http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008 21:51
THE Kingdom Meikles Africa Ltd (KMAL) saga has deepened after an
investigation team probing allegations of externalising foreign currency hit
a brick wall during a high-powered mission to South Africa
recently.
This has left KMAL rocked by boardroom wrangling between
chairman John
Moxon and chief executive Nigel Chanakira.
The
Reserve Bank, which is part of the probe, has now initiated a
process to
recover the allegedly externalised funds. This followed dramatic
events
earlier this month in South Africa after the probe team entailing
Reserve
Bank, police and local consultants ran into cat-and-mouse games with
South
African company executives, lawyers, police and court officials in a
bid to
get to the bottom of the matter.
The South African Reserve Bank also
declined to play ball. The
investigation was resultantly aborted after
encountering the difficulties,
which included threats and intimidation
between lawyers and police.
KMAL is facing a series of allegations of
salting away funds,
including:
*That the company externalised to
South Africa US$18,6 million and
R21,2 million as shown in its 2007 annual
report;
*That it disposed of its 25% shareholding in TM Supermarkets
(Pvt) Ltd
to South Africa's Pick 'n Pay worth R30,6 million but failed to
remit
proceeds in violation of the exchange control regulations;
*Disposing of 4 548 939 shares in South Africa's giant conglomerate
Mvelaphanda Group valued at R52,7 million without necessary exchange control
approval;
*Failing to remit a dividend of R11,6 million due from
its investment
in Mvelaphanda;
*Transferring US$3,7 billion from
its books via its subsidiary in the
Virgin Islands to Mentor Holdings Ltd
owned by Moxon's close business
associate Steven Levenberg through
misrepresentations;
*Transferring Euro 10,3 million through its
subsidiary in the Virgin
Islands to Coolbay Investments (Pty) Ltd on the
basis of distortions.
Coolbay, owned by Moxon, accessed the funds through
Cape Grace Hotel Ltd,
also incorporated in the Virgin Islands, by
misrepresenting facts;
*Investing in M-Southern Foods and Galnor Foods,
South African
companies, without Reserve Bank approval;
*Failing to
account for US$26 million after the company (then Meikles
Consolidated
Holdings and later Meikles Africa Ltd) had raised US$68 million
through an
IPO on the London Stock Exchange.
Official documents say there is a
prima facie case of breaching
exchange controls and possible fraud.
"Preliminary investigations have revealed potential exchange control
violations involving transactions by or between Cape Grace, Coolbay, and
Mentor, all of which are based in SA," official documents say. "These
transactions were processed through Afrifocus, Nedbank, Investec, M-Southern
Foods, Unity Trust and Standard Bank."
Information gleaned from
official documents obtained in South Africa
shows that the local central
bank will give Moxon through KMAL a specified
period to answer to
allegations levelled against him and the company.
After that the
exchange control department of the Reserve Bank will
demand repatriation of
funds which run into millions of dollars.
"The most likely penalties
for identified violations of Exchange
Control Regulations, Statutory
Instrument 109 of 1996, will be to liquidate
KMAL's local FCAs or garnish
the company's future foreign currency earnings,
until externalised amounts
have been fully recovered," documents say.
"Another option would be to
expunge the Reserve Bank's 'official debt'
with KMAL, using the company's
funds which were maintained at the bank and
were to be released to KMAL's
investments into the region. The 'official'
balance owed to KMAL
as
at November 24 was US$32 835 908."
KMAL's problems started recently
when Moxon wanted to force out
Chanakira at an aborted EGM. The EGM was
blocked by the courts.
After the fight broke out, things went from bad
to worse. Chanakira
spilled the beans by opening a case of externalisation
of funds to the
police.
The police, Reserve Bank and BCA Consulting
(Pvt) Ltd commenced
investigations into the matter which involves KMAL and a
number of South
African companies.
The South African companies
involved include the Mvelaphanda Group,
owned by businessman and politician
Tokyo Sexwale, Afrifocus Securities
(Pty) Ltd, Nedbank, Investec, Standard
Bank, M-Southern Foods, PKF Chartered
Accountants, Pick 'n Pay, Cape Grace
Hotel, Mentor, Coolbay Investments,
Unity Trust and Galnor (Pty)
Ltd.
The investigation team -- which was in South Africa from November
9-17 -- included Detective Inspector Boniface Magocha and Detective Sergeant
Emmanuel Busho from the Zimbabwe Republic Police, Charity Kadungure and
Susan Kabungaidze from the Reserve Bank and BCA Consulting's Shepherd
Nhondova, Budhama Chikambi, Joanna Mambeu and Antiock Kurauone.
Their contact persons were officials at the South African Reserve
Bank, who
included Charles Nevhutanda (head of exchange control), Alexander
Allis
(exchange control investigations), Elijah Mazibuko (also exchange
control),
Ross Hooper (senior manager operations and finance) and Thys
Basson (senior
manager investigations).
The Zimbabwean team's contact person in the
South African Police
Service was Captain Madela Hlatshwayo and Interpol
officers.
Documents say the investigation was aborted after Hlatshwayo
had been
threatened by Mentor and Coolbay lawyers at the Randburg
Magistrates' Courts
on November 15 when he was applying for authority to
interview and obtain
company records in terms of the Criminal Procedure Act
to assist the probe.
Interpol and the South African Reserve Bank did not
help much, it is said,
and the investigation was grounded.
This
forced the Zimbabwean team to try to secure interviews and
records without
subpoenas, an approach which did not yield the required
details.
By Dumisani Muleya
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
21:45
ZANU PF and the two MDC formations have agreed on
Constitution of
Zimbabwe Amendment (No 19) Bill to pave way for the
implementation of the
power-sharing agreement which provides for the post of
prime minister and
deputy prime ministers.
This followed initial
haggling in Pretoria this week between the
parties battling to finalise the
issue to allow for the formation of an
inclusive government.
The
Bill will amend the constitution to substitute the Chapter on
Citizenship to
make it more comprehensive. It will also make specific
provision for the
Parliamentary Committee on Standing Rules and Orders. It
also provides for
the appointment by the president of the chairperson of the
Zimbabwe
Electoral Commission and of members of the Anti-Corruption
Commission. This
must be done in consultation with the Committee on Standing
Rules and
Orders.
It would further provide for the appointment and function of a
Zimbabwe Media Commission, and finally it makes certain transitional
amendments pursuant to the agreement between Zanu PF and MDC
leaders.
In more detail, the individual clauses of the Bill provide as
follows:
Clause 1 sets out the Bill's short title, Clause 2 defines a couple
of terms
for the purpose of this Bill and Clause 3 seeks to substitute
Chapter II of
the constitution (citizenship) by another making it more
comprehensive.
Clause 4 seeks to correct certain cross-references
contained in
Section 41 of the constitution (which previously cross-referred
to members
of the House of Assembly only) to make them clearer. For
instance, that the
"anti-defection" provisions of Section 41(1)(e) apply to
elected senators as
well as MPs.
Clause 5 seeks to omit from
Section 57 (2) of the constitution the
incidental reference to the Committee
on the Standing Rules and Orders, for
which fuller provision is to be made
under Clause 6.
Clause 6 seeks to include a new section in the
constitution which
makes specific provision for the appointment and
functions of the Committee
on Standing Rules and Orders. For the period
during which the inter-party
agreements subsist, the composition of this
committee will be as specified
under sub-clause (2) of this clause.
Clause 7 provides that the appointment by the president of the
chairperson
of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission must be done in
consultation with the
Committee on Standing Rules and Orders.
Other amendments will fix the
term of members of the commission at six
years (renewable for one more
consecutive term) and specify in broad terms
the qualification of members of
the commission.
Clause 8 provides that the appointment by the president
of the members
of the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission must be done in
consultation with
the Committee on Standing Rules and Orders.
Clause 9 provides for the appointment and functions of a new media
commission to be called the Zimbabwe Media Commission.
Clause 10
seeks to amend the interpretation section of the
constitution by revising
the definition of "Committee on Standing Rules and
Orders" in conformity
with the amendment made under Clause 6.
Clause 11 and 12 will insert a
new section and schedule in the
constitution providing for certain
transitional amendments in connection
with the new (but possibly temporary)
office of Prime Minister and other
matters pursuant to the
agreement.
Since it is proposed to hold a referendum on a new
constitution within
two years, this office may fall away or be retained,
depending on the
outcome of the referendum. If the referendum rejects the
new constitution,
or agreement is for any reason terminated, the
constitution will continue in
force as if not amended by the
schedule.
Clause 13 anticipates any legal challenge grounded in Section
31E of
the constitution to the validity of anything done pursuant to the
exercise
of the functions of a vice-president, minister and deputy minister
between
the date when parliament was dissolved on the 29th March, 2008, and
the date
when the Bill becomes an Act.
By Dumisani Muleya
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27
November 2008 20:42
DEPUTY Minister of Science and Technology Patrick
Zhuwao has been
accused of plotting to unseat his uncle President Robert
Mugabe after
falling out of favour with him over political developments in
Mashonaland
West.
But Zhuwao yesterday denied that he was
fighting his uncle.
Sources told the Zimbabwe Independent that Zhuwao
was on Tuesday
accused of working to oust Mugabe from power during a heated
Zanu PF
provincial coordinating committee meeting held at Orange Grove Motel
in
Chinhoyi after he called for the election of youths into the party's
provincial executive.
Zhuwao's plea, the sources said, angered
Zanu's provincial women's
league treasurer identified as Amai Mubi who
interrupted the Zvimba East
legislator and fired a barrage of accusations at
him.
"Mubi said it was now common knowledge at the Mugabe family level
that
Zhuwao was plotting to oust the president," according to one of the
sources
who attended the meeting.
"Zhuwao was stunned and stopped
addressing the meeting."
The source said Zhuwao and his brother, former
Makonde MP Leo Mugabe,
have fallen out of favour with the pro-Mugabe
villagers in the Zvimba
communal lands who alleged that the siblings were
working against the
84-year-old veteran leader.
President Mugabe
hails from Zvimba.
Leo and Zhuwao are the sons of Sabina, Mugabe's
sister.
The sources said Zhuwao was heard before the coordinating
committee
meeting grumbling about Mugabe's decision to allocate the Science
and
Technology ministry to the Morgan Tsvangirai MDC under the power-sharing
agreement signed on September 15.
The sources said Zhuwao initially
eyed the Zanu PF Mashonaland West
chairmanship, but after the scene with
Mubi, the legislator did not forward
his name for the post.
Zhuwao
backed John Mafa who went on to win the chairmanship on
Wednesday against
former Zimbabwe ambassador to China, Chris Mutsvangwa, in
an election
reportedly marred by vote buying.
The deputy minister yesterday
declined to comment on what happened
during the coordinating committee
meeting, but denied there was bad blood
between him and Mugabe.
"A
supposition on my part that President Mugabe should leave office
Zviroto
zvezviroto (it's a dream of dreams)," Zhuwao said.
He said as a
national youth leader he was pressing for the
implementation of a Zanu PF
constitutional requirement that youths above 30
years should graduate into
the main wing of the party.
"The process of graduating our members
above 30 years into the main
wing is poised to see the old guards losing
positions they have been
holding," Zhuwao said.
Sources said grain,
fertilser and seed were used as inducements in the
Mashonaland West
elections while 10 000 litres of fuel allocated to Zanu PF
province for
party business was allegedly abused during the campaign.
