely affected by its consequences.
Of the hundreds of legal cases
that I read during my four years in law
school, the case of Madzimbamuto v
Lardner Burke stands out. It had
everything that intensified both my
interest and curiosity about the nature
of the law and the conduct of those
charged with its administration and
interpretation.
The case arose in Rhodesia, as Zimbabwe was known
then, in the context
of the Unilateral Declaration Independence ("UDI") by
the Smith government
on 11 November 1965. The case, which went through three
courts and seven
judgements in all, occupies several hundred pages of law
reports, the
reading and understanding of which is a daunting
task.
I do not intend therefore, to burden the reader with the
complexities
of this case but would like, in the simplest terms to which one
can possibly
reduce the case, to use it to make a point about judicial
independence in
the face of undue pressure from the executive. In my desire
to unscramble
the case for the reader, I inevitably run the risk of
over-simplification,
which may upset some of my legal colleagues, but I
proceed with the hope
that they will understand and forgive, in the comfort
of knowing the
principal object of this contribution.
Daniel
Madzimbamuto was a nationalist, fighting alongside others, for
majority
rule, whilst Lardner Burke was minister in charge of justice in the
Smith
government. Madzimbamuto was detained under a state of emergency
shortly
before the Smith regime announced UDI, stating that Rhodesia had
become an
independent sovereign state and proclaimed a new Constitution
("UDI
Constitution") to replace the 1961 Constitution ("Old Constitution").
Under
the Old Constitution, the State of Emergency under which Madzimbamuto
was
being detained was due to automatically expire after 3 months. As that
deadline approached, the Smith government extended its duration and to
maintain the detention of individuals detained under the previous
emergency.
Mrs Madzimbamuto brou-ght a legal challenge on behalf of
her detained
husband. Her application was remarkably simple - she asked the
Court to
declare that her husband's detention was illegal and for his
release. Mrs
Madzimbamuto's arguments were that all actions and laws made
under the UDI
Constitution lacked legal validity in light of the existence
of the Old
Constitution, which the British had declared to still be the
legal mandate
and that UDI was void and of no effect. The reality on the
ground however,
was that, for all intents and purposes, the Smith regime
retained effective
control of the country, including the civil service and
the security
structures.
The case was significant because it
was a clear test of the legal
authority and legitimacy of the Smith regime,
which on its side, argued that
it had successfully created a new order and
the illegitimacy of its tactics
were irrelevant because it was in effective
control. The judges in the
Rhodesian courts were therefore being asked to
make a hard decision, one
that brought into sharp focus the clash between
allegiance to legal
principle and the demands of political
expediency.
The matter went through three courts: the General and
Appellate
Divisions of the High Court of Rhodesia and the Privy Council in
the UK.
Overall, despite differing somewhat in their decision on the
legality of the
Smith government, the judges in the Rhodesian courts came to
the conclusion
that its actions and laws were valid on grounds of necessity,
being
necessary measures for the maintenance of peace and order. It was
decided
that the security situation in the country required that the state
of
emergency be allowed to continue. It did not matter to the judges, that
Madzimbamuto's rights were being violated or that the "insecurity" to which
they referred was a result of people trying to assert their civil
rights.
In fact, two of the judges in the Appellate Division even
accepted
that the UDI Constitution and the Smith government had acquired
legal
status. Not surprisingly, the Smith regime hailed the decisions as
victories
because they gave it de facto recognition.
Interestingly, one judge in the Appellate Division, Justice Fieldsend
was
not willing to accept the legality of the UDI Constitution but even he
was
prepared to recognise the actions of the government, on the basis of
necessity.
A remarkable event happened when Mrs Madzimbamuto
decided to take the
battle to the Privy Council in the UK - being the final
forum of appeal
during that time. The Solicitor-General of Rhodesia made a
radical
announcement, stating that the orders of the Privy Council would not
be
obeyed by the Rhodesian government. Zimbabweans today will be familiar
with
similar reckless statements that have been made by government ministers
to
threaten and push judges into submission.
