Zimbabwe's opposition does not rule out chance of presidential run-off

By Angus Shaw, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

An unidentified man reads the Zimbabwean State owned daily newspaper, The Herald, in Harare, Zimbabwe Saturday, May, 3, 2008. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi HARARE, Zimbabwe - Zimbabwe's opposition on Saturday held out the possibility its leader would face President Robert Mugabe in a presidential run-off, but called on the country's neighbours to verify the vote count from the first round. Thokozani Khupe, vice-president of the Movement for Democratic Change, said the group still believed a run-off was unnecessary, maintaining opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai won the first round outright on March 29. The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission released results a day earlier giving Tsvangirai the lead, but not the simple majority needed to avoid a run-off with Mugabe, the second-place finisher. The opposition rejected those results as fraudulent. At a news conference Saturday, Khupe called on the Southern African Development Community to help verify the results. "We still need to be convinced before we participate in a run-off," she said. Top opposition leaders were expected to meet this weekend to consider their next step. Khupe did not comment on the meeting. No run-off date has been set. Deputy Information Minister Bright Matonga said the constitution requires a second round no sooner than 21 days from the announcement of the results and no later than a year. The opposition has consistently rejected a run-off, but its stance has appeared to soften since the official results were released, and Mugabe's party said he would take part in a second round. On Friday, Tsvangirai's deputy in the Movement for Democratic Change, Tendai Biti, acknowledged that skipping a second round could result in another term for Mugabe. Biti told reporters in Johannesburg in neighbouring South Africa that the only way out of the impasse was a power-sharing government led by Tsvangirai, but with no role for Mugabe. Biti also said a run-off would be illegal and there could not be one "for the simple and good reasons that that country is burning" amid violence and an economic collapse from rampant inflation. International observers have questioned whether a run-off would be legitimate, given the violence the opposition has faced. The opposition's top leaders, including Biti and Tsvangirai, have been staying out of Zimbabwe for fear of arrest. In a statement Friday, New York-based Human Rights Watch said "the ruling ZANU-PF party, the army and so-called war veterans have conducted a brutal state-sponsored campaign of violence, torture and intimidation against (opposition) activists and supporters." The group said limits on the opposition's access to the media and questions about the impartiality of electoral officials also have not been addressed. "The ruling party's bloody crackdown on the opposition makes a free and fair run-off vote a tragic joke," Georgette Gagnon, Human Rights Watch's Africa director, said in the statement. In a separate statement Friday, UNICEF said there were growing reports of children fleeing their homes with their families as a result of political violence and that aid groups were finding it increasingly difficult to operate. Mugabe's officials have denied fomenting political violence, instead accusing the opposition of being behind the unrest. Mugabe, 84, was hailed at independence in 1980 for promoting racial reconciliation and bringing education and health care to the black majority. But in recent years he has been accused of holding onto power through elections that independent observers say were marred by fraud, intimidation and rigging.

Zimbabwe opposition presses victory claim

Yahoo News

by Susan Njanji Sat May 3, 11:53 AM ET

HARARE (AFP) - Zimbabwe's opposition on Saturday reiterated claims of an
outright election victory against President Robert Mugabe, saying a run-off
was "unnecessary", as tensions in the country mounted.

"We are convinced that the run-off is unnecessary," Thokozani Khupe, deputy
leader of the Movement for Democratic Change, told reporters after a meeting
of senior party members in the capital Harare.

But Khupe also appeared to leave open the possibility of a second round,
saying: "In the unlikely event of a run-off, the MDC will once again romp to
victory by an even bigger margin."

The party's candidate, Morgan Tsvangirai, was in neighbouring South Africa
from where he has pushed for Mugabe to step down. He took part in the talks
via a video link-up, said party spokesman George Sibotshiwe.

Last month, Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa accused Tsvangirai of
treason.

Tsvangirai was to make a formal announcement on Monday and the national
council, the party's main policy body, was to meet "within days", party
spokesmen said, without giving further details.

Election officials on Friday said there was no outright winner of the March
29 election, with Tsvangirai getting 47.9 percent and Mugabe getting 43.2
percent. They called a run-off between the two at a date yet to be
announced.

The run-off has to take place within 21 days of publication of the results.

It is an unprecedented development for a country where the 84-year-old
Mugabe has had a stranglehold on power since independence in 1980. Officials
from Mugabe's party have said he will contest the run-off.

Ahead of the announcement of the results, Tsvangirai said that there was "no
need for a run-off" but he has also said previously that he could take part
in a second round if international observers were present.

Observers from the Southern African Development Community (SADC), an
influential 14-state regional organisation, monitored the elections but
Western observers were banned by the authorities.

Political analysts say former trade union boss Tsvangirai, 56, has no real
option but to contest the run-off as a refusal to take part would
automatically hand victory to his longtime rival Mugabe.

Tsvangirai has been a thorn in the side of Mugabe since the 1990s. He has
faced charges of treason and was given a brutal beating by police last year.
In 2002, he accused Mugabe of rigging his way to victory against him.

The stand-off in Zimbabwe has been accompanied by a wave of political
violence in rural areas that human rights groups and the MDC say are aimed
at forcing people to vote for Mugabe in a second round.

In the latest sign of tensions, MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa on Saturday
said the party had contacted police after receiving reports from security
service sources about an assassination plot against top party members.

Police could not immediately be contacted to verify the claim.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon earlier warned of "a serious humanitarian crisis" in
Zimbabwe and the UN children's agency UNICEF has said it is providing
emergency assistance to 1,500 people displaced by the violence.

A lawyer told AFP on Saturday that the authorities have released on bail six
opposition activists and a journalist arrested for political attacks but
that more than 20 other opposition supporters remain behind bars.

The political turmoil has also aggravated an economic meltdown in Zimbabwe,
where inflation is running at more than 165,000 percent, unemployment is at
80 percent and there are shortages of most basic goods.

Meanwhile international powers have questioned the credibility of results
released nearly five weeks after voting day but have said a run-off could
take place if the violence is stopped and international observers are
allowed in.

Mugabe, a hero of the 1970s war against white minority rule in the then
Rhodesia, has condemned foreign interference and has accused Britain,
Zimbabwe's former colonial master, of imperial designs.

Should Tsvangirai accept a runoff poll in Zimbabwe?

Anxious Zimbabweans await re-run

BBC

18:21 GMT, Saturday, 3 May 2008 19:21 UK


By Farai Sevenzo
Harare

After a month of not-so-subtle suspense, the results of the
long-awaited presidential elections were finally released.

The days that preceded the announcement were dark ones - broken limbs,
burned huts, dead bodies and unofficial curfews were widely reported.

The people were cynical from the beginning.

Missing results, they said, meant the mother of all election riggings
was underway.

At the Domboshawa Election Command Centre, Beatrice Nyamupinda, newly
elected Zanu-PF MP for Goromonzi West, thought there was no need for a
recount.

"For those of us who have been educated, this is just like going back
to primary school. I won here and this recount is a waste of time."

And now we have gone from recounts to a re-run of the presidential
poll, because Mr Mugabe secured 43.2% of the vote to Mr Tsvangirai's 47.8%.

Too busy to care

The release of these figures had no immediate effect on Harare's
patient folk.

The day of the announcement saw Harare's streets packed with people
queuing at banks to get to their billions.

Cash is hard to find, fuel has soared to an unbelievable billion
Zimbabwe dollars a gallon on the black market, and large chunks of the city
are constantly in darkness because of the power cuts.

"In order to sustain a dictatorship, it is important to keep the
people busy," says Daves Guzha in his topical new play The Two Leaders I
Know, currently running at the Harare International Festival of The Arts.

And Hararians have simply been too busy surviving to care about the
new twists in their political fortunes.

It is a different case for the politicians, though.

The notion of a re-run has been pushed since the MDC prematurely
claimed victory.

What was once the opposition is relishing telling the press that Mr
Mugabe is now the leader of the official opposition.

Full page ads in the local press from the MDC are signed "President
Elect" and "Morgan".

The ads are headlined "Delayed democracy" and "Martyrs for democracy".

"It is a tragedy that our own sons and daughters are being murdered,
tortured and wounded for no other reason than that the regime believes they
have voted for change," the MDC says.

For Hararians the rural violence has reached them one way or another -
from the pictures being screened by international broadcasters to the local
hospitals and their steady flow of injured people, to damning reports from
international human rights organisations.

What will this background do to a re-run between these two men?

Will people turn up to vote or will the injured be too broken to visit
the polls again?

Sam Mutukula, a thatcher, says he will go and vote the same way he
voted the first time.