"All the
people who were elected into the provincial executive lack
the academic
stamina and relevant experience to run the party," a senior
Zanu PF official
said. "Their advantage was that they had a grip on the
electorate because of
the inducements they offered. Unlike other provinces
that elected capable
people, Mashonaland West will be run by villagers."
By Constantine
Chimakure
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008 20:41
THE
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) has called for nationwide
protests
next week against the low maximum bank cash withdrawal limits
imposed by the
Reserve Bank.
Lovemore Matombo, the president of labour
confederation, told
journalists in Harare yesterday that the protest would
be on Wednesday.
He implored workers and the public to take part in the
protests.
"December 3 2008, that is next Wednesday, is the day when
workers and
the generality of the public will throng banks and demand
unlimited
withdrawal of their money," Matombo said.
He said the
decision to protest against the central bank was arrived
at during the
ZCTU's general council meeting in Masvingo on Tuesday, which
deliberated on
the problems faced by workers.
"The general council also noted that
various labour forums which were
held in all six regions of the country had
resolved that a nationwide
protest be organised, where workers will express
their anger towards the
current monetary policies being promoted by the
central bank," Matombo said.
He said the situation in the country had
reached levels which were now
beyond the comprehension of the generality of
ZCTU members who were being
forced to queue daily, some even sleeping
outside banks for days, to get a
paltry $500 000 from their hard-earned
salaries.
Matombo said as a result of the cash limits many people have
died of
treatable diseases like cholera and dysentery after their banks
failed to
approve their bulk cash applications on time.
"As workers
we have always called on the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe to
remove the cash
limit, but the central bank seems not to be taking us
seriously," Matombo
said.
The country's largest workers representative body also attacked
the
central bank for authorising a number of selected shops to trade in
foreign
currency when most workers were not paid in hard currency.
Meanwhile, more than 500 National Constitution Assembly activists on
Wednesday held a protest march in Harare calling for the setting up of a
transitional government to address the urgent needs of the people.
The NCA chairperson, Lovemore Madhuku, said the march was successful.
"The
demonstration was a success because of the big turnout and the police
didn't
have the capacity to deal with the huge crowd," Madhuku said.
Madhuku
said the NCA would join the ZCTU in its Wednesday protest
against the
RBZ.
By Lucia Makamure
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008 20:37
THE morning of Thursday June 3 will
remain etched in the minds of many
people at Jerera Growth Point in Zaka,
Masvingo, for decades to come.
Engraved by the horror of political
violence that engulfed the area
around 3.30 am.
Guns reportedly
rattled for over 30 minutes before they went silent,
leaving the Morgan
Tsvangirai-led MDC's office in the district of about 40
000 people ablaze,
two activists dead and eight others nursing serious
injuries.
The
dead -- Washington Nyamwa from Ward 19 and Chrison Mbano from Ward
18 --
were burnt beyond recognition after the office was torched by
suspected Zanu
PF militia, state security agents and war veterans in the
countdown to the
June 27 presidential election run-off.
The injured were first treated
at St Anthony's Mission Hospital, five
km from the growth point, and those
seriously burnt were transferred to
Harare for specialist medical attention
at private hospitals.
One of the survivors of the attack, Kudakwashe
Tsumele, told the
Zimbabwe Independent how he cheated death on the eventful
night and suffered
80% disability.
Almost seven months after the
savage attack, Tsumele is still
bed-ridden and suffering from multiple
wounds on his hands, stomach and
legs.
"Zanu PF thugs wanted to
kill us for supporting Tsvangirai," Tsumele
told the Independent at his
rural home on Sunday. "I survived by the grace
of God. The attack was the
height of political violence since the March 29
elections when we voted for
Tsvangirai ahead of Mugabe."
Tsumele said on the fateful day he and
nine colleagues were guarding
the party office when about 10 suspected Zanu
PF activists armed with AK-47
and FN rifles arrived and broke down the
door.
"Four of the Zanu PF thugs entered the office and when one of my
colleagues tried to escape he was shot dead. We were ordered to lie on the
floor, sprinkled with petrol and torched. They then rushed out of the
office," remembered the emotionally charged Tsumele. "We were engulfed by
fire. I managed to get out of the office and remove my clothes that were in
flames. By the time I got to the hospital, I had suffered serious
injuries."
While Tsumele was on his way to the hospital, another
colleague was
burnt beyond recognition just outside the office.
Because of the degree of the burns, the 23-year-old Tsumele was
transferred
to Harare where he spent six months receiving specialist medical
attention
at a private hospital.
"What is painful is that when I returned home I
heard that tension was
high in this constituency (Zaka Central) despite that
the MDC won," he said.
"Zanu PF youths militia is threatening to 'finish us
off' and they said they
are waiting for an order from the powers that be to
carry out the dastardly
deeds."
Another survivor of the attack,
Edson Gwenhure, said since his release
from hospital two months ago Zanu PF
activists approached him and threatened
him with death.
"Tension is
high," Gwenhure said. "We don't know what Zanu PF is
planning for us. Though
the torture bases were dismantled, some of the
soldiers, youth militia and
war veterans who terrorised people during the
campaign are still in the
constituency. They said they are waiting for
orders from above to deal with
us."
Gwenhure's face and fingers were disfigured and he lost the
greater
part of his left foot.
He can hardly walk and has since
abandoned his bicycle repair job at
the growth point. Life has become
unbearable for him because he no longer
has any source of income.
The constituency MP, Harison Mudzuri, told the Independent that there
were
fresh reports of Zanu PF intimidation and that tension was high between
the
supporters of the two political parties since the one-man run-off.
"I
must admit that there were no violent cases reported to me since
June 27,
but there are fresh reports of intimidation of supporters by Zanu
PF youth
militia and war veterans," Mudzuri said. "We are afraid that if the
power-sharing deal fails to be implemented our supporters will be targeted
for attack."
He said he was reliably informed that Zanu PF militia
intended to
launch an operation code-named Makasaina chibvumirano (you
signed the
agreement) once the pact fails to hold.
"Our supporters
are living in fear of the operation, but we are united
that Tsvangirai
should only agree to a genuine power-sharing deal," said
Mudzuri, who is
also the spokesperson of the militant Progressive Teachers
Union of
Zimbabwe.
Intimidation or no intimidation, violence or no violence,
Tsumele and
Gwenhure are bitter and yearning for revenge.
"What is
painful is that no one was arrested for what they did to me
and my
colleagues," Tsumele complained.
He said Tsvangirai should not be party
to the unity government with
Mugabe as long as the 84-year-old fails to cede
"real" power to the former
firebrand trade unionist.
"We are saying
Tsvangirai should wait even for the next five years for
a fresh election and
finish off Mugabe," Tsumele said. "The government of
national unity as
presently proposed still gives our tormentor more power
than Tsvangirai who
won a free election on March 29. Why enter the unity
government when you
will become a junior partner?"
Even Gwenhure said MDC supporters were
prepared to endure the current
economic hardships for another five years if
Mugabe is not prepared to cede
power to Tsvangirai.
"After the June
3 attack we became more resolute that we will do
whatever is in our capacity
to ensure that Tsvangirai gets real power,"
Gwenhure said. "No matter the
amount of suffering Zimbabweans will face, we
will not compel Tsvangirai to
be party to a government in which he has no
real power."
Mudzuri
said the MDC wanted reparations for the violence that dogged
the June
run-off.
"We will not adopt the biblical Jesus saying that God forgive
them
(violence perpetrators) because they did not know what they were
doing," he
said. "We are saying God forgive them because they knew what they
were
doing."
By Constantine Chimakure
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27
November 2008 20:34
THE judgement by the Supreme Court this week
dismissing a Danish land
suit against the government has shown that any
foreign investment in land
will not be protected by the law, defence lawyer
Advocate Lewis Uriri has
said.
The Supreme Court dismissed a
constitutional lawsuit brought by Danish
farmer Kim Bikertoft, former owner
of Nyahondo Farm (Pvt) Ltd in Chinhoyi,
who challenged the acquisition of
the farm under the controversial land
resettlement programme.
Uriri
argued that the farm could not be acquired by Retired Brigadier
General
Walter Tapfumaneyi as it would be a breach of the Bilateral
Investment and
Protection Agreement (Bipa) signed between Zimbabwe and
Denmark in
1996.
The agreement states that foreign land investments of Danes
should not
be expropriated except in the public interest, on the basis of
non-discrimination, carried out under due process of law, and against
prompt, adequate and effective compensation.
The judgement has also
been interpreted to mean that the government
has failed to respect the Bipa
which should afford protection of investments
by Danish nationals.
However, Chief Justice Godfrey Chidyausiku sitting with Deputy Chief
Justice
Luke Malaba and Justices Paddington Garwe, Wilson Sandura and
Misheck Cheda
as a constitutional bench, dismissed the appeal. They said
detailed reasons
for the ruling would be provided in due course.
Uriri commenting on the
judgment said: "The judgement in other words
implied that foreign land
investment in the country is not protected by the
law. the state can
expropriate the land."
This, he said, was as a result of Section 16 B
of the Constitution
that was amended in 2005 to prohibit a person from
challenging the
acquisition of land by the state.
"But the rules of
natural justice demand that a man be heard. A man
must be heard," said
Uriri.
Bemoaning some of the provisions of the Zimbabwe Constitution,
Uriri
said they had exhausted all approaches to justice in the country and
now
looked forward to take the case further.
"The way the
Zimbabwean Constitution is amended is not consistent with
the Sadc Charter.
Since we have exhausted all approaches, the advice I have
been given is to
make a specific declaration to the Sadc Tribunal that
Zimbabwe acts in
accordance with international law," he said.
He said even though the
Danish company was entitled to compensation
and interest, there was no
indication that this was going to be done soon.
Uriri said if one
approached Section 16 (B) of the constitution
literally, the judgement would
be correct.
However, Tapfumanyei, through his lawyer Gerald Mlotshwa
said the
acquisition was lawful under Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment
17.
By Wongai Zhangazha
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
20:30
ZIMBABWE Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) this week issued an
ultimatum
on behalf of Harare residents to the water parastatal, Zimbabwe
National
Water Authority (Zinwa),
giving it a week to account
for the funds it received from the central
bank to deal with the water and
sewage crisis in the city.
In a letter sent to Zinwa's chairperson on
Wednesday, the lawyers said
many Zimbabweans were faced with the threat of
cholera and other diseases
such as diarrhoea due to water shortages. They
said the ailments were
continuing despite the fact that the Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe and government
had on several occasions provided the water utility
with significant sums of
money and other forms of assistance to enable it to
respond to the water
shortages and sewage management.
"In the
premise ZLHR, on behalf of the residents of Harare, calls upon
Zinwa to
.immediately give an account of Zinwa's expenditure and use of the
monies
given to it to respond to the water and sewage crisis," reads the
ZHLR
letter.
The human rights lawyers in the same letter ordered Zinwa to
immediately provide Harare residents with up to date information on the
situation of water supplies in their areas, and to ensure the provision of
clean water to all residents of Harare.
The lawyers said they will
take legal action if Zinwa fails to meet
its demands by December 1.
"Should Zinwa fail to take the action highlighted above with immediate
effect, with progress being evident no later than December 1, we shall have
no option but to proceed with legal action against you as advised by our
clients and residents of Harare," the lawyers said.