The
Solicitor-General's political announcement, clearly in defiance
and contempt
of the judicial authorities, was surprisingly accepted by the
judges but
most notably, Justice Fieldsend resigned in protest. Three
Africans who were
on death row, who could have appealed to the Privy Council
were executed
within the week of that announcement. What is significant here
is that the
judges in Rhodesia had effectively recognised the legal
authority of the
Smith government. The judges kept office and recognised the
UDI
Constitution, even though they had been appointed under the Old
Constitution, which they had sworn to protect and obey.
The
Privy Council decided in favour of Mrs Madzimbamuto, holding that
the
actions of the Smith government lacked legal validity. It stated that it
was
not for the judges to recognise the acts of an illegal regime. But the
victory was only of theoretical significance, because the Rhodesian judges
refused to accept the decision of the Privy Council. This refusal prompted
one of the judges of the High Court, Justice Dendy Young, to resign in
protest.
So in Justice Fieldsend and Justice Young, the story
has two unlikely
heroes, besides Mrs Madzimbamuto, the unsung heroine of the
case. The two
judges had remained faithful to their oath and refused to be
cowed into
submission by the illegal regime, and therefore asserted their
independence
by resigning and refusing to serve under the circumstances. It
is worth
noting here, that when independence finally arrived in 1980, the
new
government duly recognised Justice Fieldsend by appointing him as the
first
Chief Justice of Zimbabwe. I like to think that the nationalists had
recognised the integrity with which he had carried himself, sticking to
principle rather than submitting to political expediency. It is ironic
therefore, that the same people who once recognised the value of judicial
independence, appear to have adopted the same tactics of the Smith regime in
the Madzimbamuto case - bullying judges and putting them in very difficult
conditions.
The judges faced the risk of losing their jobs if
they had refused to
recognise the Smith government and it could therefore be
said that in
deciding as they did, they were protecting their own interests.
But it would
have been a price worth paying for adhering to their oaths and
legality.
Justices Young and Fieldsend set the right precedent, preferring
to lose
office than to capitulate to the pressure exerted by the executive.
They
arguably occupied a privileged position in society but they gave it up
as a
matter of principle.
As Zimbabwe moves towards ever more
uncertain times, the courts will
be called upon to make very difficult
decisions. And as the current
Zimbabwean judges may be aware, they face
similar and perhaps worse
pressures but capitulating to such pressures would
be a betrayal of their
office and indeed the millions who look to the court
as the final bastion
for the protection of their rights.
*Dr
Alex T Magaisa can be contacted at wamagaisa@yahoo. co.uk
Reuters
Sat Mar 3, 2007 12:58 PM GMT
HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe's
doctors have halted a two-month strike over
pay that plunged the country's
creaking health system into crisis, the
health minister said on
Saturday.
David Parirenyatwa told Reuters the government had agreed a pay
deal with
the doctors, who wanted better salaries to keep pace with
Zimbabwe's roaring
inflation.
Nurses and paramedics had also joined
the strike, paralysing a public health
system already stretched by the
burden of HIV/AIDS, but they returned to
work last month after agreeing a
separate pay deal.
"That is now a thing of the past. Everything is back
to normal,"
Parirenyatwa said.
Government doctors stopped work in
December demanding an 8,000 percent wage
increase, while government could
only offer a 300 percent hike.
Before the industrial action, state
doctors earned Z$56,000 a month, worth
about $224 at the official exchange
rate but about $7 on the black market.
The president of the Hospital
Doctors Association, Kuda Nyamutukwa,
confirmed doctors had agreed a pay
deal with the government, but declined to
give details of the new
wages.
"Everyone is back at work now ... the (Health Services) Board has
offered us
a new pay package," Nyamutukwa said.
President Robert
Mugabe's government has come under increased pressure from
workers who have
borne the brunt of a deepening economic crisis, which has
seen inflation
soaring to almost 1,600 percent.
The authorities last week averted a
full-scale strike by government
employees when it awarded them the second
wage increase in as many months
after teachers -- who make up the majority
of civil servants -- began a
strike.
The government has begun talks
with trade unions and business leaders over a
proposed wage and price hike
it hopes will arrest galloping inflation.