"I will repeat my vote. Things are tight in Zimbabwe because of the
old man, he has no friends and we are suffering."

Cynicism

The old suspicions that seem to attach themselves to Zimbabwean polls
are already doing the rounds.

"The voters roll will be vastly reduced, there will be some trickery
somewhere," says Sam Mutukula.

Former Minister of Information Jonathan Moyo put it another way in the
local press: "The mind of the electorate is now so fixed against Mugabe that
if he were to contest against a donkey in the run-off, the donkey would win
by a landslide not because anyone would vote for it, but simply because
people would vote against Mugabe."

I ring a Zanu-PF man and ask him what the feeling in the Zanu camp is.

"I don't know about the party, but the message from the electorate is
more than clear."

Hararians are strangely quiet about their long-lost poll results.

They will have to muster enough energy to do the whole thing again in
the coming weeks.

Sleeping in the tall grass

Zimbabwe Metro

How victims of the Zanu-PF countryside purge pass the night

Mercy Chiusaru is six years old. When I meet her she is settling down for
the night in the tall grass by the side of a road in Muzarabani. It is a
chilly night, and her father, Clever Chiusaru covers her with a thin sheet.

Her sister, Taizivel, aged eight, left the family farm to go to school that
morning. Then the Zanu-PF militia arrived, and drove the family out.
Taizivel hasn't been seen since.

Clever Chiusaru tells me:  "I don't know if I will ever see her again. I
dare not go back to the farm - they will kill me."

Chiusaru voted MDC in the elections.

A few yards away Mbuya Manjazi, who is a frail 74, wraps herself in a
threadbare towel before trying to sleep. She too was driven from her home.

"I don't have anywhere to go," she says, shivering visibly. "I have lived at
the farm for my whole life. This cold will kill me tonight."

A few yards away Tendai Meza is crying. She is two months old, and has spent
the day on her mother's back. Now she is tired and hungry.

Tendai's mother, Tracy, tells me: "Of course she is hungry. My breasts have
no more milk for her. We have had nothing to eat today."

I count 60 people who will spend the night in the tall grass. Most of them
want me to go away, in case I draw attention to them. They are very
frightened.

This is Zimbabwe today. This is the country where we are asked to take part
in the re-run of an election that has already been fairly won.

This is the country whose neighbouring states know how we suffer, but cling
to ancient loyalties and do nothing to help.

This is the country where,despite vivid evidence of cruelty and murder, the
United Nations refuses to intervene.

Tracy and baby Tendai, grandmother Mbuya Manjazi, and Clever Chiusaru and
his daughter Mercy, are on their own in the tall grass tonight. And no-one
knows if eight-year-old Taizivel Chiusaru is alive or dead.

Posted on Saturday, 03 May 2008 at 11:42

The close of the Mugabe era

The Zimbabwe Times

By Mark Bellamy and J. Stephen Morrison
May 3, 2008

AFTER 28 years of increasingly violent misrule, the reign of Zimbabwean
president Robert Mugabe has entered its endgame. Frustrated by his failure
to secure victory in the March 29 parliamentary and presidential elections,
Mugabe has turned loose his security forces, ruling party militias, “war
veterans,” and youth gangs to terrorize populations suspected of
sympathizing with the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).
Reports of violent assaults and killings are proliferating.

As in Burma in September 2007, resort to repression has raised the specter
of both a spasm of state violence against civilians and the consolidation of
security chiefs’ power, organized under the Joint Operations Command.

It has undermined already slim hopes that a runoff presidential election
could be a free and fair contest.

The “crackdown” option has been effective in the past for Mugabe, but this
time he will not easily reverse gathering momentum for his removal.
Fractures have appeared in the ruling Zimbabwe African National
Union—Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party and among Zimbabwe’s security chiefs.
Mugabe’s conspicuous failure to successfully rig the election, something he
has done routinely this decade, has damaged his position among ZANU-PF
hardline stalwarts and exposed his vulnerability to a citizenry that has
crossed a threshold of anger and economic desperation.

A determined political opposition and brave civil society refuse to give up,
despite escalating threats and unrelenting official violence. The
parliamentary vote recount reaffirmed that the MDC won control of that body.

Among his regional neighbors, Mugabe is at long last losing the essential
insulation provided him this past decade by the leadership of the Southern
African Development Community (SADC).

To Mugabe’s dismay, new Botswana president Ian Khama insisted that Zimbabwe’s
opposition leader be present at the SADC extraordinary summit in mid-April.
Zambian president Levy Mwanawasa, the current chair of SADC, has publicly
criticized Mugabe’s refusal to disclose electoral outcomes. Multiple
southern African states, including Angola, have refused to allow the transit
of Chinese weapons destined for Zimbabwe. In an overt rebuke to South
African president Thabo Mbeki, African National Congress (ANC) president
Jacob Zuma opened a direct dialogue with the Zimbabwe opposition and while
on tour to Berlin, Paris, and London signaled his openness to new solutions
that look beyond Mbeki’s dismal mediation of the crisis in the past year.

At the same time, international condemnation of Mugabe and impatience with
his southern African neighbors are rising.

UK prime minister Gordon Brown has called for an international arms embargo.
France, which assumes the EU presidency in June, has signaled its discomfort
with the region’s confusion and disarray on Zimbabwe. U.S. Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice has condemned the “abomination” and “disgrace” of the
Mugabe regime and dispatched Assistant Secretary of State Jendayi Frazer to
the region, where she declared that the opposition had won the March 29
presidential elections, indicated that it is time for Mugabe to quit, and
threatened to take the Zimbabwe crisis to the UN Security
Council if matters continue to worsen.

UN secretary-general Ban Ki Moon hosted opposition leader Morgan Tsvangarai’s
dialogue in Accra with west African leaders.

At least temporarily, Mugabe may yet escape the net that is closing around
him. He has done so in the past and may endure for awhile through further
militarizing the government; intensifying repression; sending another
convulsive exodus of Zimbabwe’s citizens into neighboring states; sustaining
financial lifelines from Angola, Equatorial Guinea, and perhaps others
states like Libya and China; and continuing to enjoy earnings from the
platinum sector and virtually free power from South Africa. He may make
another effort to rally and intimidate SADC to validate his presidency and
rebuff
his international critics.

As long as that regional protection remains in place—typified by Thabo Mbeki’s
continual rejection of any attempt to “internationalize” the crisis in
Zimbabwe - Mugabe can act with impunity. If, however, that essential ring of
protection can be broken and SADC turns to the purpose of building the
post-Mugabe future, Zimbabwe may finally enter a genuine transition,
something the great majority of Zimbabweans and their neighbors will
celebrate.

Mugabe’s endgame is likely to be volatile and possibly dangerous. The most
glaring uncertainties lie in how much violence it will inspire, how many
more lives it will cost, and how much additional internal damage and
regional instability a potentially chaotic transition will exact. Intimately
tied to these concerns is the large, unanswered question of the
international response: whether regional states, Western powers, and
international organizations can somehow begin to act in concert to avert the
worst outcomes and meaningfully create the basis for stability, renewed
democratic progress, reconstruction, and economic growth. On this question,
there is today no minimally coherent game plan.

There are four areas where urgent action is needed and where U.S. leadership
can help forge a new, concerted international effort on Zimbabwe.

1. Win agreement on the lead message: no solution is possible until Mugabe
goes. There is little to stop Mugabe from orchestrating a final orgy of
violence. There is nothing to be gained and much to be lost by pursuing a
presidential runoff, and no meaningful transition can commence until Mugabe
has stepped aside. Agreement within the international community is urgently
needed on a simple, clear-cut demand that Mugabe leave. This should be the
foremost guiding principle of coordinated international action on Zimbabwe.
Choreographing Mugabe’s departure will be complex and
difficult, but the United States and others should clearly embrace this
urgent goal and organize all other activity around it. African leaders are
best positioned to deliver this message to Mugabe. The overriding focus of
U.S. diplomacy should be
to enlist African leaders to assume this responsibility.

2. Concentrate on reducing security risks. Zimbabwe’s security chiefs and
the forces under them can be violent spoilers. Some have much to lose once
Mugabe is gone. Critical preemptive steps can be undertaken now,
bilaterally, in the context of the UN Security Council and through ad hoc
multilateral dialogues. Priority steps should include:
- Identify and reach out quietly to those elements of the security forces
judged to be the most professional, least politicized, and least beholden to
Mugabe.
- Identify likely spoilers and signal to them serious consequences that will
follow their interference in a transition.
- Selectively release to international media what is known of the corrupt
practices of the most venal.
-Assemble an incentives package for Zimbabwean officers who promise future
cooperation, including training and educational opportunities to build
professionalism and return Zimbabwe’s forces to international
respectability. For example, offer select Zimbabwean captains and colonels a
year in the company of U.S. and international counterparts at the U.S.
National War College, or at similarly prestigious institutions in Canada,
Australia, or the United Kingdom.
-Insist that multinational observer teams be allowed into Zimbabwe to
observe and report on security aspects of the transition process.
-Acknowledge that past serious human rights violations will require
accountability. Zimbabwean legal and human rights advocates have been
outspoken on this point, and they are correct. The trick will be phasing
accountability measures to come at a later stage in the transition process
and concentrating their focus.