They also said
failure by Zinwa to fulfil its statutory obligation had
led to many
residential areas across Harare, especially areas such as
Budiriro, Glen
View, Mabvuku, and Chitungwiza going for months without
constant water
supplies.
According to the letter, the little water that residents have
been
receiving from Zinwa is in fact unhealthy as a result of Zinwa's
failure to
refurbish Harare's water supply system.
The lawyers
accused Zinwa of unethical conduct for dumping untreated
sewage into Lake
Chivero - Harare's main water source - and for billing
residents for monthly
water consumption when in many cases they have not had
water supplies for
months.
By Lucia Makamure
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27
November 2008 20:30
THE Morgan Tsvangirai-led MDC says it will approach
multilateral
institutions to pressure President Robert Mugabe's government
to release 15
activists the party claims are in police custody after their
arrest earlier
this month.
The move to engage international
bodies by the MDC comes after police
have defied a High Court order to
release the activists. The party also
petitioned in vain the acting
Attorney-General Barat Patel on the matter.
The activists, according to
the MDC, were still unaccounted for after
they were arrested in pre-dawn
raids on their homes in Banket, Mashonaland
West.
Nelson Chamisa,
MDC spokesperson, told the Zimbabwe Independent this
week that the party had
no option but to engage Sadc, the African Union (AU)
and other international
bodies to intervene.
"The MDC has done all in its power to have the
activists released
without any success and the only option left will be to
knock at the doors
of multilateral institutions like Sadc and the AU,"
Chamisa said. "We have
to put pressure on the Sadc and the AU to put
pressure on Zimbabwean
authorities to release our activists. As a party we
are also demanding the
respect of the human rights of our
activists."
The MDC said the continued detention of its activists was a
"major
threat" to the party's power-sharing negotiations with Zanu
PF.
The party activists have been held for almost 30 days without
access
to their lawyers or families.
A High Court ruling on
November 11 ordered the urgent release or the
immediate appearance in court
of the activists, but the police have defied
it.
Chamisa said the
continued illegal detention of the activists was a
violation of the
power-sharing agreement the two MDC formations signed with
Zanu PF in Harare
on September 15.
The MDC listed the missing members as the party's
women's assembly
chairperson Concillia Chinanzvavana, her husband Emmanuel
Chinanzvavana, and
Zvimba South District chairperson Fidelis
Chiramba.
Chiramba stood as an MDC senatorial candidate for Zvimba in
the March
29 elections.
The other activists are parliamentary
candidate for Zvimba North in
the same elections Ernest Mudimu, Zvimba South
youth organiser Fanwell
Tembo, deputy provincial secretary Terry Musona, and
the wife of MDC Zvimba
South youth chairperson Collen Mutemagawo, Violet
Mupfuranhehwe.
Mutemagawo and Mupfuranhwe's two-year-old child, who was
abducted
together with his parents, is also missing. So are activists Lloyd
Tarumbwa,
Pieat Kaseke, Gwenzi Kahiya, Tawanda Bvumo, Agrippa Kakonda and
Larry Gaka.
Kakonda and Gaka are from Chitungwiza.
By
Loughty Dube
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
20:28
ZANU PF will hold its provincial elections in Bulawayo tomorrow
amid
serious divisions in the party over the revival of PF Zapu and the
decision
by most members of the current executive not to seek
re-election.
The party chairperson in the city, Macleod Tshawe, said he
would not
seek re-election when the polls take place at Zanu PF's provincial
headquarters.
Tshawe's pullout comes at a time when six members of
his executive
have left Zanu PF to join the revived PF Zapu.
The
six include secretary for information and publicity Effort Nkomo,
secretary
for administration Tryphine Nhliziyo and secretary for security
Andrew
Ndlovu.
Sources in the party said members of the current executive
opted out
of the elections after a commission of inquiry set up by Zanu PF
to
investigate events leading to the revival of PF Zapu accused them of
plotting to desert the party.
Zanu PF national chairman John Nkomo
this week did not disclose the
full contents of the commission of inquiry
report, but briefly said the
probe revealed that the organisers of a recent
PF Zapu meeting wanted to
"embarrass" Vice-president Joseph Msika when they
invited him address their
indaba.
"The commission of inquiry
established that the entire executive was
involved in setting up structures
towards the revival of PF Zapu and the
current members of the executive will
therefore not stand in the elections,"
one of the sources said. "There is a
crisis in the party as most senior and
experienced leaders have declined to
contest for party positions."
Tshawe told the Zimbabwe Independent this
week that he would not seek
re-election because of family and business
commitments.
"I am not standing for re-election as the Zanu PF
provincial
chairperson because of pressing family and business commitments
and I am
happy to say I have contributed enough to Zanu PF since my election
in
2004," Tshawe said.
He confirmed that his executive had called
for meetings on the revival
of PF Zapu to appraise Msika on the problems
former cadres of the party were
facing.
Zanu PF national commissar
Elliot Manyika said the polls would go
ahead, but declined to shed light on
political developments in the province.
Party sources said politburo
and central committee members from the
province were working on a plan to
stop war veterans leader Jabulani Sibanda
from becoming the chairperson of
the province.
"The crisis the central committee and politburo members
face now is to
come up with the right people who are respected in the
province to take over
the provincial leadership and they are struggling to
find the people as
everyone capable of leading is moving over to PF Zapu,"
another source
said. - Staff Writer.
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November
2008 20:22
TAPIWA Nyamutsime cannot help but reflect on how the year
2008 has
been for her and her family.
Light showers are falling as
she trudges back home after tilling a
small patch of land allocated to her
by war veterans in Epworth,
Harare, after lying that she was a
staunch supporter of one of the
candidates vying for Zanu PF's provincial
chairmanship of the capital on
Sunday.
Her $800 000 rent for
November, like that of others backing the
candidate, was paid for as part of
the campaign and vote buying.
However, the benefits from the campaign
do not comfort her at all,
instead they bring more misery to her and wishes
that 2008 comes to an
abrupt end.
Nyamutsime, living positively
with HIV and Aids since 2001, is bitter
that 2008 was a deception in the
fight against the pandemic.
She is of the strong view that there is
nothing much to celebrate on
World Aids Day on December 1.
Nyamutsime blames the hardships she encountered during the course of
the
year on the political situation in the country, especially the countdown
to
the June 27 presidential election run-off which was littered with
violence
reportedly perpetrated by state security agents, Zanu PF militia
and war
veterans.
The bloody campaign was meant to secure victory for President
Robert
Mugabe against MDC's Morgan Tsvangirai who had out-polled the veteran
leader
on March 29, but failed to secure the mandatory votes to win the
presidency.
Nyamutsime was one of hundreds of residents of Epworth who
were
displaced by the political violence. The displacement affected her
normal
supply of anti-retrovirals (ARVs) from a local clinic and this
adversely
affected her health.
"My displacement was a challenge,"
Nyamutsime said. "I was worried so
much, because I needed to register again
in Dzivaresekwa where I was staying
with relatives to have access to ARVs. I
went for some days without a normal
supply of the drugs."
As she
was trying to come to grips with her displacement, the
government dealt her
another heavy body blow.
On June 4, the Social Welfare ministry
suspended humanitarian
organisations from carrying out their
activities.
Among those suspended were HIV and Aids organisations and
this
affected mostly poor people living with the pandemic, as they were left
with
no access to free ARVs and food.
The suspension of the
organisations pulled back the fight against the
scourge at a time when the
country's prevalence rate was declining.
Zimbabwe boasts of achieving a
decline in the HIV and Aids prevalence
rate from 18,1% to 15,6% over the
past four years. In 2001, the rate was
26,5% and it went down to 18,1% by
2003.
Government hospitals have few supplies of ARVs, while the few
humanitarian organisations that were operational could not cope with the
large numbers of people who sought assistance.
Most vulnerable
people affected were in Manicaland, Mberengwa,
Masvingo and some parts of
Matabeleland North and South.
The biggest problem that faced people
living with HIV and Aids was the
lack of food rich in nutrition, a
requirement for them before taking their
medication.
Emma
Kundishora, the Zimbabwe Red Cross Society secretary-general,
said food was
needed for ARVs to work effectively.
"Without a full stomach many of
those on ARVs are now choosing to
default on their treatment as they cannot
cope with the debilitating side
effects," Kundishora said recently in Kadoma
where her organisation was
donating food.
A 55-year-old woman,
Antonia Tsikira, of Rimuka who is living with HIV
and Aids, said she had not
taken the ARVs for days after failing to secure
food and as a result her
health had deteriorated.
The government lifted the ban on humanitarian
organisations on August
29, but this did not help much as the damage had
already been done.Zimbabwe
is facing an acute food crisis.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the World
Food
Programme (WFP) food-insecure persons in rural and urban areas will be
3,8
million by December.
This is expected to go up to at least 5,1 million
people between
January and March next year.
The signing of the
September 15 political agreement between Mugabe,
Tsvangirai and the leader
of the smaller formation of the MDC Arthur
Mutambara is yet to bring hope
to people infected and affected by HIV and
Aids as the parties are still
embroiled in arguments on forming the unity
government.
The plight
of those living with HIV and Aids was worsened by the
recent strike by
doctors, which saw a number of wards being closed and
patients being
discharged, at times without treatment.
Moreover, the shutting down of
a number of opportunistic infections
clinics in Chitungwiza, Harare and
Parirenyatwa hospitals, which provided
services to people living with HIV
and Aids, worsened the situation.
The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe has not
helped matters. The maximum daily
withdrawal limit of $500 000 is not enough
to buy a loaf of bread, let alone
ARVs.
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human
Rights (ZLHR) have since taken up a case of
a woman living with HIV and Aids
against the central bank and a commercial
bank that denied her access to
money in her account she intended to use to
buy ARVs.
The woman -
whose identity is protected - tested HIV positive in 1998
and used to buy
ARVs using bank certified cheques or cash.
However, as from November
18, the price of the ARVs was pegged at $706
million payable in cash at most
pharmacies.
With the maximum daily cash withdrawal of $500 000, the
woman would
have to spend at least 1 412 days (almost four years)
withdrawing the total
amount required for her drugs. In the meantime the
prices would be going up
due to the hyperinflation.
Nyamutsime only
hopes for the best and that Zanu PF and MDC would stop
squabbling
and
form an inclusive government immediately. She celebrates World Aids
Day in tears and agony, but still optimistic that the government will take
their plight seriously.
By Wongai Zhangazha
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November
2008 20:11
RE-APPOINTED Reserve Bank governor Gideon Gono might not
meet the next
January's deadline that brings an end to the bank's
involvement in
quasi-fiscal activities despite promising an end to the
supra-ministerial
interventions, analysts have said.
Analysts
said delays in forming an inclusive government and the
absence of a national
could force Gono to perpetuate quasi fiscal activities
aimed at bailing out
the heavily indebted government. This week President
Robert Mugabe gave the
incumbent Reserve bank governor the nod to see
through another term in
office amid weeks of speculation over his fate.
But analysts said
although Gono's re-appointment would inspire little
international and local
confidence, his new lease of life at the helm of the
bank would not
introduce new monetary measures that would guide the country
from the decade
long economic recession.