Analysts have warned rising
discontent over the economic meltdown in
Zimbabwe could trigger street
protests against Mugabe's government.
News24
03/03/2007 19:33 -
(SA)
Malabo - Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe arrived in the
economic capital
of Equatorial Guinea in an unannounced visit on Friday,
said an airport
source.
He was met at the airport by his
Equatorial-Guinean counterpart, Teodoro
Obiang Nguema, at the start of his
trip to Bata, which a source close to the
government said was for "purely
private" reasons.
The two heads of state planned to hold talks during
Mugabe's trip, which was
due to end on Sunday night, a presidential source
on the Equatorial-Guinean
side said on condition of anonymity, without
giving further details.
In a highly-publicised visit to Equatorial Guinea
in November 2004, Mugabe
was proclaimed a "saviour" in Harare and Malabo for
having foiled a coup to
overthrow Obiang.
The alleged leader of the
plot, Briton Simon Mann, was sentenced to four
years in a Zimbabwean jail.
Malabo is seeking his extradition.
Mann is fighting the move, as he could
face the death penalty in Equatorial
Guinea.
Dear Family and Friends,
On the roadsides between towns and cities the grass
is nearly two metres
tall and it is ripe: green at the base, yellow and
golden above. As you
travel along the roads the swaying and flowing of the
grass is a calming,
peaceful, almost mesmerising sight. The kilometres pass
and the view
doesn't change and it suddenly strikes you that something is
wrong. This
shouldn't be the view of Zimbabwe's farms in March and you wonder
where
everyone and everything is. For scores of kilometres passing prime
roadside
farms there are no workers in the fields, no great stands of
ripening
maize, no smoke coming from the flues of tobacco barns, no sign of
life or
production at all. There are no cattle or sheep getting fat on the
grass -
tons of free food for animals is standing on the roadsides and in the
once
fenced fields and paddocks just going to waste. When you ask
Zimbabweans
how often they eat meat, many will say once a fortnight, or once
a week if
they can afford it. Meat has become a luxury and yet there are no
animals
to eat the grass - how utterly absurd.
This week no sooner had
President Mugabe left the country on an official
visit to Namibia then the
gloves came off back at home. The Governor of the
Reserve bank went walkabout
- not to banks and financial institutions, as
is surely his mandate, but to
farms - and with the ZBC TV cameras in tow.
This was not the usual government
type tour where the armchairs have been
dragged out under the tent and there
is microphone, flowers and a vast
number of men in suits and women in fancy
dresses and larney headgear. The
Governor didn't have a flower in his
buttonhole the way the politicians
usually do but he was wearing a track suit
and strode out to see the crops
on a couple of farms. The entourage seemed to
be mostly soldiers and
cameramen and they often had to run to keep
up.
After six years of ludicrous statements by the previous Minister
of
Agriculture when promises of a bountiful harvest were the annual
litany,
the Reserve Bank Governor broke ranks dramatically. "There are some
people
who have become professional land occupiers," he said,
"vandalizing
equipment and moving from one farm to another." Dr Gono said
that the crop
of maize presently in the ground would be likely to only
produce 600 000
tonnes of maize. This is a dire and diabolical admission that
should cause
widespread alarm and consternation. Assuming a population of 12
million
people in Zimbabwe, allowing half a kg of maize per person per day,
there
is only enough maize in the ground for 100 days. Dr Gono admitted
that
Zimbabwe was already importing maize and said: "For us to import food in
a
country that has had a land reform programme is a shame." Precious
foreign
currency needed to buy medicines and chemicals, spare parts and fuel
was
going to have to be diverted to buy food in a land blessed with
sun,
fertile soil and summer rainfall.
While Dr Gono was trekking
around farmland, President Mugabe was speaking
in Namibia. He was presenting
a different face of Zimbabwe and at a big
public function he said: "I can
safely declare that the land and
resettlement plan of our government was
completed successfully."