3. Appoint an eminent persons group to organize power sharing. It is not
clear even to opposition leaders that a brusque transfer of full executive
power into the opposition’s hands is a reliable or advisable route to
stability and recovery. Much discussion is needed of possible power-sharing
arrangements. While it is clear that Mugabe and the worst
of his associates cannot be part of such an arrangement, less tainted, more
moderate elements of Zanu-PF could contribute to the stability of
transitional governing arrangements.

Such a discussion requires a forum that reaches beyond SADC but that does
not leave the region behind. The United States and its allies should press
for the appointment of an eminent persons group (EPG), possibly under
African Union and/or UN auspices, to work with parties in Zimbabwe to
constitute a new government and chart a near-term course for constitutional
reform and eventual parliamentary and presidential elections.

The EPG could draw on the historical precedent of the 1985 EPG and its
contribution to international debate on moving South Africa beyond
apartheid. The negotiating formula could draw on former UN secretary-general
Kofi Annan’s efforts earlier this year in Kenya. It should be endorsed, or
even called for, by SADC, but not be subordinated to SADC, and certainly not
controlled by South Africa.

Few Zimbabweans will have confidence in South African mediation following
President Mbeki’s failed efforts.

4. Assemble a robust post-Mugabe reconstruction package. Despite much talk
in the United States and elsewhere about post-Mugabe scenarios, there has
been little concrete planning. The United States and other major donors,
including China and the World Bank, should quickly assemble a multi-sector
recovery package, assign roles, and win commitments of funding. This should
be embraced at the G-8 summit in Hokkaido July 7 to 9.Washington will need
to give special priority to winning congressional backing for substantial,
rapidly disbursable U.S. contributions.

Sustaining International Support
Zimbabwe is today and into the future the crisis priority for southern
Africa. It faces immense challenges even after Mugabe leaves. Spoilers will
threaten whatever consensus emerges for a way forward. More refugees will
likely pour into the surrounding region in the near term, while eventually
millions will desire to return home and face rising pressure from their host
governments to do so rapidly. There will be intense pressures to stabilize
and revitalize a ruined economy and bring back a once-thriving agricultural
sector where complex land ownership controversies persist. The public health
system, having lost more than 80 percent of its skilled work force, will
require rebuilding from the ground up and special care to preserve ongoing
antiretroviral services to 100,000 Zimbabweans.

Key institutions - courts, universities, media, police, and armed forces -
have been heavily damaged and will require special, concentrated reforms.
Courageous civil
organizations will continue to press for justice, especially in regard to
serious human rights abuses and officially sanctioned egregious corruption.

Zimbabweans will find answers but cannot do so, at least in the short term,
without vital international assistance.

Zimbabweans have been badly let down in recent years by SADC and South
Africa especially. The United States should make clear that it is willing to
work cooperatively with SADC in the context of a wider international effort
to rescue Zimbabwe. The United States should be equally clear that it will
not stand idly on the sidelines if the voices of
Zimbabweans working for democracy, justice, and economic recovery are again
ignored.

(Steven Morrison is director and Mark Bellamy a senior fellow of the Africa
Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington,
DC. The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is a private,
tax-exempt institution focusing on international public policy issues. Its
research is nonpartisan and nonproprietary. CSIS does not take specific
policy positions; accordingly, all views, positions, and conclusions
expressed should be understood to be solely those of the author(s).)

Second round will be sweeter for MDC

The Zimbabwe Times

By Phillan Zamchiya
May 3, 2008

THE state of affairs in Zimbabwe is that the March 29 presidential election
has failed to produce a clear winner and a run-off is, therefore, imminent.

Morgan Tsvangirayi is clearly leading with 47.9 percent of the vote, with
Mugabe trailing behind for the first time since independence with 43.2
percent. Never mind the glaringly obvious rigging by Zanu-PF, the current
reality as things stand, is back to the ballot.

Given this scenario, some of the weak-hearted in the corridors of power,
long subjugated to being victims of Zanu-PF, are developing cold feet over
the impending second round. In my view, the first round of any human
endeavour serves the purpose of a light engagement. It is from the second
round that combatants usually start knocking each other out.

In this short article, I want to outline why Zimbabweans should not be
scared of the second round but should rather endeavour to ice the cake for
sweeter victory.

Let me start by saluting the MDC, civil society and the generality of
Zimbabweans for knocking down the dictator in the very first round. Now the
people should be on guard against falling into the defeatism mode for the
greatest weapon of the tyranny is the mind of the oppressed. Let us remove
the culture of fear. The dogma of Mugabe’s infallibility is no more. The
dictator has been defeated and everybody can see that he is fallible. Never
mind his dream of being life President of Zimbabwe signaled when he signed a
secret agreement to create a secret army in October 1981 with Kim Sung 11 of
North Korea.

Now it is almost impossible for Mugabe to recover from the floor given his
age. My friend who is studying biology told me that scientifically it is
more realistic for a 56 year old to recover for a second round bout than an
84 year old. It’s almost impossible to carry the endurance of the second
round at that age.

As if that was not enough, Mugabe has no panacea for the comatose economy
between now and the next round. The economy continues to bleed, with
inflation officially put at 165 000 percent and more chaos in the foreign
exchange market fuelled by Gideon Gono’s ill-advised monetary policy. In as
much as Mugabe is able to arrest the MDC party members there is no way he
can send his dreaded securocrats to arrest the economy. So in the latter he
remains with a lethal opposition he can not deal with.

On top of that, MDC has made a commonsensical step by re-uniting towards the
second round. This means that the split vote between Mutambara and
Tsvangirai is going to be consolidated toward the latter. Consequentially,
Tsvangirai is most likely to double his vote in Bulawayo Province and triple
his vote in parts of Matabeleland North and Matabeleland South. Further from
that, the 10 constituencies that Zanu-PF won by default because of the then
MDC split will be rightfully re-claimed by Tsvangirai. This means Mugabe
would be left to battle it out in less than 87 constituencies’ visa-a-vis
Tsvangirai’s 123 constituencies.

Now, what’s the fear? Violence at its maxim failed to yield ballot victory
for Mugabe in 2000 and 2002. From the verification process held at the
behest of the High Court following the disputed 2002 presidential election
it was clear that Tsvangirai won the election by 70 000 votes. Ask David
Coltart who participated in that re-count. Even though, if voter turn out
had been 66 percent in all constituencies, given the same voting trend for
both MDC and Zanu-PF, the former could have won an outright victory.

The cake has been baked and all that is needed for Zimbabweans is to believe
and adjust to what Musaemura Zimunya calls the cultural shock. The icing of
the cake would include a more unified working approach with a robust civil
society and bonus points from the likes of Ibbo Mandaza and Edgar Tekere.
The battle is now for every vote. The gospel now should be, “Come now let us
reason together” Isaiah 1 vs. 18.

(Phillan Zamchiya writes from Cape Town, South Africa.)

Press freedom finally coming to Zimbabwe

The Zimbabwe Times

By William Bango

(A paper presented at a panel discussion on the state of the media in
zimbabwe at a commemoration of Press Freedom Day, May 3.)

THE issue of Press freedom in Zimbabwe has generated a lot of debate, in
particular during the past eight years. Zimbabwe is the only country
occupying an abnormally large presence in cyber-space, such a presence
having grown significantly again during the past eight years.

The reason is simple. If democracy is a conversation, as they say, expected
personal interactions in a democracy are usually mirrored through the Press.
An absence of these interactions, a state of abnormality often creates a
vacuum: a vacuum that breeds a cacophony of disjointed voices; a vacuum that
distorts normal behaviour and discourse and, at worst, a vacuum with a
potential to divide a nation.

At Independence in 1980, there was consensus on the direction the media had
to take. There was a national feeling that the way forward required a
transformation of the Press and the broadcast media to reflect the new
thinking. Other African countries understood the situation and even assisted
us in our attempts to realise that dream.