With annual inflation now over the official
231 million percent,
critics blame the Gono for stoking inflation through
quasi-fiscal
interventions in his just-ended first five-year term.
Accepting re-appointment of the second term Gono said he would cut his
seemingly erstwhile involvement on quasi-fiscal matters.
"With
effect from January, 2009, therefore, the Reserve Bank will be
focusing on
the core businesses of inflation control and financial sector
stability,"
Gono said.
"Under the new thrust, it would be expected that all our
parastatals,
local authorities and all government departments and ministries
will fully
discharge their statutory mandates without the need to rely on
the central
bank for assistance."
Expressing skeptism in Gono's
remarks, University of Zimbabwe
political science professor Eldred
Masunungure said the Reserve bank could
continue with its "ill-advised
policies".
"He should not have undertaken the policies in the first
place,"
Masunungure said. "In my view those were outside his jurisdiction.
The fact
that he is abandoning them is however salutary bearing in mind that
he
should have started carrying out the policies."
"It will be
extremely difficult to stop those activities given the
ongoing delays in
forming an inclusive government and the absence of a
national budget. I do
not see the talks being concluded in January. I think
that will be very
optimistic and in the absence of a budget the Reserve Bank
may be compelled
by default to intervene," he said.
Masunungure said the establishment
of a new institution tasked with
rounding up the current quasi-fiscal
activities would usher in new but
concealed quasi-fiscal activities by the
Reserve Bank.
"The Reserve Bank has merely the created creature-an
invisible conduit
for new quasi-fiscal operations. My fear is that the
quasi-fiscal activities
will continue but hidden under the institution. The
Reserve bank has become
habituated in carrying out quasi fiscal activities,"
Masunungure said.
Sources also said the re-appointment of Gono could
also introduce a
contentious issue to the ongoing negotiations over the
formation of an
inclusive government between President Robert Mugabe and MDC
leaders-Morgan
Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara.
Former university
of Zimbabwe economics professor Rob Davies however
described Gono's
statement as mere rhetoric. Gono made the same remarks when
he presented
last year's first quarterly monetary policy that also resulted
in the
establishment of Fiscorp - a wholly owned Reserve bank subsidiary
tasked
with carrying out quasi fiscal activities.
Since its formation the
Reserve bank has undertaken programmes such as
the Farm Mechanisation, Basic
Commodities Supply Side Interventions, the
Agricultural Support Enhancement
Facility and the Parastatals and Local
Authorities Re-orientation
Programme.
"This is not the first time that the governor has said he
would cease
quasi-fiscal activities," Davies said. " He made similar remarks
when
Fiscorp was established but nothing much has been said about it since
then.
Its mere rhetoric."
ZB bank group economist Best Doroh said
Gono's decision to stop
quasi-fiscal activities was commendable if fully
implemented.
"This indicates good indications on the part of the bank
and we hope
that this promise will be fully implemented. In my view these
activities had
been contributing to inflation through credit creation," said
Doroh.
By Bernard Mpofu
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
20:09
THE Zimbabwe Stock Exchange has been on a tailspin, plummeting by
over
82% since Monday last week to Wednesday this week. Many investors have
lost
their money on the market in more or less the same fashion that has
gripped
global markets. Many shares have collapsed, including heavyweights
such as
Old Mutual. Businessdigest reporter Paul Nyakazeya (PN) this week
interviewed economist Brains Muchemwa (BM) on what has been happening on the
stock exchange.
PN: Can we conclude that the bubble has finally
burst after measures
taken by Reserve Bank governor Gideon Gono last
week?
BM: It is very difficult to evaluate statistically and it may
remain a
speculative debate.
PN: Why would you imply the bubble has
not burst when the stock market
has plummeted by such proportions?
BM: A bubble bursts when investors make huge losses in real terms.
Look at
what has happened in the major global housing markets and regional
bourses
such as the JSE down 58% in real terms, the Lusaka Stock Exchange
down 28%
in real terms and the Botswana Stock Exchange down as well 58% by
Monday.
What has happened on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange is far
from being a
real bubble bursting because no one knows the fair value of the
exchange
rate. And taking the Old Mutual Implied Rate to be the proxy, the
market
goes up and down with it. Hence really very few recorded real losses
from
that perspective. However, in nominal terms the bubble has burst for
those
that bought at the peak mid-November, but surely a serious investor
should
not worry about nominal values in a hyper-inflationary
environment.
PN: Going forward, is the market likely to recover in the
short-term?
BM: The lessons for 2003-2004 and 2006 are clear to us. The
market
will remain bearish only by the extent to which the Reserve Bank will
be
maintaining a very tight liquidity position in the market.
All
asset price buoyancy is largely a function of excess liquidity.
Look at how
prolonged periods of soft monetary policy by the US Federal
Reserve buoyed
the Dot Com bubble in the early 2000 and the sub prime
mortgage bubble to
2007. And locally of course how excess liquidity has
buoyed nominal house
and stock market prices in 2005, 2007 and 2008.
What we need to
understand is that the central government and related
institutions resort to
the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe for funding in the face
of the persistent high
budget deficits, and the sources of government
revenue, largely tax from
corporates and pay-as-you-earn, are dwindling
fast. Therefore liquidity
will soon be coming back into the market and the
upward rally, net of the
margin of rogue trading, will begin.
PN: Why would investors continue
to pile on the Zimbabwe Stock
Exchange and shun other investment
markets?
BM: Investors are looking at value creation and convenience of
investment. The economy is dollarised, and many companies no longer sell by
cheques or RTGS, and are demanding the scarce cash and foreign currency.
Hence the goods market is not easily a tenable alternative for households
and corporates with excess cash balances. Therefore anyone with Zimbabwe
dollars is faced with options of the money market with negative real
returns, the property market that needs loads of money to enter or the
convenient local bourse. That is why the stock market has many favorites,
and of course it's not a bad attitude to have a saving culture as a
people.
PN: There is a general view that most assets and listed
companies in
Zimbabwe are trading at excessive discounts today. What's your
view?
BM: That is a general view, as you have said. Look at it from
this
perspective. An asset is trading at discount if one is confident they
would
realise better value in a reasonable foreseeable future when the true
value
becomes known to the market.
In my view there are no assets
trading at a discount in Zimbabwe. The
market values reflecting on the
assets are taking into consideration the
state of the economy, the economic,
political and business risks, the
prospects of future earnings, current
consumer demand and more importantly,
the opportunity cost of capital in a
global environment. Hence investors are
taking all relevant available
information to arrive at the fair value we see
tagged on companies
today.
Of course there are some listed companies that are trading below
the
replacement cost, but still the issue comes to the exchange rate that
one
uses among the many that exist. No one knows where the exchange rate
will
settle when there is stabilisation and that makes the argument of fair
values difficult to conceptualise unless the stock market starts trading in
US dollars.
PN: Is there merit in the ZSE trading in US
dollars?
BM: If there is merit in OK, Edgars, National foods and Delta,
for
example selling in US dollars, why not then trade their values in that
currency if possible for ease of valuation?
PN: What do you take of
the performance of foreign currency licensed
companies?
BM: The
eventual stabilisation and predictability of US dollar
cash-flows will
improve earnings, but for selected counters largely in
industrials.
Services sector companies will be the last in the chain to enjoy the
benefits as the Zimbabwe dollar which is being rejected by some quarters
will continue to dominate their cashflows and balance sheets.
PN:
After events that happened last week, what would be the best
investment
strategy on the stock market?
BM: With excessive inflation and acute
market volatility, it is very
difficult to consistently beat alpha. And
besides, crystallisation of value
is usually mythical on the stock market
because of the rapid loss of value
that once existed on the market. So my
advice is largely for one to identify
quality counters today and stick to
them until the economy stabilises.
Active trading is very dangerous in a
market with acute volatility.
PN: There has been a global meltdown
because to the after-effects of
the US sub-prime mortgage market crisis. How
safe is southern Africa and
Zimbabwe in particular?
BM: Southern
Africa is suffering largely from its commodity backed
currencies that have
taken a tumble as commodity prices have taken a huge
slump.
The
tumble in currencies has instigated withdrawals of carry-trade
related
portfolio investments, creating second round pressure on currencies
thereby
creating more volatility and weakness
we see today on the rand, pula
and kwacha.
Zimbabwe is slightly immune because we are not so open an
economy.
However, because the country leans heavily on remittances from
abroad, the
credit crunch out there is affecting incomes of Zimbabweans
working abroad,
and eventually the inflows will be thinning out. That
creates a slowdown in
economic activities here.
PN: After this
crisis, what could be the next crisis on the markets?
BM: It is very
difficult to predict crises, but the fuel coupons
crisis could be the next.
Fuel coupons are replacing the payment system as
more people and business
are demanding payment by these ahead of local
currency. Anyone who can issue
a fuel coupon has become an issuer of choice
and value, and that could
become another pyramid to crumble as rogue trading
schemes are much more
possible if the speculators descend on the scene big
time.
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
20:08
THE delay in forming a government of national unity by the
country's
three main political parties aimed at solving the political crisis
and the
adjournment of parliament is likely to affect the announcement of
the
national budget.
For the first time since Independence in 1980,
the country was likely
to go into a new year without the announcement of the
national budget which
is traditionally scheduled between the last week of
November or first two
weeks of December.
With the current
hyperinflationary environment, some economic analysts
were questioning if
it made sense to announce a national budget in Zimbabwe
dollar terms at the
rate the local currency was losing value against major
currencies.
International laws however do not allow Zimbabwe to present a
national
budget in US dollars.
Analysts who spoke to businessdigest said the
delay in crafting and
announcing the national budget which is a reflection
of a country's "health"
was a recipe for a national disaster.
ZB
Bank group economist Best Doroh said it was imperative to come up
with a
national budget under the current economic environment.
"We are not
sure how government ministries would operate without these
allocations,
service delivery will further deteriorate and the absence of
the national
budget will make it difficult to come up with meaningful
projections," said
Doroh.
In the absence of balance-of-payments support from multilateral
institutions, Zimbabwe has been funding its budget since the turn of the
century.
As revenue dwindles because of harsh economic conditions,
expenditure
has recorded an upward trend as government failed to live within
its means.
This has necessitated the need for supplementary budgets which
are usually
10 times larger than the original budget because of
inflation.
Political analyst Eldred Masunungure however said the budget
had not
been a key instrument in public policies for the past three
years.
"It (budget) has been overtaken by other interventions like the
quasi-fiscal activities by the Reserve Bank even if it is announced, it
would be quickly consumed by inflation," Masunungure said.
"It will
not make sense to present a budget now because all it will be
are figures on
paper hard to put into practice. Two months down the line
most ministries
will have exhausted the money they would have been
allocated," he
said.
National Constitutional Assembly chairperson, Lovemore Madhuku,
said
there were no consequences linked to the delay in announcing the budget
because President Robert Mugabe and his allies have never been serious about
planning.
"To them (government) the budget is just a legal process
concerned
with figures and not really about where the money is going to come
from,"
Madhuku said.
Analysts said poor allocation of funds or no
funding at all leads to a
whole lot of inflation drivers as Reserve Bank
governor Gideon Gono had
embarked on funding quasi-fiscal
activities.
"The Reserve Bank has been funding all ministries through
its
quasi-fiscal activities which calls for more money printing, a move that
is
highly inflationary," Madhuku said.