Confusion reigns because as one leader talks of
a success, another talks of
shame, food imports and land vandals. A hundred
days, the Reserve Bank
Governor said, food for twelve million people for just
three and a half
months. Until next week, thanks for reading, love cathy
Copyright cathy
buckle 3rd March 2007.
http://africantears.netfirms.com
IOL
Basildon
Peta
March 03 2007 at 11:53AM
Embattled Zimbabweans
have devised new methods of venting their anger
at their increasingly
unpopular leader, Robert Mugabe, who turned 83 last
week.
Mugabe's government has tightened the vice of repression over the past
two
weeks, jailing several opposition leaders and banning opposition rallies
and
meetings around Zimbabwe.
Taking a leaf from wars in the Middle
East, Zimbabwean activists are
circulating a specially created deck of 55
playing cards to identify the
"most wanted" members of Mugabe's government
who they believe should face
trial for crimes against humanity.
The deck of cards method was successfully used by American-led
coalition
forces in Iraq to identify the "most wanted" members of Saddam
Hussein's
regime.
The Iraqi cards were designed to display
the names, faces and titles
of the Iraqis to help soldiers and Marines in
the field should contact
occur. Each deck had two Jokers, one showing Iraqi
military ranks and the
other, Arab tribal titles. The executed Saddam
Hussein was depicted on the
ace of spades.
Copying the same
method, Mugabe is being shown in each deck as both
the ace of diamonds and
the ace of spades. He is shown sitting on an
Emperor's chair surrounded by
bags of money and a box of diamonds from the
DRC to depict some of the vices
that Zimbabweans want him tried for.
Mugabe deployed a third of
Zimbabwe's army to help the late DRC leader
Laurent-Desire Kabila stave off
a rebel onslaught in 1997 in exchange for
vast mining concessions. Analysts
say nothing has been repaid to the
Zimbabwean treasury for the war efforts,
while politicians and army generals
benefited privately from the mining
concessions.
Mugabe's young wife, Grace Marufu, is shown as the
queen of hearts
holding shopping bags from Los Angeles, New York, London and
Paris. Before
she and her husband were banned from Britain, Grace had
established
international notoriety for her shopping escapades amid poverty
in Zimbabwe.
She had reportedly become a favourite at Harrods in London
alongside
prominent Hollywood celebrities like Liz Hurley and Tom
Cruise.
Other Mugabe cronies in the deck of cards include his
deputy Joyce
Mujuru, cabinet ministers Emmerson Mnangagwa and Patrick
Chinamasa, and
police and army generals responsible for the human rights
clampdown in
Zimbabwe . Former Information Minister Jonathan Moyo is shown
as the joker
with his face attached twice to a lengthy python.
Previously, Zimbabwean activists had put Mugabe's face on toilet paper
as
well as condom packets.
This article was originally published
on page 4 of Pretoria News on
March 03, 2007
The
Herald (Harare)
March 3, 2007
Posted to the web March 3,
2007
Business Editor
Harare
THE Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe has
established FISCORP Private Limited to take
over its quasi-fiscal operations
with effect from March 1.
This is consistent with the announcement made
by RBZ Governor Dr Gideon Gono
in his January Monetary Policy Statement that
the central bank sought to now
concentrate on its core business, weaning off
the quasi-fiscal operations to
FISCORP.
Among other things, the
new company is expected to collect and administer
outstanding loans given
under the various productive sector support
facilities by the central bank
over the last three years.
When Dr Gono took over the reins at the
central bank in 2003, he introduced
various finance facilities for
agriculture, mining, manufacturing and the
export sector, among others, to
offer cheap funds as a strategy to revive
productivity.
FISCORP will
also provide ancillary technical and advisory services to
beneficiaries as
provided for in the various RBZ frameworks establishing
such
facilities.
The handling of any outstanding funds under these facilities
will now come
under the FISCORP umbrella.
The new company, owned 100
percent by the central bank, will be headed by Mr
Matthews Kunaka as the
chief executive. Prior to his appointment, he was
division chief, internal
audit and compliance at the central bank. Former
division chief Economic
Support Facilities Mrs Winnie Mushipe has been
appointed FISCORP general
manager for the Agricultural Sector Productivity
Enhancement Facility
(ASPEF) and other special support programmes.