Today, 28 years later, we find ourselves stuck in an emotional web that
makes our conversations, through the Press and the media, impossible. There
are accusations and counter-accusations on the definition and understanding
of our national vision. The language in the Zimbabwean media is unique.

Words like patriotism, revolution, puppet, regime change, sell-out and many
others dominate our columns and airwaves, making conversations difficult and
alienating a large part of our nation away from debate and discussion. But
the nation has continued to talk to itself. The nation has accepted the
unhealthy state of our media and resorted to other communication channels to
remain abreast with local and world developments. The result of such a move
became more visible during the just-ended elections.

For the first time, the national sentiment registered, in a practical way,
the need for a regime change.  I am one of the millions of people who share
that national sentiment, and the national view that Zimbabwe is now firmly
in the middle of a regime change process. Against all odds, on March 29,
2008, we struck a covenant with the people. We signed a contract with the
people for regime change. And we are on the roll, determined to make it
possible for the people to change their political life and live under a
different political platform from 28 years of Zanu-PF dominance. Our
perseverance has paid off. We are ready to govern, encouraged by the fact
that the entire nation is fully behind us in this regard.

For the avoidance of doubt, it is beyond dispute and debate that Morgan
Tsvangirai was the overall winner in the recent election. Some may still
argue that he was not the outright victor. But the fact remains that Robert
Mugabe lost. Mugabe is now the leader of the opposition. The term
opposition, the generic meaning of the word opposition, refers to a
political party’s standing in Parliament. In this Parliament, the MDC shall
have to appoint a leader of the House to co-ordinate legislation and drive
the legislative agenda, the MDC shall appoint a Speaker, the third most
powerful politician in the land, and his or her deputy, plus the chairperson
of communities. In the history of this country, this is a major victory. It
signals the sincere beginning and placement of a regime change agenda on the
table.

Mr Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, one cannot separate Press freedom from
other freedoms in our different facets of life. The people made the point
clear in March and decided that only through regime change can they reclaim
their voices; their political space.

With an undisputed majority in Parliament, Zimbabweans only need to be
patient. We can’t move into a house on the day an agreement of sale is
concluded and signed. We must respect the process. But we are definitely
moving in. An agreement of sale has already been concluded and signed.

What remains in this irreversible transition towards a new society is the
conclusion of the paper work. Once we move into the house, there are
definite plans to examine the state of the gutters, the electrical fittings,
the life and behaviour of the occupants of this house and the kind
conversations that take place inside and outside that house.

As a matter of policy, the leadership of the incoming dispensation believe
any future government, if it is to be deemed relevant to the extension of
freedom, should have no business in newspapers. Newspapers and the media
generally should assist the people check a regime’s excesses. Newspapers and
other media should provide an early warning system to society on any looming
dangers, while, at the same time, creating a platform for unfettered debate
and discussion on national challenges and national solutions.

What happened in March, in particular the rejection of the status quo in
Parliament opens superb opportunities for the rebuilding of a media industry
that is responsive to national needs and, one that constantly checks the
sector’s relevance to national development as a whole. A responsible media
should by now be reminding Robert Mugabe and his ministers that the person
qualified to run this country at the moment is the Chief Justice. That is
what our Constitution says. Mugabe has appointed himself a caretaker
president, against the law. In the absence of a President and a Speaker, the
Chief Justice must take over the ship of state.

Media freedom flourishes in a society where all other freedoms are
respected. As a priority, the forces about to assume power in this country
shall target the restoration of the rule of law as a major turning point in
the reconstruction and rehabilitation of our battered nation.

Once the rule of law has been restored, and the police and the judiciary are
accorded their rightful place in a genuine democracy, 90 percent of our
nagging problems shall disappear at the instant. We should be able to enjoy
our sovereignty without the numerous distortions and policy flip-flops in
our midst.

Remnants of the old thinking and those wishing to perpetuate an
unsustainable status quo shall naturally give way to a progressive national
sentiment.

The minority status of those losing power today shall be further whittled
down by the conclusion of pending cases, many of which are of a criminal
nature, committed but never pursued, during the past eight years. A number
of by-elections are inevitable and within a short space of a year, a lot can
happen.

We view this aspect very seriously because Zimbabwe has historically nursed
a culture of impunity, allowing those in power to abuse it without
restraint.

The events, which led to our dominance in Parliament this year, shall
continue to mutate a pace, which could take the media industry by surprise.

I urge all stakeholders to ready themselves for a period of rapid growth and
rapid development. We are strongly against media regulation, especially
regulations designed to stifle debate and discussion and to promote
misguided social engineering.

We believe in community initiatives, empowerment and freedom. We fully
support the development of a vibrant community media. We determined to see
the introduction of commercial radio and televisions to increase the number
of voices and access to information. We believe a public broadcaster should
just be that: a public broadcaster.

Public broadcasting requires no specific definition. What we consider to be
unacceptable is the deliberate promotion a partisan political line, using
claims that such material is either news or is in the public interest.

Political parties, like all other interest groups, must never be allowed to
abuse public and national institutions while pursuing a particular ideology.

If it were not for the uncomfortable delays arising from the delicacy of our
transition, the Movement for Democratic Change, as the new forces that
successfully effected regime change in Zimbabwe in March, should have placed
the building blocks of a new media society on the ground today and laid out
the groundwork for Zimbabweans to exercise their normal habits of
citizenship.

Nothing is moving at the moment. Local government is at a dangerous
standstill. What is happening in government offices is anybody’s guess as
officials grope for political direction and the way forward. The delay the
nation is experiencing stems from the anxiety and the personal insecurity
dilemma of those still holding onto the keys to the main house, long after
the agreement of sale has been sealed and delivered.

The insecurity dilemma is responsible for the intolerance and the vitriol
exhibited in the Zimbabwean media today. When a man or a woman is suddenly
rendered politically irrelevant, especially after an election, he or she
needs to be managed with extremely caution and care. The reality of losing
power is a terrible experience and often brings out the worst in human
beings. In a way, we are no different from our cattle: many of our people
have been injured at cattle dips when a cow or a steer realises that it has
no choice other than to take a plunge, especially for the first time.

There is a massive retreat among those who have spent the last few days
throwing ill-informed advice around and antagonising all and sundry by
calling themselves super-patriots. You see it through their actions: there
is nothing happening in commerce and industry; there is nothing happening on
the farms; there is nothing-meaningful taking place anywhere. They have
completely withdrawn, preferring to feather their nests and to use the time
to sanitise what they looted over the years as they prepare for a new life
in a New Zimbabwe. There is a hive of activity as yesterday’s strong men and
women check all the corners for political insurance. From time to time, they
even whisper words of advice on how Zimbabwe should vaccinate itself against
negative past experiences.

The desperation becomes publicly pronounced when even a something-year-old
stands on top of an anthill and shout: Will revolutionaries please stand up!
Or else! One wonders as what this all about. The only consolation comes from
the reality on the ground.

In times of stress and political uncertainty, nations often look to the
public media for answers and guidance in conflict resolution and management.
Rarely does the ordinary person buy a newspaper at a cost of $100 billion a
copy only to be insulted by being told that you are puppet of some
Westerner. For many years, Zimbabweans have had to endure that raw deal. In
terms of the real money that those who were born and worked here before
August 2006 when Gideon Gono decided to slash three zeroes from our
currency, a newspaper in Zimbabwe costs $100 billion a copy, a box of
matches costs $10 billion and a two litre bottle of cooking oil is selling
for nearly $1 trillion.

Our public media editors, as observed by Mr. Elias Rusike, when he was chief
executive of Zimbabwe Newspapers 20 years ago, “pander to government
ministers in an attempt to gain favours”.

Mr Rusike, in his book The Politics of the Mass Media made the following
observation: “Editors as opinion-leaders and pace setters in the country
must have the intellectual depth and breadth to equip them to educate,
inform and entertain readers. Unfortunately, editors of
government-controlled newspapers in Zimbabwe do not possess such qualities.
They are appointed not what they know, but who among the ministers they
know. They do not even always speak on behalf of the government, but are
voices of selected ministers.

What this means is that media crisis in Zimbabwe is essentially structural
and deep. We know that attending to emotional preferences or adopting
piecemeal measures cannot clear the crisis. The entire industry requires
redefinition and a proper placement in our society for it to perform to
expectations after years of confusion and abuse. We are aware that the
insecurity syndrome on the political market today stems from a serious delay
in dealing with our generational transition.

We must free our senior citizens from the daily chores of running a country.
Organisations with a wealthy of experience in the care of the aged, like
HelpAge International, can easily assist us in this regard.