Some analysts however said
announcing the national budget under the
current economic environment was a
non event because of the high inflation
rate.
Kingdom Bank economic
analyst Witness Chinyama said the absence of
essential tools for the
formulation of policies such as the national budget
lead the economy to be
run by piecemeal arrangements and crisis management
methods.
By
Jeslyn Dendere
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008 20:08
WHILE global markets are selling their shares because of the financial
crisis, a buying fever has gripped the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange following the
"riot act" read by the Reserve Bank governor Gideon Gono last Thursday,
Imara Edwards financial services said.
The stock market fell
sharply this week following monetary policy
measures introduced by the
Reserve Bank meant to curb fraudulent speculative
behaviour that had gripped
the market.
Gono said it was because investors were abusing the two
trading
session structure of the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange to "buy and sell"
shares
that were not backed by actual credit balances in their bank
accounts.
For instance, an investor would instruct a broker to buy
shares of
certain listed companies in the morning call-over and order the
sell of part
of those shares during the afternoon call-over, thereby making
huge profits
as share prices would have increased by a massive
percentage.
As there would be no money in the investor's account, part
of the
profit would then be used to pay for the shares that would have been
"bought".
Imara said the perverse market behaviour was explained
by
hyperinflation and the increasing 'dollarisation' of the Zimbabwean
economy,
with the exception of its domestic financial markets and the public
sector.
John Legat, head of Imara Asset Management, who is based in
Harare
said: "In local currency terms, the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange (ZSE) has
been
going ballistic in line with hyperinflation and money creation. The ZSE
was
up 56 436% in October."
Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe governor
Gideon Gono last week said: "You
only need to look at the madness that has
been going on at the stock
exchange and the fictitious, obnoxious and
artificial wealth that was being
created in an environment where
fundamentals have actually not improved. My
warning to those who are playing
on the stock exchange is that if you play
with fire you know what
happens."
Imara manages and markets a range of investment funds with
equity
holdings in various African jurisdictions, including
Zimbabwe.
"Daily moves of over 200% on the ZSE index are now normal. On
some
days, individual stocks have risen by 100 000%.
"Fundamentals
on individual stocks have largely been ignored as
individuals and
institutions are investing in the stock market regardless of
risk as it is
one of the few places left where Zimbabwe dollars are accepted
as currency,"
said Legat.
"Rather than have Zimbabwe cash balances in a bank wasting
away,
investors are instructing their stock-brokers to buy anything liquid,"
said
Imara.
Earlier this month, the government slammed insurance
companies and
pension funds, which make up more than 80% of ZSE's investors,
for
preferring to invest in the stock exchange rather than the
government.
Insurance experts said to punish them, the Reserve Bank
introduced a
statutory requirement that from the end of this month, they
would have to
invest between 30% and 35% of their assets in prescribed
government assets.
Failure to comply would result in "very serious remedial
measures".
There are suggestions that ZSE should become
dollar-denominated, along
with many other parts of this rapidly dollarising
economy.
With the introduction of foreign currency shops and fuel
stations, the
move towards doing business in hard currency is spreading like
wildfire.
Employees are starting to ask for salaries to be paid in hard
currency
as they are unable to easily access Zimbabwe dollars from the
banking system
and most goods are available only in foreign currency shops
and on the black
market, both of which require real money.
While
the partial dollarisation has provided some breathing space for
Zimbabweans
with access to foreign currency it has created dual pricing on
every good
and service.
Prices in US dollars are actually higher than those in
local currency.
Meanwhile Old Mutual plc, has delayed its dividend
payment to Zimbabwe
shareholders because of the problems in country's
banking system.
The insurer noted the failure of the banking system to
handle the
number of zeros in processing the transactions which amounts to
$453
trillion per share for its interim period which is due today.
"The banking system in general is having difficulties with the size of
the
numbers involved," Matthew Gregorowski, a spokesman for London-based Old
Mutual, said in a statement. "It was a temporary processing issue" which
would be solved soon, he added.
According to Kingdom Stock Brokers
(KSB) trade on the money market is
apparently stagnant because of the
recently administered cheque limits and
the persistent Real Time Gross
Settlement system challenges that have
affected the entire settlement
system.
NMB Bank Ltd that was suspended from the clearing house
on
Saturday was readmitted on Tuesday. This effectively means the bank
was out of the clearing house for one day.
Asked for comment on the
circumstances surrounding its suspension, the
bank said: "It was common
knowledge that when one of the commercial banks
was taken out of the
clearing house on the morning of 17 November 2008, we
became a victim of the
contagion effect. The suspended bank owed us $195
quintillion in clearing
settlement. The suspension of the one bank affected
two other banks that
failed to settle with us an amount of $121 quintillion.
One of the said
banks has since paid us $103 quintillion."
NMB was in surplus on
Tuesday when it was readmitted to the clearing
house.
By
Paul Nyakazeya
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27
November 2008 20:03
THE Zimbabwe Stock Exchange (ZSE) said it has
observed acts of insider
trading on the local bourse which was causing some
counters to inflate,
depress or cause fluctuation of shares.
In
a statement to the Reserve Bank and Ministry of Finance signed by
ZSE chief
executive Emmanuel Munyukwi and chairman Seti Shumba yesterday,
the local
bourse said it would investigate all reported cases as it was a
serious
offence.
"The ZSE committee has also observed, with concern that there
are some
relatively large institutions which have capacity and strategic
macroeconomic information which is used to inflate, depress or cause
fluctuations in the prices of securities in breach of the Securities Act
(Chapter 24:25) Section 96 (2)," said ZSE.
"This is considered a
very serious offence and will be subjected to
investigation in order to
determine complicity under the securities Act,"
the stock exchange
said.
The ZSE committee said it had not yet ruled on the issue of
defaulting
members that were revealed by the Reserve Bank last
Thursday.
"It (activities on the stock market) was simultaneously
escalated to
the public domain as the report was being brought to the
attention of the
committee," the ZSE said.
The ZSE said the
procedures as prescribed in Rule 11.01 for bringing
this issue, as well as
other complaints about members, has not been varied
or waived.
"The
ZSE committee has a primary duty to appraise the discovered
evidence and
then set out to prove the breach. The committee must then
follow procedures
as laid down in rules 11.01-11.12," said the ZSE.
The stock exchange
committee said it would consider the question of
final re-admission of any
defaulter in two different classes according to
rule 11.12 namely (i) Cases
of failure arising from default of clients or
from other circumstances where
no bad faith or breach of the rules and usage
of the exchange has been
practiced. (ii) Cases marked by indiscretion and by
failure to exercise
reasonable caution on the part of the defaulter.
"The ZSE Committee
will examine any such evidence provided in
investigating the matter through
normal channels," the ZSE said.
The stock exchange committee also said
it will call for all
participants to be subjected to interviews regarding
the circumstances of
the alleged breach and weigh the evidence to establish
the underlying
motives for suspicious conduct and behaviour by the members
as innocent,
negligent or fraudulent.
"The quality of the evidence
must be such that it is admissible in
open court so as to provide a
successful prosecution and ultimate conviction
if the need arises," the ZSE
said.
The committee said it shall ensure that the rules of Natural
Justice
are applied and observed by taking all reasonable steps to ensure
that every
person whose interests are likely to be affected by the exercise
of the
functions is given adequate opportunity to make representations in
pursuit
of fairness and any probabilistic outcomes in terms of the rules.
Commenting
on purchasing and settlement risk, the ZSE said a precedent was
observed in
the current difficulties in which bank cheques were
dishonoured.
"This put the entire marekt at risk as there was no longer
any
guarantee, even by the designated authorities in the bank that their own
paper and what they have signed for can be rendered disabled. Therefore no
other paper will be acceptable to stockbrokers for the purchase of shares,"
said ZSE.
ZSE said the recently introduced measured of further
securing
liability on the proceeds of the cheque by getting the bank chief
executive
to undertake the endorsement has disabled the whole
system.
"The banking system itself appeared to be struggling with
deposits and
end of day balances and the zeroes. They cannot establish
cleared effects
and the whole industry has been rendered as defaulters," ZSE
said.
According to ZSE the main operating bank Stanbic has admitted
that
they have a back log of unprocessed deposits for stockbrokers going
back to
October this year. This will continue to feature as "uncleared
effect".
"This has the effect of disabling the account which can no
longer be
used for settlement purposes. Most accounts are also therefore in
default,"
the stock market said.
The RTGS system has not been fully
restored and will be currently
limited to five transfers per day.
The stock market said the banking system also appears to be struggling
to
handle the range of figures.
"Removing a fixed set of zeroes on the top
end will result in the loss
of data as the lower cash end of the range,"
said ZSE.
The local bourse said there was a significant level of
settlement risk
in trading. It said it therefore was prudent for the
participating brokers
to reduce this level of risk by managing the volume of
activity being
processed.
"Any exposure under current conditions
would worsen overall market
risk," ZSE said.
By Paul
Nyakazeya
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
20:04
ECONET Wireless Zimbabwe's use of an outdated software resulted
in
contract line subscribers being migrated to the "Business Partna"
package.
Because of foreign currency shortages, the software, which
is
responsible for the billing system and which has a lifespan of five
years,
was used for nearly 10 years.
Econet now require US$2,5
million for a new billing system, which
would enable the company to revert
to it old set-up.
Speaking to businessdigest, Econet chief executive
Douglas Mboweni
said after being advised that the system could not be
repaired after passing
its lifespan, the mobile telecommunications company
had only two choices,
switch contract lines off completely, or put
subscribers on the Buddie and
Libertie platform.
"The billing
system was collapsing, it meant all contract subscribers
would be off air.
We then decided to migrate them to Business Partna," said
Mboweni.
"The supplier had told us that they would not be able to provide any
spares
to keep the outdated equipment running and the solution was to
purchase a
new one. Shortage of foreign currency could not allow us to
upgrade the
software," he said.
Mboweni said when they have money to improve the
entire network they
would "easily identify the contract subscribers and
restore their status".
He could not give a timeframe as to when the
entire network would be
improved as there were other competing issues
needing attention.
"We know we should have alerted the contract
subscribers before the
migration but the situation was beyond our control.
We were throwing every
resourse to the heart of the network which is the
switch," Mboweni said.
"We are dealing with an era of crisis. The work
that we have done at
the heart of the network is significant. What we have
done here is a way of
averting disaster, it is part of a journey but we have
hit a hard patch," he
said.
Contract line user accounted for 5% or
about 50 000 of total
subscribers, while Buddie and Liberties platforms make
up 95%.
Mboweni added that Econet had other activities more critical to
the
survival of the network that also require urgent attention and
investment.
This means any new funding raised would not be deployed
immediately
into the acquisition of the new billion system given the
Business Partna
customers can be serviced on the pre-paid
platform.
By Paul Nyakazeya
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November
2008 19:45
RESIDENTS in the suburb of Glen Norah reported a disquieting
spread of
cholera in the area this week, with more than four people dying in
Glen
Norah B, as of November 20.
The state-run Herald newspaper
featured an article which alleged that
"Cholera is under control" while
people continue to have no access to clean
tap water and to die from
cholera.
It is paradoxical that this mishap comes at a time when the
state is
desperately propagating untrue information in a bid to cover up the
statistics and magnitude of the epidemic.