Mr Rongai Chizema has been
appointed general manager Parastatals, Local
Authorities Reorientation
Programme Facilities (PLARP). Before this
appointment he was the RBZ's
division chief, Parastatals Reorientation
Programme (PARP).
Mr Kunaka
is a chartered accountant who holds a Master of Business
Administration
(MBA) from the University of Delaware in the United States,
specialising in
finance.
He is also a holder of a Master of Science degree in Strategic
Management
from the University of Derby in the United Kingdom and a Bachelor
of
Accountancy Honours degree from the University of Zimbabwe.
Mr
Kunaka is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Zimbabwe
and
an associate member of the Institute of Management and the Computer
Society
of Zimbabwe.
He has previously headed the Zimbabwe Newspapers Group, the
Institute of
Chartered Accountants and was also chief executive of the
Independent Media
Group.
Mrs Mushipe holds a Bachelor of Arts Social
Science degree in Economics from
Wolverhampton University in the UK and has
attended various management and
technical programmes in Zimbabwe and
abroad.
She had over the years driven economic support programmes put in
place by
RBZ to support the productive sectors. She has headed the Credit
Guarantee
Company and the Apex Unit that was responsible for the management
of the
World Bank Enterprise Development Project.
Mr Chizema, who has
had stints with the Ministry of Finance, the Zimbabwe
Investment Centre,
ZimTrade and Intermarket Holdings, joined the central
bank in May
2005.
He holds a Bachelor of Science Economics degree from the University
of
Zimbabwe, a Masters of Arts Development Economics from the USA and a
diploma
in Investment Analysis and Portfolio Management from
UNISA.
"The Governor wishes FISCORP (Pvt) Ltd management all the best and
is
confident that they will ensure completion of all ongoing projects and
secure 100 percent collection of all outstanding disbursement and thus
enable the bank to attain the set money supply reduction targets as part of
the ongoing fight against inflation," said a statement from the central bank
last night.
From ZWNEWS, 3 March
By Maureen Johnson
Journalist Ian Mills,
who reported on Rhodesia and Zimbabwe over four
decades for the British
media and international news agencies, has died at
his home in Harare. He
was 74. Mills' byline was for many years perhaps the
best known from the
country to foreign audiences. Between 1973 and
independence in 1980 he
covered for 14 different outlets what had become a
major news story as the
Rhodesian Front tried to hang on to white minority
rule and the civil war
escalated. These included the BBC, three major
international news agencies,
Reuters, Agence France Presse and United Press,
and British national
newspapers with political leanings as diverse as the
liberal Guardian, and
the right of centre Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph. He
continued reporting
on the country's upheavals, including Robert Mugabe's
land seizures and
clamp down on press freedom, until retiring from
journalism two years ago.
Mills, however, was a journalist with a real
hinterland. He was a talented
musician. He played in bands, and composed and
taught many disciplines
ranging from classical music to rock. In his later
years, his great love was
jazz. He was performing and teaching music in
Harare until a few months
before his death.
Ian Henry Mills was born in Dorking in England, and
came to Rhodesia when
his Scottish parents settled in Mutare in 1949. He
started work in the
African Affairs department of the civil service,
becoming a fluent Shona
speaker. He then joined the King's African Rifles
until switching to
journalism relatively late in life aged 26. Mills got a
job on the then
Rhodesia Herald, now the state-run Herald, becoming its
political
correspondent and winning a Commonwealth Press Union award. In
1973, he took
over a freelance business run by Peter Niesewand, a journalist
deported by
Ian Smith's regime. Amusing, charming and generous both as a
host and with
his encyclopedic knowledge of his adopted country, its history
and its
politics, Mills was an invaluable source for visiting
correspondents. He was
also a terrific mimic and raconteur. Mills and his
wife, fellow journalist
Heather Silk, entertained literally waves of foreign
reporters at their
home. For most of the visitors the vicissitudes of the
country, from
bloodshed to economic chaos, were essentially a story. For
Mills, it was
much more. He wrote with deep knowledge and without bias about
his home.
Mills is survived by Heather and their daughters Melissa, also a
musician,
and Camilla, who recently left school, and by two sons from a
previous
marriage, Stephen and Paul.