Zimbabweans must create a cafeteria environment to enable our senior
citizens, who played a sterling role in the making of our nation, to make
choices and to continue to play critical roles normally associated with, and
expected out of, age, experience and accumulated wisdom.  As a nation, we
must assure those in public service that there is an exciting life with
their families at home, and in retirement.

The delay in sorting out our generational transition has caused a lot of
pain and further delayed normal inter-party changes in the political life of
a country. We should have long experienced a transition from one party with
roots in the nationalistic struggle and in government to another. In our
case, the new post-independence party is a product of social movements
seeking the extension of freedom through post-colonial formations.

Press freedom, like all other freedoms, is certainly coming to Zimbabwe.
Given our history, very soon we shall look back and wonder whether we were
engulfed in huge dream. Our undisputed majority in Parliament is a
significant step in that direction. Zimbabwe shall never be same again.

(T. William Bango was the news editor of The Daily News. He then became the
spokesman for the MDC president, Morgan Tsvangirai. He was a candidate in
the March 29 parliamentary election.)

Zimbabwe: One last chance to pull it out the fire

The Times, SA

3 May 2008, 16:58 GMT + 2
NOT even Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe could rig the election result
for the presidency which was announced today, although the result leaned
more in his direction than initial monitoring suggested. For the record,
that country’s electoral commission, following an unseemly month of
unexplained delays, gave Mugabe 43 percent of the vote to the MDC leader,
Morgan Tsvangirai’s 47 or so percent.
The election result means a run-off, something which the MDC claims would
not have come about had the original result been announced with Tsvangirai
over the 50 percent threshold.
During this month of unspeakable silence on South Africa’s part, Mugabe
launched a systematic assault on the opposition, rounding up opposition
activists, jailed them, beat them up and tortured them. The aim was clearly
to weaken the MDC ahead of a presidential run-off.
Now Mugabe and Tsvangirai will face each other in a run-off. This time,
things will be different. This time the playing field will tilt 45 degrees
against Tsvangirai.
Expect Mugabe to use every weapon in the state’s arsenal to undermine the
opposition and every resource to get voters to the polls to save his
presidency.
Little mistakes that were made in the last election, such as the posting of
results outside polling stations after counting to allow independent
observers direct access, will not be made again. Whatever duress the
electoral commission was under is likely to be doubled.
Oh, and don’t expect results to be announced until a much better
orchestrated effort by Mugabe’s thugs to stuff the ballot boxes in his
favour.
Tsvangirai won the last round and, if you give him half the eight percent
garnered by the third candidate, Simba Makoni, he should win this round.
But it is almost inevitable that Mugabe will triumph. Why else would he
believe he stands a chance of winning?
If anything, his post election stature is weaker than it has ever been with
Zimbabwe’s Parliament already out of his control.

Now Mugabe's party challenges 52 parliamentary seats won by MDC

Monsters and Critics

May 3, 2008, 8:48 GMT

Harare - The day after Zimbabwe's election commission announced presidential
poll results indicating a runoff election was needed, President Robert
Mugabe's party said Saturday it was launching a legal challenge to 52
parliamentary seats won by the opposition Movement for Democratic Change
(MDC).

ZANU-PF chief election agent Emmerson Mnangagwa was quoted by the state-run
daily The Herald as saying the ruling party candidates had filed petitions
to this effect in the Electoral Court.

'The party's candidates have filed petitions in 52 constituencies seeking
the setting aside of the announced results and these petitions have been
filed with the Electoral Court,' he said.

The MDC has already said that, for its part, it is challenging 60 seats won
by Zanu PF. in the March 29 parliamentary elections held at the same time as
the presidential poll, in which the MDC won 99 seats, its splinter won 10,
and ZANU-PF won 97.

Presidential results released Friday by the country electoral commission
showed there was no outright winner, thus pitting Mugabe and the MDC's
Morgan Tsvangirai for a run-off within 21 days under Zimbabwe's electoral
laws.

However, opposition leaders denounced government demands for a run-off
election as 'grand theft' and insisted they had won the elections.

They said late Friday they would decide over the weekend whether to
participate in another round of voting.

This was stated late Friday by Tendai Biti, Secretary General of the
Movement for Democratic Change, in South Africa - where many MDC supporters
have fled seeking refuge from violent attacks by Mugabe's supporters since
the elections.

Biti also suggested that Mugabe be given a figurehead position in a new
'government of national healing' which would be headed by Tsvangirai.

Zimbabwe's Election Commission (ZEC) said Friday the long-delayed results
showed Tsvangirai was the top vote-getter with 47.9 per cent, beating
Mugabe's 43.2 per cent.

Mugabe has been president for nearly three decades. The results marked the
first time in several controversial elections that the official election
organization conceded more votes to a Mugabe challenger.

But the MDC insists it won the 50 per cent required for an outright win.
Biti charged that the commission used the month-long delay to manipulate
almost 90,000 votes by adding more than 37,000 votes to Mugabe and removing
50,000 votes from Tsvangirai.

Under pressure from his own party, religious leaders and the international
community, South African President Thabo Mbeki - who has insisted Zimbabwe's
elections were an internal matter - signalled late Friday that he would
immediately send a team to Zimbabwe to investigate reports of violence
against opposition supporters.

'He assured us that he would do everything to ensure that the run- off
election happens in an atmosphere of peace,' said Reverend Nyansako-ni-Nku,
president of the All Africa Conference of Churches.

The minister spoke to reporters after four hours of talks between religious
leaders and Mbeki at the presidential guesthouse in Pretoria, SAPA news
agency reported.

'The president said that right away they will dispatch a team to check every
allegation of violence,' the minister said. Mbeki did not speak directly to
reporters.

In Harare, the regional group, Southern African Development Community, said
it found an increase in violence and a 'tense environment' amidst
'inflammatory utterances' by both ruling party and opposition leaders during
the election recount.

Jose Marcos Barrica, Angola's minister of youth and sport who is heading the
SADC mission, noted that torture, killings and destruction of goods had
taken place in a 'climate of political intolerance' that he blamed on
'leaders who took part in the elections.'

The British and US governments said the results announced Friday lacked
'credibility.' A runoff would 'not be fair unless international monitors
were present,' Britain's Foreign Office said.

In Washington, US State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey called for
Mugabe's government to 'cease the kinds of action it's been taking against
the opposition before anyone should even think' about a run-off.

The MDC Friday estimated that 20 opposition supporters have been killed by
Mugabe's strike troops. Human Rights Watch accused Zimbabwe's military of
participating in the attacks.

In South Africa, the chairman of the ruling African National Congress party
(ANC) Jacob Zuma again distanced himself from Mugabe's policies.

The South African leader announced measures to limit the illegal entry into
South Africa of Zimbabweans, whose numbers are estimated at up to 3 million.

Lawyers for Human Rights, a rights activist group, reported 150 teachers had
been arrested for allegedly favouring the opposition in their role as
election monitors.

Late Friday, a Zimbabwe High Court judge granted bail to 50 members of the
opposition and a freelance journalist arrested two weeks ago after the
opposition called for a nationwide strike to press for release of the
election results.

The ruling overturned a lower court insistence that they not be released
because of the country's 'volatile' situation.

The released journalist, Frank Chikowore, was arrested on April 15 as he was
covering the strike.

Zanu pays thugs to kill MDC officials

Farm workers stand up to Squatters, War Vets

The Zimbabwean

Friday, 02 May 2008 16:18

BY CHIEF REPORTER
MUDZI

Farm workers and ex-guerrillas observed an uneasy truce here on
Thursday after workers blocked an attempt to storm and occupy a white-owned
homestead in the heart of the nation's grain belt.
The workers, aiming to protect their livelihoods, formed a cordon and
forced the would-be squatters to gather reinforcements from a nearby shanty
settlement.
But workers from neighbouring farms joined the cordon, swelling its
strength to about 150 men, and told leaders of the outnumbered ex-guerrillas
and squatters - who were armed with axes, spears and clubs - to advance no
further.
Thursday’s standoff, one of several similar confrontations around the
country, marked a potentially explosive escalation in the political crisis
that began when a motley assortment of unemployed squatters, led by
so-called war vets and Zanu youth militia, started re-occupying the
remaining 300 white-owned farms after the controversial March 29 poll.
The standoff near Kotwa ended with the withdrawal of the would-be
squatters by nightfall - a move negotiated by police.
Zimbabwe’s main labour federation accused the ruling elite of
enriching themselves and failing to implement land reform.
”The war veterans, the landless and the workers are one and the same,
why are they fighting against each other?”' said Wellington Chibebe,
secretary general of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions. “Only an orderly
process will ensure peace in our country. Once again, it is the working
class who are being short-changed.”
Robert Mugabe, the head of the military junta, has refused to stop
illegal occupations of privately owned land, arguing that it was a justified
political protest in light of alleged plans by the MDC to return stolen land
to the rightful owners. The MDC’s election manifesto outlines a workable,
equitable and just solution to the land problem.
Farmers accuse Mugabe of allowing squatters to remain on white farms
as a political ploy to shore up his party's waning support ahead of the
presidential election run-off expected later this month.
Caught in the middle are the black farm workers, who feel they will
lose their income if the squatters force out the remaining white farmers and
the land is broken up into small holdings.