The pandemic whose
nucleus in Harare is Budiriro suburb is
distressingly spreading to other
neighbouring residential suburbs and is
also wreaking havoc across the
country, thus exposing the government's
disaster management and preparedness
incapacity and the need for help.
Suffice to say the cholera pandemic must
be declared a national disaster .
Zinwa, the government parastatal
responsible for water provision and
sewer management has, despite the
resources it received from the Reserve
Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ), failed to
meet the residents' clean tap water
requirements.
The government
has also failed to timeously act on the Zinwa
failure -- that is --
reversing the disastrous decision of the water and
sewer takeover and return
the management of these to the local authority.
These failures, coupled with
the collapse of the country's public health
sector, have resulted in the
massive infections and deaths from cholera.
The Combined Harare
Residents Association demands that the government
acts responsibly by
relieving Zinwa of the sewer and water management duties
and return them to
the Harare local authority.
The residents cannot bear another day of
Zinwa failure, government
laxity and the cholera pandemic.
CHRA
will continue to rally the residents around demanding quality
service
delivery and a responsible leadership.
We stand by the cholera victims
and hold Zinwa and the government
liable. The residents shall continue to
seek recourse for their violated
rights.
Farai Barnabas
Mangodza,
Combined Harare
Residents Association
(CHRA).
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
19:41
THERE has been a lot of debate in the media, of late, relating to
what
exactly the term "power-sharing" means and entails. The main thrust of
this
article is to clarify the obvious and in some cases, deliberate,
distortions
and untruths peddled by the state media on the subject of
power-sharing.
A power-sharing government is one in which two or more
political
parties join hands in forming and running it. The ratio of
power-sharing is
entirely determined by the preceding agreement between the
contracting
political parties who agree to enter into a power-sharing
government.
What is patently clear is that there is no precise formula
for a
power-sharing government. There is definitely no one-size-fits-all
approach
to the formulation of a power-sharing government. Each
power-sharing
government is unique and indeed, peculiar, to its own specific
and special
circumstances. Put differently, the model of a power-sharing
government
adopted in country A is not necessarily suitable for country
B.
The power-sharing agreement signed by Morgan Tsvangirai, Robert
Mugabe
and Arthur Mutambara on September 11, 2008 and solemnised amidst much
regional fanfare on September 15 underpins the need for the country's two
major political parties, namely the MDC-T led by Tsvangirai and Zanu PF led
by Mugabe to share power equitably and fairly. There is nowhere in the
memorandum of agreement where any one political party is described as the
dominant political entity and thus, the party that will literally invite
other political parties to join it in forming a so-called all-inclusive
government.
My understanding of the 9/11 agreement is that it forms
the global
framework on which an all-inclusive government is to be formed.
It is
therefore preposterous and indeed, fallacious, for Zanu PF to perceive
itself as the "dominant'' political party that should unilaterally determine
the parameters and ramifications of an all-inclusive government in Zimbabwe.
The 9/11 agreement conceptualises a government in which the MDC formations
and Zanu PF share power equally. More importantly, the agreement has the
outcome of the March 29 harmonised elections in which Tsvangirai emerged as
the winner of the presidential electoral contest as its bedrock.
It
is beyond debate that Mugabe was beaten hands down by Tsvangirai in
the
March poll. A sham election was held on June 27 in which Mugabe competed
against himself and won "resoundingly''. One does not have to be a rocket
scientist to appreciate the overwhelming lack of legitimacy of the charade
that took place in Zimabwe on June 27.
Surely, if Mugabe "won'' the
June 27 election run-off fairly and
legimately with over 85% of the total
valid votes cast as announced by the
thoroughly discredited and partial
Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), then
why didn't he proceed to quickly
form a government as the overwhelming
"winner'' of the presidential election
run-off? The mere fact that Mugabe
has not formed a government nearly five
months after "trouncing''
Tsvangirai during the June 27 run-off election
speaks volumes about the lack
of legitimacy of that particular election
"result". The annals of history
have recorded the murderous campaign
perpetrated by Zanu PF that preceded
the June election run-off. This one-man
"election'' received unprecedented
and universal condemnation from even the
Sadc observer mission, the
Pan-African Parliament observer mission and the
AU observer mission. This is
the main reason Thabo Mbeki found it necessary
to broker the power-sharing
agreement of 9/11.
In normal electoral
dispensations, an overwhelming winner of a free
and fair election can never
be compelled to share power with a loser. It
will really be up to the winner
to show his magnanimity by inviting the
loser to join him in government. And
we all know that it is not within
Mugabe's political DNA to invite electoral
losers into his government!
Tsvangirai is, therefore, perfectly within
his rights when he demands
that there must be genuine and equitable
power-sharing between himself and
Mugabe before he can join the so-called
all-inclusive government.
Mugabe and Zanu PF have absolutely no right
to unilaterally dictate
the terms and conditions of the power-sharing
government. By unilaterally
apportioning cabinet portfolios as done by
Robert Mugabe some few weeks ago,
the need for Tsvangirai to be more careful
in his dealings with Mugabe
cannot be over-emphasised. As Tsvangirai has
repeatedly said, it is better
to have no deal than to have a bad deal. The
people of Zimbabwe spoke on
March 29 and who are we to ignore the wishes of
the voters who chose
Tsvangirai to be their president?
The 9/11
agreement should not and indeed, cannot, be taken as a
substitute for the
people's choice as reflected in the outcome of the March
elections. If
anything, Tsvangirai should be applauded for exhibiting true
statesmanship
by agreeing to have Mugabe, a clear loser of the legitimate
March
presidential election, remain as head of state!
Power-sharing is not
and can never be an easy thing to do in politics.
Political parties, rightly
so, contest for political power to enable
themselves to form governments.
Thus, it is always going to be very
difficult and painful, for electoral
winners to form coalition governments
with electoral losers. Even in Kenya,
the situation is not all that rosy.
Raila Odinga was forced to share power
with Mwai Kibaki in order to avert a
major catastrophe in Kenya. But
recently and especially after the outcome of
the Waki Report was made known,
things have really been on a knife-edge in
Kenya. Justice Philip Waki's
report is basically an analysis of the causes
and effects of the
post-election violence in Kenya between December 2007 and
January
2008.
And now some politicians in Odinga's political party are crying
foul
alleging that the Waki Report is a witch-hunting exercise meant to
tarnish
their image by labelling them ''warlords'' who masterminded the
post-election violence. There is even talk of bringing those politicians
implicated by the Waki Report to trial at the International Criminal Court
at the Hague to face charges of crimes against humanity.
This
clearly shows the need for Tsvangirai to enter a power-sharing
government
only after ensuring that the rug will not be pulled from under
his feet once
he blindly enters into a government that is dictated by the
whims and
fantasies of Mugabe and his Zanu PF party.
All important issues such as
the promulgation of Constitutional
Amendment No 19, the equitable
distribution of cabinet portfolios,
governorships, senior diplomats and
senior civil servants as well as the
composition and operations of the
National Security Council, have to be
clearly and unequivocally canvassed
and agreed upon before Tsvangirai can be
sworn in as Zimbabwe's new prime
minister. Nothing short of this should be
acceptable. Power-sharing doesn't
mean rushing into an
improperly-constituted government simply because the
people are suffering.
Fortunately for Tsvangirai, the majority of the people
understand the basis
of his reservations and certainly; he remains arguably
the most popular
national leader in Zimbabwe at the moment.
By
Obert Gutu: MDC Senator for Chisipite and member of the party's
National
Legal Committee.
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008 19:38
LEGAL experts this week said Justice
minister Patrick Chinamasa had no
constitutional obligation to consult both
formations of the MDC before
crafting the draft Zimbabwe Constitutional
Amendment No19 Bill to give
effect to the September 15 power-sharing
deal.
They however said it would have been "politically correct" to
have the
input of the two parties to demonstrate the spirit of the global
political
agreement (GPA) brokered by recalled former South African
President Thabo
Mbeki.
The government announced last week that it
had drafted the Bill and
sent it to Mbeki, a move that drew a hue and cry
from the Morgan
Tsvangirai-led MDC which insisted that it should have
participated in its
crafting. The party rejected the draft and drew up its
own.
The Bill will give legal effect to the GPA and will create the
office
of prime minister and two deputies.
Talks on the
constitutional amendment opened in South Africa on
Tuesday with
MDC-Tsvangirai insisting that the negotiations should not be
narrowed to the
Bill, but should deal with outstanding issues, among them
ministerial
portfolio allocations, appointment of governors, ambassadors and
permanent
secretaries and composition of the proposed National Security
Council.
The MDC demands are contrary to the ruling of Sadc earlier
this month
that the only sticking issue was the allocation of the Home
Affairs
ministry, which the regional bloc said should be co-managed by Zanu
PF and
the MDC-Tsvangirai.
Sadc also ruled that the constitutional
amendment be crafted, taken to
parliament and passed to enable President
Robert Mugabe to constitute
"forthwith" an inclusive government.
Legal experts said arguing over where the amendment Bill should have
originated from was just politicking, because the power-sharing pact did not
specify who had the mandate to draft it.
Constitutional law expert
and also chairperson of the National
Constitutional Assembly (NCA), Lovemore
Madhuku, said Chinamasa had no
constitutional obligation to consult the MDC
in crafting the Bill.
"There was no constitutional requirement on who
should have drafted
the Bill, but politically it was wrong for Chinamasa to
draw up the Bill
without any input from the MDC," Madhuku said.
He
said the two political parties would need to work together for the
Bill to
get through parliament, as neither of them had the mandatory
two-thirds
majority in the House.
Madhuku added that Zanu PF and the
MDC-Tsvangirai were wasting time
debating the origin of the Bill and having
protracted disputes on its
contents when parliament should iron out its
flaws.
"The politicians are wasting time debating about the contents of
the
Bill at this stage as the parliamentary process, which will come later,
will
remedy any defects in the Bill," Madhuku argued.
Terrence
Hussein, a Harare legal practitioner, agreed with Madhuku
that the
government had no legal obligation to consult the MDC formations on
the
drafting of the constitutional amendment.
He argued that the GPA was
not enshrined in the Constitution of
Zimbabwe and, therefore, had no legal
effect.
"Zanu PF did not have any legal obligation to invite the MDC in
the
crafting of the Bill although they had a political obligation," Hussein
said. "Politically it would have been ideal for the two parties to work
together in drawing up the final draft of the constitutional Bill."
A parliamentary legal services NGO, Veritas, is of the opinion that
there
should have been a combined drafting of the Bill and this should have
started immediately after September 15.
"What is happening now
seems a time-wasting method of producing the
Bill, with the country in dire
extremity and without a proper government,"
the lawyers said. "It is
extraordinary that representatives from all three
parties were not pulled in
to draft the Bill together, as according to the
GPA the substantive terms
were already agreed upon by the party
negotiators."
The lawyers
said pending the formation of the inclusive government,
the Bill could be
introduced in parliament in terms of the constitution.
The Bill can be
introduced in parliament by either of the two
vice-presidents or
alternatively by Chinamasa who, in the absence of the
inclusive government,
has been the caretaker Justice minister.
The lawyers said another
choice would be for Tsvangirai to be
immediately appointed prime
minister.
"The GPA specifies only one ministerial appointment before
the
introduction of Constitution Amendment No. 19," said the
lawyers.