Dip tank attendants appointed as election officers

The Zimbabwean

Friday, 02 May 2008 08:40

BY PINDAI DUBE
HARARE

In what seems like another desperate bid to cling onto power, Robert
Mugabe and the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) have appointed general
hands from various government departments and dip tank attendants
(vadhibhisi) as presiding officers for an election run-off.
According to authoritative police sources based at the Police General
Headquarters (PGHQ), the ZEC sent out a new national list of polling
officers to preside over the expected presidential run-off.
The Zimbabwean established that three-quarters of polling officers who
had presided during the March 29 joint elections – many of them teachers –
had been scrapped. Their replacements were to come from ministries,
hospitals and parastatals like the National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) and
the Cold Storage Company (CSC). Dip tank attendants were to preside in most
rural areas.
Utoile Silaigwana, ZEC spokesperson, confirmed the appointments and
said teachers had been released from the duty, as they were needed for their
usual work in schools.
Political analysts have said it is as another ploy by the desperate
Mugabe regime to remain in State House at all costs.
Police have been targeting polling officials over the last four weeks,
arresting scores of ZEC officials, especially teachers, whom they accuse of
conniving with the Movement for Democratic Change to deny Mugabe and his
party victory in last months’ elections.
This follows Tuesday’s reports from the Progressive Teachers Union of
Zimbabwe (PTUZ), which said teachers who were presiding officers were being
abducted in the middle of the night and forced to write sworn statements
declaring they had rigged the elections.

Zimbabwe travel advice

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office today changed its Travel Advice
for Zimbabwe. Due to increased tensions surrounding the Zimbabwean elections
we are advising against all but essential travel to Zimbabwe. The relevant
summary points now read:

"We advise against all but essential travel to Zimbabwe at this time
due to the continuing tension surrounding the election and the deployment of
uniformed forces (police and military) and war veterans across the country.
In the absence of officially confirmed results of the Presidential election
there continues to be a high level of political tension and uncertainty. The
current situation is unpredictable, volatile and could deteriorate quickly,
without warning.

If you are in Zimbabwe, you should keep a low profile, exercise a high
degree of caution, monitor local news reports and avoid all areas where
demonstrations may be held, or where there are large gatherings of people.
You should also defer visits by friends and family members until the
situation becomes more stable. We also advise against backpacking and travel
on public transport, as public services are unreliable

We strongly advise against visiting high density, low income suburban
areas at any time; and farming areas unless you have a strong need to go
there. Farmers or agricultural workers who used to operate in Zimbabwe are
advised that in the current tense environment it is dangerous to visit their
former properties or other agricultural areas: a number of such visits have
led to confrontation and violence. You should also avoid areas where War
Veterans are active."

Notes for Editors

Full details of the revised travel advice for Zimbabwe are available
on the Foreign Office website (http://www.fco.gov.uk).

FCO Travel Advice can also be obtained on the following telephone
number: 0845 850 2829.

Workers Go Through Hell

Zimbabwe Independent (Harare)

1 May 2008
Posted to the web 2 May 2008

JOHN Nhamo, a clerk at a Harare government office, is the breadwinner of a
family of six having lost both his parents to the HIV and Aids scourge in
the late 1990s.

Traditionally the civil service is the lowest paying sector in the country
and Nhamo says his $3,5 billion monthly salary is only enough to pay for his
rent and part of service charges.

"God knows where I get the rest of the money for food, transport, school
fees, clothes and other basics," he lamented.

"To raise additional cash, I sometimes sell muffins made by my wife to
fellow employees and at times I take off days and go to Botswana to perform
menial jobs, like tilling other people's gardens or washing their dirty
clothes. Life is tough for us ordinary people."

Nhamo's plight is not confined to civil service employees but is a permanent
feature for most, if not all, Zimbabwean workers.

It is indeed a rough life for workers who for the past eight years have
endured the ills of an economic meltdown as a result of poor government
policies.

And as employees celebrated Workers Day yesterday, the question at the back
of their minds was whether it was still worth it to continue going to work
when they can barely manage to look after their families.

Apart from poor wages and salaries, Zimbabwean workers are some of the most
heavily taxed in the world and those infected with HIV have no easy access
to the life-prolonging anti-retroviral drugs.

Last month, the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra) reduced the highest tax
band from 60% to 47,5%, but the country's biggest labour organisation -- the
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) -- dismissed the move.

"Workers will not be hoodwinked by Zimra that the highest tax band has been
reduced to 47,5% from the previously announced 60%," the 300 000-member body
said.

"47,5% is what workers have been fighting against all along."

The ZCTU said workers were tired of negotiating for higher wages only for
whatever gains made to be chewed up by income tax.

"Zimbabwe workers are the highest taxed in the world yet the taxes do not
benefit them, instead we remain poor and hungry... Companies are into
business for profit, while workers work to earn a living," the labour union
said. "Workers are being denied their right to life by being taxed to
death."

The ZCTU is demanding that all workers earning below the poverty datum line
should not be taxed, while the highest tax should be pegged at 30%.

An average worker earns less than $3 billion monthly, about US$30 on the
parallel market.

A few days before the March 29 harmonised elections, embattled President
Robert Mugabe increased the salaries of teachers and other civil servants,
triggering a massive hike in prices of basic commodities.

The prices saw the majority of workers, both in the public and private
sector, sinking more into a hopeless abyss of poverty and deprivation.

Some workers have resorted to changing jobs in search of greener pastures.

Tendai Chasakara is one such employee.

She is currently a health officer with a non-governmental organisation,
having dumped the civil service where she was employed as a nurse at the
country's largest referral hospital, Parirenyatwa, for more than 20 years.

Chasakara said she quit her nursing job due to a poor salary and working
conditions.

In the 1980s, she said, nursing was a noble profession and with her salary
she could afford to buy furniture, basic goods and luxuries.

She was also able to send her three children to boarding schools and assist
her husband in paying a mortgage for their house in Waterfalls, Harare.

However, for Chasakara things took a bad turn in 2000 soon after the
ill-fated farm invasions which heralded the country's unprecedented economic
decline.

Nurses, along with other civil servants, found themselves being the least
paid workers in Zimbabwe.

"There was a time when I could hardly afford to go to work as my salary was
way below what I had to spend on transport alone," Chasakara said. "I was
left with no option but to quit."

The organisation she now works for was last month forced to suspend its
operations in rural areas due to rampant political violence in their target
area in Manicaland.

Incidents of violence have been recorded around the country after the March
29 elections, which saw Zanu PF losing control of the House of Assembly to
the opposition MDC.

Chasakara and other workers employed by NGOs face a bleak future.

They have spent the past weeks gossiping and updating each other on the
political situation in the country with no work to do.

"My contract expired last week, but my employer cannot renew it now because
of the political situation that has resulted in us halting operations," she
said.

Mugabe's government admits workers are facing difficulties, but lays the
blame on alleged sanctions imposed on the country by Western powers opposed
to the controversial seizure of land from white farmers for redistribution
to the majority landless blacks.

As part of this year's Workers Day commemorations the ZCTU and other civil
organisations adopted a people's charter aimed at improving the lives of
workers.

The charter, among other things, advocates for decent work, employment and
the right to earn a living for all.

The charter reads: "Fair labour standards which include a tax-free minimum
wage linked to the inflation and the poverty datum line and pay equity for
women, youth and casual workers.

"Safe working places and adequate state and employer-funded compensation for
injury or death from accidents at work."

According to the ZCTU, about 2% of workers still in formal employment earn
above the breadline salary of $5 billion, while multitudes of employees have
been made redundant following company closures over the past years and have
to eke out a living as petty traders in the informal sector.

While government and labour unions do not agree on the level of unemployment
in Zimbabwe, independent consultants claim that the rate of unemployment is
now above 80%.

The biggest problem for workers, according to the Consumer Council of
Zimbabwe, is the skyrocketing of food prices.

A snap survey on basic commodities carried out by the Zimbabwe Independent
this week, revealed that a 10kg bag of the staple maize meal now costs $300
million, while the price of a two-litre bottle of cooking oil is $700
million.