Article 20.1.3 of the GPA states that: (The President) "shall
pursuant to this agreement, appoint the prime minister pending the enactment
of the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment No 19".
Article 20.1.6
(3) specifies that the prime minister will be
Tsvangirai.
Minister
of Information Sikhanyiso Ndlovu last week said: "A Bill
cannot go to
parliament if it is not approved by Cabinet" and the Bill would
have to be
presented and steered through parliament by the new
MDC-Tsvangirai minister
responsible for constitutional affairs. But
constitutional law experts said
if government sticks to the line that
ministers and Cabinet have to be
appointed before the Bill is taken to
parliament, it would lead to another
impasse between MDC-Tsvangirai and Zanu
PF.
"The MDC-Tsvangirai
has stated categorically that they must have a
mutually-agreed Constitution
Amendment No 19 passed into law first before
accepting ministerial and
cabinet posts. In view of the delay and past
disputes they must have legal
authority before accountability," Veritas
said.
According to the
lawyers, there is no constitutional or legal
requirement for prior cabinet
approval of a Bill before it goes to
parliament.
The lawyers said
there had been a long-standing internal government
administrative practice
under which all government Bills were taken for
approval to the Cabinet
Committee on Legislation and Cabinet itself before
going to
parliament.
This practice, however, did not have the force of law. The
experts
said the constitutional procedural requirements make it unlikely
that the
Bill would become law before the middle of January, even if the
parties
reach agreement on its wording this week.
"The Bill must be
printed and gazetted as required by section of the
Constitution, and this
would take until the end of November or early
December," said the
experts.
After the Bill has been gazetted, 30 days have to elapse
before it is
taken to parliament.
During the 30-day period the Bill
must be referred for consideration
to the relevant parliamentary portfolio
committee, but since parliamentary
committees were still to be set up this
would have to be done when
parliament resumes sitting.
During this
time the Bill will be made available for public scrutiny
and the relevant
portfolio committee should call for written representations
from the public
and arrange stakeholder meetings and public hearings.
A report from the
portfolio committee must be presented during the
second reading of the Bill
in parliament.
Once it is before parliament, the Bill should be debated
in both
Houses, which under normal rules of procedure would take at least
two weeks
although if the parties are in agreement motions to fast-track it
could be
passed, and it could sail through the House of Assembly and Senate
within a
few days.
After being passed by parliament, the Bill would
then have to be
signed into law by the president.
By
Lucia Makamure
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
19:51
REAPPOINTED central bank governor Gideon Gono will still find it
difficult to endear himself with key players in the economy even after
announcing this week that he will cease all quasi-fiscal activities (QFAs)
and concentrate on the core business of the Reserve Bank - controlling
inflation and policing the financial sector.
His opponents say the
QFAs are responsible for propelling inflation
into the stratosphere,
decimating the local currency and ravaging the
economy. Despite serious
petitioning and lobbying by the opposition MDC and
business leaders to have
Gono taken out of the Reserve Bank, President
Mugabe renewed the governor's
tenure this week. The renewal of Gono's term
is definitely going to annoy
business and the MDC-Tsvangirai, especially its
secretary-general Tendai
Biti who at one time described Gono as an economic
terrorist.
There
is no doubt that the MDC-Tsvangirai - which is angling for the
Finance
ministry in the proposed unitary government - is not prepared to
work with
Gono. On Wednesday MDC leader and Prime Minister-designate Morgan
Tsvangirai
fired warning salvos at Mugabe over the reappointment. Tsvangirai
said the
renewal of the term showed "lack of good faith". He denounced Gono
as "the
architect of Zimbabwe's economic collapse". He said Gono "has
blatantly
plundered the national treasury to fund Mugabe's party and its
elite".
Even in a lesser role Gono's reappointment is set to open
yet another
front and heighten conflict between Zanu PF and the MDC. He is
now a
political battlefield on which the feuding parties will contest for
power
and influence. There is already a battle raging between Mugabe and
Tsvangirai over appointment of Zanu PF provincial governors in areas the MDC
dominated in the senatorial and parliamentary polls. Mugabe's appointment of
Gono is a controversial undertaking. Gono is now in an invidious position in
which he will always be viewed as a symbol of Mugabe's defiance and his dead
man's grip on power.
In this battle, Gono has to make difficult
choices of openly
proclaiming allegiance to the failed Zanu PF aristocracy
or assuming a more
neutral position which is in line with his new
pronouncements of sticking to
core business. But he will always find it
difficult to disentangle himself
from the cobwebs of the Zanu PF conundrum.
In fact his activities at the
central bank are going to be determined by the
politics in the country.
As long as there is no political settlement,
Zimbabwe will not get
balance-of-payments support and production in industry
and on farms will
remain depressed. In that case the government will
continue pressing Gono to
run the printing press. Gono should be aware that
the solution to
eliminating the cash economy and resultant money supply
growth is beyond his
capabilities. At the beginning of his first term as
governor, he took the
battle to fight inflation as a personal struggle which
he wanted to win at
all costs. He made bold declarations about the perils of
losing the battle,
the most famous one being "failure is not an
option".
That he has lost the battle -- and the plot - is very evident
but we
will not fault his religious zeal to want to see inflation brought
down to
single digit levels. Even after declaring that he would avoid QFAs,
his
statement this week does not disguise the fact that he still wants a
piece
of the action. He wants to see growth in mining and other foreign
currency
generating businesses.
He wants to see Zimbabwe attract
foreign investment and to ensure
developmental projects take root once more.
Gazing into the horizon he said:
"The outlook period will see an
unprecedented vigour in mobilising foreign
exchange through the strategic
deployment of the country's natural
resources, as well as those parastatals'
assets and shareholdings that are
amenable to private sector
participation."
But he has to mend fences with miners, especially gold
extractors whom
the central bank has not paid for gold deliveries. The same
goes for maize
and wheat farmers who were promised payment in foreign
currency for
deliveries to the Grain Marketing Board. Exporters and a large
section of
the banking industry will also not celebrate his reappointment.
Depositors
queuing for the worthless $500 000 at banks do not have kind
words for Gono
either.
The soiled image of Zanu PF has rubbed onto
him and he has an arduous
task to launder that. In the event of the unitary
government succeeding,
Gono has a huge task to remove the tag of unwanted
governor in government
circles. Judging by the current state of this economy
and the task to hand,
it will be difficult for Gono to save Zanu PF from
political demise. He was
appointed as the face of change in the Zanu PF
administration five years ago
but was immediately handed a poisoned chalice.
He gulped it down and his
image as change agent quickly evaporated. Can he
rise above the zeros to be
a trusted handyman?
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
19:51
SOUTH African president and Sadc chair Kgalema Motlanthe this
week
made a significant turn in his country's approach towards President
Robert
Mugabe's regime.
His remarks this week contrast with
those of his predecessor Thabo
Mbeki who appeared to be more
indulgent.
On Sunday, Motlanthe called for the speedy implementation of
the
September 15 global political agreement (GPA) and insisted that Prime
Minister-designate Morgan Tsvangirai and his two deputies be sworn in
alongside Mugabe.
Twenty-four hours later, Motlanthe removed the
gloves and announced to
the world that Mugabe and his regime lacked
legitimacy and, as such, it was
imperative to constitute a government of
national unity as a matter of
urgency to deal swiftly and firmly with a
worsening humanitarian crisis in
the country.
"We agreed that with
regards to Zimbabwe the next step really is to
ensure that we unblock the
impasse for them to take (Constitutional)
Amendment 19 through the senate
and the assembly, so that Mr Tsvangirai
could be sworn in as prime minister
and (Arthur) Mutambara as the vice-prime
minister and Mugabe as the
president, so that once the three of them have
been sworn in they can then
form an inclusive government," Motlanthe said on
Monday.
The
following day he said: "Unless the root cause of the political
absence of a
legitimate government is not solved the situation will get
worse and may
implode or collapse."
While the South African stance is likely to hurt
Mugabe very deeply
because recognition by his peers is something on which he
has traditionally
placed premium value, it reaffirms the notion that the
June presidential
election was a sham.
This also means that
Africa's powerhouse, which is also a neighbour,
is now challenging Mugabe's
legitimacy.
Motlanthe's pronouncement came in the wake of his country's
decision
last week to withhold the R300 million aid it had promised Zimbabwe
after
the formation of a government of national unity for agricultural
recovery.
Mugabe should understand the meaning of the South African
president's
pronouncement.
The mere fact that Sadc has endorsed the
global political agreement
between the country's three major parties
confirmed that the generally held
position in the region is that no single
party could form a government
without the support of the other
parties.
Mugabe has been basking in false glory that Sadc and the
African Union
(AU) recognised him as the legitimate president of Zimbabwe
after his
military-like campaign, which resulted in him winning
"resoundingly" the
June one-man run-off.
It is patently clear that
Sadc and the AU have accepted that there is
no legitimate government and the
outcome of the March 29 elections did not
give the mandate to govern to any
single party.
In such circumstances, the only resolution Sadc could
pass was to
encourage the parties to come to some arrangement along the
lines contained
in the GPA and proceed to form a government that is
inclusive.
The role and status of the Zanu PF ministers, some of whom
are no
longer relevant because they lost the elections, exposes the
illegitimacy of
the regime.
With Sadc and the AU's realisation of
Mugabe's lack of legitimacy,
Zimbabweans expect the regional and continental
bodies to take a bold stance
against the 84-year-old leader and goad him to
be sincere in the
power-sharing deal.
Regional leaders should be
united in confronting the Zimbabwe crisis
and tell Mugabe to play ball and
make sure there is successful
implementation of the GPA.
Motlanthe,
Botswana President Ian Khama and the late Zambian leader
Levy Mwanawasa,
were the only regional heads of state to speak out against
Mugabe's
government, but the most worrying thing is that they never did it
in the
formal forum of Sadc.
Zimbabweans should never anticipate a major shift
in Sadc's position
on our crisis even after the regional bloc's chair has
said Mugabe and his
current government lack legitimacy.
Some of the
Sadc leaders have since 2000 exhibited sound and fury, but
with little in
the form of substance.
Why don't they do it in the formal forum of
Sadc, where decisions are
firm and binding? Everyone should be sceptical
when leaders use the media
platform and yet avoid the formal forum to tell
it like it is.
One hopes those media statements can be transformed into
formal
language and action. Zimbabwe needs to move forward, not to remain
trapped
in the current political paralysis.
By Constantine
Chimakure
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008 19:32
IT is almost incomprehensible that government should bar three
worldwide
prominent persons of the stature of former United Nations
Secretary-General,
Kofi Annan, past United States President Jimmy Carter,
and Graca Machel,
wife of the world-revered Nelson Mandela, from visiting
Zimbabwe. Not only
is it blatantly evident that none of them have any
political axe to grind on
Zimbabwe, but also that their intended visit was
wholly and solely intended
to assess the present humanitarian needs in
Zimbabwe, undoubtedly with the
underlying motive of thereafter
facilitating the provision of aid to
address those humanitarian needs.
There can be no credible or
justifiable reason for government to
obstruct and prevent the intended
evaluation of the humanitarian needs
crisis that is prevailing, and
intensifying daily, save and except if
government fears exposure that the
culpability for the inordinately
pronounced humanitarian crisis lies fairly
and squarely with government.