A bar of washing soap is now $180 million and all these basic commodities
were only available on the black market.

Zimbabwe Frees On Bail 6 Activists, 1 Journalist

nasdaq

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AFP)--Six Zimbabwean activists and a journalist charged
with violent attacks following March 29 elections have been released on bail
but more than 20 others remain behind bars, their lawyer said on Saturday.

"The seven were granted bail yesterday.... The others are still in remand
prison and we are making an effort to secure their release on bail," the
lawyer, Alec Muchadehama, told AFP.

They include Luke Tamborinyoka, information director for the opposition
Movement for Democratic Change, and Frank Chikowore, a freelance journalist.
They were all among some 30 people arrested last month.

The group has been accused of burning a commuter bus, stoning cars and
barricading roads after the opposition called for a strike over delays in
announcing the results of the elections.

  (END) Dow Jones Newswires
  05-03-080747ET

Bernier calls for monitors in Zimbabwe run-off

National Post, Canada

Canwest News Service  Published: Saturday, May 03, 2008

Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier called Friday for African leaders to
oversee the aftermath of the Zimbabwe's disputed presidential election.

In a statement released on the Foreign Affairs Web site, Mr. Bernier also
encouraged the UN to send a special envoy to the troubled African country to
ensure Zimbabweans their democratic rights in the scheduled run-off vote
five weeks after the first indecisive March 29 election. "If a run-off takes
place, it must be held in an open and transparent manner, in accordance with
regional and international principles regarding elections," said Bernier.
"The presence of international and regional election observers will be
essential."

"Canada calls upon the leaders of the Southern African Development Community
and the African Union to bring the full force of their leadership and
principles to bear on efforts to resolve this crisis," said Mr. Bernier. The
SADC is made up of 14 African countries, including South Africa, Tanzania,
and Botswana.

Tensions in the impoverished country occasionally flared into violence
throughout April as President Robert Mugabe, who has led Zimbabwe since
1987, has claimed that his opponent Morgan Tsvangirai did not win enough of
the popular vote to claim the presidency. Final vote results released last
week showed Mr. Tsvangirai claiming 47.9% of the vote and Mugabe with 43.2%.
To win the election outright, however, a candidate requires 50 per cent plus
one of all ballots to avoid the run-off, a second vote in which only Messrs.
Mugabe and Tsvangirai would run.

Mr. Bernier urged an end to the intimidation and violence plaguing
Zimbabwe's electoral process. "Canada strongly condemns the regime-sponsored
violence: Zimbabweans should be free to exercise their democratic rights in
an environment free from fear," he said.

Mr. Mugabe's rule with the ZANU-PF party has witnessed famine, political
violence, and an astronomical decrease in the value of Zimbabwe's currency.
Mr. Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change party claims that up to 20
of their members have been killed by ZANU-PF supporters in the wake of the
election.

We will not give into intimidation – ZESN

The Zimbabwean

Friday, 02 May 2008 15:18

BY STAFF REPORTER
HARARE
An independent poll monitoring group says it is under siege from the
authorities since announcing figures for the presidential election showing
that MDC President, Morgan Tsvangirai, secured more votes than Robert
Mugabe.
The Zimbabwe Election Support Network, a bonafide election monitoring
group that was duly accredited by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC),
said its observers have been beaten, one had his home torched, and others
have been harassed and intimidated.
The former Minister of Justice, Parliamentary and Legal Affairs,
Patrick Chinamasa, approved ZESN accreditation of 8,667 observers, who were
then duly accredited by ZEC. However, since announcing the projections, the
crackdown on the poll monitoring group has been intensified.
The ZESN national director, Rindai Chipfunde-Vava was detained for 45
minutes at the Harare International Airport on April 15 and quizzed by
intelligence officers.  On April 25, ZESN's national offices were raided by
the police, armed with a search warrant allowing them to look for subversive
material. The police confiscated a number of documents and took Programmes
Manager, Tsungai Kokerai, who was subsequently detained at Harare Central
Police Station for six hours and interrogated.
Chipfunde-Vava’s home was also raided on April 25.
ZESN Chairperson, Noel Kututwa and Chipfunde-Vava have been required
for three days running at Harare Central Police Station to answer questions.
“We believe all of these efforts are intended to intimidate ZESN so
that it will not observe future elections,” Kututwa said. “ZESN will not be
moved by these cynical actions on the part of the government and will
continue to defend the right of Zimbabweans to vote, a right so dearly paid
for in the struggle for the country’s liberation.”
Meanwhile, police have also arrested employees of humanitarian
organisations Action Aid, with its acting director Anne Chipembere, senior
programmes officer Precious Shumba and three other employees were arrested
in Mayo, Manicaland, by police officers from the Law and Order department.
The National Association for Non-Governmental Organisations also
issued an alert this week saying the offices of Crisis Coalition, Centre for
Research and Development, and Plan International offices in Mutoko were
raided by police over the past week.

MDC names diplomat as murderer

The Zimbabwean

Friday, 02 May 2008 15:10

HARARE - A CIO agent who masquerades as a diplomat at the Zimbabwean
embassy in the United States is alleged to have shot and killed Tabitha
Marume in Rusape last week.
The MDC has named Daniel Romeo Mutsunguma as the murderer of Mrs
Marume, an MDC activist.
Mutsunguma’s wife is said to be employed at the embassy in Washington
as a receptionist. The MDC has alleged that Mutsunguma returned to Zimbabwe
from Washington to take part in the terror campaign that has rocked the
country since the March elections, in which Zanu (PF) lost.

Never the same again

www.cathybuckle.com/

Saturday 3rd May 2008

Dear Family and Friends,
It took the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission almost five weeks to verify less
than two and a half million votes that were cast in our Presidential ballot.
In a country where junior school children have learnt to count, add,
subtract and even multiply in millions and now billions in order to survive
our collapsed economy, five weeks is insulting and highly suspicious to say
the least.

After five weeks the ZEC declared the following results:
Morgan Tsvangirai: 1,195,562 votes (47,9%)
Robert Mugabe: 1,079,730 votes (43,2%)
Simba Makoni: 207,470 votes ( 8,3%)
Langton Towungana: 14,503 votes ( 0,6%)

ZEC went on to declare that since no candidate had received more than 50% of
the votes cast, a run off election must be held at a date yet to be
announced.

In the five weeks while ZEC were 'verifying' those two and a half million
Presidential votes, the country has come to a virtual standstill: lives and
businesses have been on hold and we have waited and waited and waited. In
between the daily 16 hour electricity cuts we have followed every rumour,
whisper and news bulletin. We have scrambled for precious newspapers and
crowded around short wave radios for any information. It has also been a
brutal five weeks filled with fear, violence and retribution. More than
twenty people are dead, hundreds are injured, thousands have been left
homeless and everyone has seen the horrific images of people with broken
limbs, bloodied, bruised and burnt bodies.

Many are calling this the rural Murambatsvina and when you see the pick up
trucks overflowing with people coming into towns from the rural areas you
know why. The faces are gaunt, the eyes frightened and a weary, grey
exhaustion surrounds the images to all who care to see.

The American Ambassador to Zimbabwe, James McGee, said he was personally
recording incidents of violence and interviewing victims. Mr McGee said: "We
are looking and taking note of the people responsible for the violence. Out
of the 500 cases that I have handled, only one has been attributed to the
MDC as an aggressor. We have affidavits; we have the names of the
perpetrators. We know the perpetrators and there will be justice at the end
of the day."

In these five weeks, aside from the fear and exhaustion, daily life for all
Zimbabweans has reached ever more desperate levels. When we voted on March
29th a loaf of bread was 7 million dollars; last week it cost 40 million
dollars; this week it is almost impossible to find. A friend who takes life
sustaining drugs paid 345 million dollars for her tablets at the end of
March. Just five weeks later the same tablets cost her 4.6 billion dollars.

As I write it is not yet known if Morgan Tsvangirai will take part in a
second election. Whatever the MDC decide, the ordinary people of Zimbabwe
know one thing : the MDC won the 2008 elections; they won a parliamentary
majority and their candidate got more votes than Mr Mugabe in the
presidential count. For the first time in 28 years Zimbabweans have begun
freeing themselves from the clenched fist of Zanu PF. Real courage, real
bravery and a decade of intolerable hardship has finally guided their hands
in the ballot boxes. Zimbabwe will never be the same again.
Until next time, thanks for reading, love cathy.

Zim unashamed of media oppression – MISA

The Zimbabwean

Friday, 02 May 2008 16:09
World Press Day on May 3
HARARE – Zimbabwe marked World Press Day on May 3 with two journalists
languishing in custody, and others risking arrest and imprisonment, with no
sign of a let-up in a crackdown on the media.
The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) said it had received 57
alerts of press freedom violations in Zimbabwe this year alone.
“In the course of the year MISA issued 181 alerts (in southern
Africa),” MISA regional chairperson Kaitira Kandjii said. “Zimbabwe had the
highest number of alerts at 57.”
International press freedom group Reporters Without Borders said
journalists in Zimbabwe “face the wrath of an aging regime clinging to power
and protective of its authority. It is balking at liberalisation, especially
when broadcasting is involved,” it said.
Zimbabwe has only one State-owned radio and TV broadcasting station
and the authorities have staunchly refused to open up the airwaves for more
players.
The last 12 months have seen the crackdown on the media being
intensified and taken to new heights.
Freelance journalists Frank Chikowore is currently in remand prison.
Namibian based Rashweat Mukundu, the media monitoring and research
programme specialist for MISA, said Zimbabwe marks press freedom day
carrying the infamous crown of being one of the worst violators of media and
freedom of expression rights in the world. “Zimbabwe is probably one of the
few countries that are unashamed of not only arresting but detaining
journalists on cooked up charges ranging from the criminalisation of the
profession itself to charges of political violence,” Mukundu said. “As a
result of this, two journalists are in state detention awaiting trial. The
levels of harassment, fear and anxiety that pervert the journalism
profession is so far reaching that many are afraid of even being seen
carrying out interviews or taking pictures in public.”

US says it knows who the criminals are

The Zimbabwean

Friday, 02 May 2008 09:00

BY STAFF REPORTER
HARARE

The United States of America said this week that the international
community knew who the victims of violence in Zimbabwe were – and had also
identified the perpetrators of that violence.
The US ambassador to Zimbabwe, James McGee, told reporters this week
that what had begun as a political crisis was now “a humanitarian crisis or
human rights issue with the level of violence taking place (in the)
countryside and in the high density suburbs”.
The Geneva-based Human Rights council said on Tuesday in New York that
several political murders had occurred, and at least 351 people had been
hospitalised for injuries related to political violence.
McGee said violence was mainly coming from people who were not happy
with the way others voted.
“I have seen a 75-year-old grandmother who was beaten simply because
her relative stood on an MDC ticket,” he said.
“Judging from the figures that were shown outside the polling stations
it is clear that [the] people of Zimbabwe have voted for change,” McGee
said.

 

Botswana warns of more asylum-seekers

The Zimbabwean

Friday, 02 May 2008 08:45

BY STAFF REPORTER
GABARONE

An increasing number of Zimbabweans crossing into neighbouring
Botswana have been seeking political asylum, according to Botswana Minister
of Defence, Justice and Security, D. N. Seretse.
“For some time, we have been receiving illegal immigrants from
Zimbabwe, seeking economic opportunities, who have been crossing at
un-gazetted entry points into Botswana. But until recently, few have been
seeking asylum,” he said.
“But, since the elections, we have received a number of people
actively seeking political asylum and international protection, and [who
have] alleged that they fear for their lives.
He said his country had procedures to determine whether people were
legitimate asylum-seekers, and asked people to continue to report any
illegal entry into the country.

When will Mugabe get the sack?

May 3rd 2008
From Economist.com

Zimbabwe's president lost the election, according to official results, but
he will compete in a second round

NEARLY five weeks after the presidential election, the results have at last
come out. According to the electoral commission Morgan Tsvangirai, the
challenger, beat Robert Mugabe, the incumbent, but too narrowly to win
outright. The official data said that Mr Tsvangirai had won 47.9% of the
vote to Mr Mugabe’s 43.2%. This means there must be a run-off. But it is
unclear whether Mr Tsvangirai will take part. The Movement for Democratic
Change insists that its candidate won outright with 50.3% and that the
official results are false.

Mr Tsvangirai faces a dilemma. If he boycotts a second round, he will lose
by default. But if he agrees to compete, Mr Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party
seem certain to use intimidation, violence and vote-rigging to force people
to vote for the incumbent. For now the opposition leader remains abroad,
unlikely to return without being offered guarantees of his safety.

It is unclear when the run-off will take place, although it may be within
three weeks of the result being officially declared. Mr Tsvangirai and the
MDC may eventually agree to take part if there is a much stronger presence
of international monitors than before, preferably from the United Nations.
So far, the Southern African Development Community, a group of 14 countries
in the region, has provided oversight. But the MDC and most independent
observers say it is biased in favour of Mr Mugabe. In particular, Thabo
Mbeki, the president of South Africa, has been reluctant to oversee Mr
Mugabe’s downfall.

Mr Mugabe’s position is not entirely secure. For the first time, Zimbabwe's
crisis has been discussed in the UN's Security Council. Southern African
leaders are becoming alarmed by multiplying reports of government-sponsored
violence. The MDC says that at least 20 of its supporters have been killed
in recent weeks, and hundreds beaten up. Some in the ruling circles are
muttering that the impasse can be solved only with a government of national
unity. Mr Mugabe, however, has given no hint that he will step down.

But his acknowledged loss of Parliament—his ZANU-PF party is without control
for the first time since independence in 1980—is a big blow. Despite fears
of rigging, a recount of votes in 23 of the 210 constituencies failed to
change the overall result. The two factions of the MDC, which together won
109 seats against ZANU-PF's 97, have promised to join forces in Parliament.
If Mr Mugabe were to manage to stay on, his government would struggle to
pass any law in the legislature. (The MDC would not be able to rule the
roost either as it lacks the two-thirds majority needed to change the
constitution.) The president's wide powers could enable him to rule by
decree. He can appoint a third of the senators, so his party would still
outnumber the opposition in the combined Senate and assembly, which could
elect a successor if Mr Mugabe were to retire mid-term.

International impatience is rising. Some SADC members have begun to express
open criticism. The key, say Western diplomats, is to persuade enough SADC
leaders to take the lead in diplomacy away from South Africa's Mr Mbeki. The
UN's secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, says there is a humanitarian crisis and
has offered his “good offices”. But Zimbabwe is creeping up the agenda at
the UN Security Council, and on May 1st Britain took over the council's
monthly chair from South Africa.

SADC may still push for a government of national unity. But it is far from
getting all parties to agree on who should lead it. ZANU-PF refuses to work
with Mr Tsvangirai and says it is poised for a second presidential poll. The
MDC stresses that a unity government would not mean power-sharing; as the
biggest party in the assembly, it would lead a broad government including
some members of ZANU-PF and other capable outsiders. Regional leaders have
been keen to promote Simba Makoni, a former ZANU-PF finance minister who ran
as an independent, but he appears to have won 8% of the votes. Most who
voted for Mr Makoni are likely to vote for Mr Tsvangirai in a second round.
If it were fairly conducted and the count independently verified, there is
little doubt that Mr Tsvangirai would win.

Mission to save twin town

Press and Journal, Aberdeen

Former police chief and his wife launch new charity
Published: 03/05/2008

A FORMER Grampian Police boss and his wife are on a mission to save Aberdeen’s
twin town, where more people are dying every day than in Iraq.
Ex-chief constable Ian Oliver and wife Elsie have launched a new charity to
help halt the devastation of the city of Bulawayo in Zimbabwe.

The area, which is rife with starvation and unemployment, is suffering at
the hands of Robert Mugabe’s government.

With a population of about 707,000 it is the country’s second largest city
but every week an estimated 3,000 people die and the life expectancy has
dropped from 69 a few years ago to 34.

Mr Oliver first visited the city with his wife in 1990, the year he became
chief constable.

“We knew it was twinned with Aberdeen and wanted to go over, see it for
ourselves,” he said.

“It was a thriving, lively place with a booming economy.

“In the past couple of years, the standard of living has plummeted.

“The people are suffering extreme hardship under a political regime that has
completely lost control of the economy.

“Inflation is so high that even the most accomplished financier would have
difficult managing the money which becomes worthless even before it is
printed.”

Mr Oliver, of Weston Gardens, Haddington, East Lothian, said he and his wife
had sponsored 30 children at one of the city’s schools.

“People have to pay for their education there and there are not many who can
afford to do that,” he said.

“We felt we had to do something.”

The couple have registered a new charity, the A to Z Trust, Aid to Zimbabwe,
and are planning to organise a series of fundraising events in Aberdeen.

The charity has been registered in Mrs Oliver’s name.

She said: “Not many people even know that this place is twinned with
Aberdeen but everyone will be shocked to see what’s happening out there.”

For more details, or to make a donation, call 01620 824284.