Clearly the governmental hierarchy has so
very much to hide that it
considers it an untenable risk to allow persons of
the stature of Annan,
Carter and Machel to see the factual
circumstances.
Government has long deluded itself that skills of its
Ministry of
Misinformation and Duplicity are of such great magnitude that
Zimbabweans
and the world at large could endlessly be duped into believing
the plethora
of spurious and specious contentions that the circumstances of
the
Zimbabwean people were only minimally as grievous as Zimbabwe's enemies
contend, and that such circumstances are wholly due to the malevolent
intents and actions of those enemies.
But government must have
recognised that if persons of the renown and
integrity of Annan, Carter and
Machel witnessed the realities, and made
those realities internationally
known, the old maxim of "the truth will out"
would materialise. Thereafter,
any governmental denials would be devoid of
any credibility.
Moreover, government's foolhardy action, against the best interests of
the
grievously embattled populace which government is supposed to care for,
cannot achieve government's objective of truth concealment. The calibre of
the trio who intended to visit Zimbabwe in order to see for themselves is
such that they are not so easily deterred. Instead they now intend to
conduct their investigation from South Africa, and they can readily access
authoritative information from the millions of Zimbabweans living there.
Almost all of them are there in order to generate support for their
dependants at home, who are struggling to survive under extreme straitened
circumstances. They will also be able to gather considerable factual and
well-informed information from the Zimbabwean diplomatic corps. In addition,
undoubtedly many of the non-governmental organisations (NGOs) operating in
Zimbabwe will send emissaries to brief these three eminent persons of the
harsh facts of Zimbabwean conditions, and of the monolithic humanitarian
crisis that is erupting ever more strongly in the distraught Republic of
Zimbabwe.
Unquestionably the international investigating team will
become aware
that:
l Millions of Zimbabweans barely exist on the
threshold of intense
starvation, malnutrition, ill-health and the
debilitating repercussions of
extreme hunger pangs, and very many are dying
from resultant ill-health. The
primary cause of these disastrous conditions
has been government's
continuous destruction of the economy through massive
mismanagement,
ill-conceived excessive regulation, punitive taxation,
uncontained
corruption, collapsed infrastructure, constant deterrence of
investment,
alienation of the international community, and very much
else.
The consequential pronounced poverty is exacerbated by an equally
pronounced insufficiency of food. Government has reduced agriculture to near
total destruction. Maize production has declined, in eight years, from two
million tonnes to only 500 000 tonnes, which is only marginally more than a
quarter of national need. Similarly distressing production levels apply to
other key crops, such as wheat.
lThe majority of the employable
population is unemployed within the
formal sector, due to the gargantuan
contraction of that sector in
consequence of the governmental destruction of
the economy.
Instead, those formerly employed in the formal sector, now
strive,
inadequately, to generate some livelihood form informal sector
operations,
ranging from cross-border trading, black marketeering in
currencies and
commodities to much else, including gold panning, illicit
diamond dealing,
and many other crimes. However, these alternative
occupations fail, with
some exceptions, to generate a sufficiency of income
to raise those so
engaged above the poverty datum line (PDL);
lThose circumstances are exacerbated by those in receipt of any
income, no
matter how inadequate, having to support an ever greater number
of
dependants, due to the wide-ranging, poverty, and due to the
repercussions
of HIV and Aids;
lThey are further exacerbated by the hyperinflation
which has soared
to levels of quadrillions percent;
lFew can
access needed medical care, with most hospitals being almost
inoperative
due to mass emigration of doctors, nurses, and other health care
professionals, and with almost all medical equipment being in appalling
disrepair.
Much of the humanitarian aid that has heretofore been
given to
Zimbabwe has either been applied to pursuit of political
objectives, being
distributed only to those favoured for their actual or
promised political
support, or has been diverted for personal gain of a
politically influential
few. These are but a few of the facts that the
international trio will have
become aware of from their visit, and will
undoubtedly still be
comprehensively appraised of, albeit externally of
Zimbabwe.
With usual political duplicity, the Zimbabwean government has
denied
that it has barred the intending visitors from coming to Zimbabwe.
Such
action was denied by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Simbarashe
Mumbengegwi. However, this was clearly nothing but a semantical
interpretation of the terminology "barred from entry", for the hard fact is
that the trio were refused entry visas, on the trumped-up contention that
there had been no prior consultations with government on the "timing and
programme" of the visit.
In other words, government wanted time to
arrange a rigged tour for
the international investigative trio, in order to
mislead and deceive them,
partially refuting allegations of a humanitarian
crisis, and partially
ascribing any humanitarian crisis to the evil
machinations of others, with
government being blameless.
Once again
government has put itself ahead of the needs of the people,
for by
preventing the visit, in order to protect its hallucinatory image,
much aid
which would undoubtedly have been forthcoming to ease the ills of
the
Zimbabweans will now not be forthcoming.
In addition, by its foolhardy
and attempted self-protection action,
government will have further
worsened the economy, for now even more of
the country's grossly
inadequate foreign exchange resources must be applied
to food and other
humanitarian need imports, instead of funding of other
economically
critical imports, and by creating yet another massive blemish
to
Zimbabweans tarnished image, to the prejudice of investment and other
international support.
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008
19:28
ZIMBABWE did not "bar" the Elders trio from coming here, claimed
Foreign minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi on Saturday after they had told
South African media in Johannesburg that they had been refused
admission.
It was not true the group - Kofi Annan, Jimmy Carter, and
Graca
Machel - had been barred, Mumbengegwi said. Their visit had merely
been
"postponed" because Kofi Annan had not made "prior consultations" on
the
"timing and programme" of the visit.
For the record, readers
should know that Jimmy Carter's security team
had been denied visas ahead of
his visit, according to reports in South
Africa. And Thabo Mbeki told the
trio the Zimbabwean authorities would not
issue visas in time for their
visit. This was after his intervention.
But the Zimbabwean authorities
engaged in all sorts of semantics to
justify their refusal to admit the
three. All kinds of daft aspersions were
made as to their motives. The
Sunday Mail allowed an unnamed "local
political commentator" to occupy 18
paragraphs to insult the group with
childish claims that they were
"humanitarian tourists" coming to "certify
the death of Zimbabwe" following
the crash of the local currency.
In particular the "local political
commentator" appears to have taken
exception to their proposed meeting with
women's organisations and
humanitarian and trade union groups, among
others.
"These are people who had the final document in their
briefcase" prior
to their visit, the "commentator" suggested.
If
this "commentator" could be afforded 18 paragraphs to spout his
ridiculous
views, surely he warrants identification? Or does he not have the
courage of
his convictions?
The government had shown willingness to address
the humanitarian
crisis through signing a memorandum of understanding with
the World Food
Programme that will see the WFP assisting with grain imports
worth US$500
million, the "commentator" said.
This followed what
Mumbengegwi claimed was "a thorough humanitarian
audit".
These
claims are of course spurious. It was the UN aid agencies that
conducted the
audit. And it is their efforts that have prevented mass
starvation so far.
The government has done virtually nothing to address the
crisis believing,
as the "commentator" reveals, that it is all part of a
grand conspiracy
against the Zanu PF government.
The Herald carried a similar juvenile
"plot" story on Tuesday.
Now the people of Zimbabwe will be denied
humanitarian relief that the
visit of the Elders would have fast-tracked
into the country.
Donors have been dragging their heels to date but it
was expected aid
flows would increase following the visit of the Elders who
could draw
international attention to the seriousness of the situation. Only
a
high-level visit of this sort could have achieved that.
The
Elders could come once a mutually agreed date had been decided,
Mumbengegwi
said.
So obviously this was not an urgent matter for government. They
were
standing on ceremony and confirming the international community's
impression
of a rogue regime that doesn't give a damn about the fate of its
people.
That is how the story was reported around the world.
What surprises us in all this is the "guilt by association" imputed to
Graca
Machel in Tuesday's Herald. We didn't know until then she was on the
regime's hit list. We can understand them gunning for Annan whom they loathe
and detest because he declined to fall for their Africanist pretensions. Or
even Jimmy Carter who appointed Andrew Young to help bring about Zimbabwe's
Independence in 1977-9 but then, like everybody else, became disillusioned
with Mugabe's excesses.
But Machel: what has she done apart from
humanitarian work for
children in the neighbourhood?
It is a good
indication of the regime's fading appeal that it is
lashing out at African
leaders who no longer apologise for them.
Are they finally getting the
message: that they are an embarrassment
to Africa?
"We take strong
exception to any suggestion that there are those out
there who care more
about the welfare of our people than we do," Mumbengegwi
declared on
Saturday. But isn't that the simple truth: Hasn't this episode
confirmed
just that?
Also revealing was South Africa's announcement on
Thursday that it
would withhold R300 million in agricultural aid until a new
power-sharing
government was in place. The disillusionment in the voices of
South African
government spokesmen was palpable.
"This aid will not
be transferred until such time as a representative
government is in place,"
Themba Maseko told journalists.
"Our major concern is that we missed
the planting season."
This was a loan touted by the government here as
a rescue package.
It will not now be forthcoming. And there were Zanu
PF apologists
suggesting that the party's do-nothing, say-nothing strategy
was an act of
cunning statecraft when compared to the MDC's noise. Not so
cunning now, it
would seem. There has been a mould-breaking shift in policy
after the Mbeki
era.
Raila Odinga, one of the regime's
favourite betes noir, has broken
ranks with African leaders this week by
calling for international
peacekeepers to be sent to Zimbabwe.
"Because there is no legitimate government in Zimbabwe, the AU should
consider sending a peacekeeping force," Odinga said in a report in the
London Times. "This is what is going to send a strong signal to one Mr
Robert Mugabe."
Odinga was himself a victim of election-rigging,
when President Kibaki
was declared the winner of a disputed poll in Kenya
last year, the paper
pointed out.
"To many African leaders the
situation in Zimbabwe has returned to
normal," Odinga said. "This is because
these leaders carry the same baggage
like Mugabe."
He added:
"Mugabe was a freedom fighter who spent many years in jail,
but I don't
believe that when you are a freedom fighter you acquire a title
deed to own
the nation."
Now watch the government rotweilers bark at him. It will
make a change
from Khama.
We were interested to see Mabasa
Sasa's Herald piece on Monday
lecturing the MDC-T on the need for
accommodation rather than confrontation
when responding to Constitutional
Amendment No 19. There should be no
bellicosity in dealing with a measure
that benefits the MDC-T more than Zanu
PF, we are told.
There is
also a message here that cabinet is the fount of all
authority and there was
no need for the government to negotiate anything
outside what was agreed on
September 15. If the MDC-T wasn't careful,
especially in trying to
renegotiate the agreement, they could find their
draft "dying a quiet and
ignomious death".
This is the tenor of remarks coming from ruling-party
propagandists
that we have seen in recent months and indeed this piece bears
more than a
passing resemblance to Manheru's recent contributions to the
Herald
including the salacious references.
The MDC-T needs to
remind Zanu PF publicists that the September 15
agreement was not a gift
from a generous government but the price of
electoral defeat. While Mugabe's
coterie may be in denial about this,
pretending they could all make a
glorious come-back the next time - as if
the nation is begging to
be
punished again! - the truth is that Zanu PF is a dead-beat party
that
needs the agreement to hang on to power.
The MDC-T is wisely
exercising caution in granting this lease on life.
The last thing it needs
to listen to are the pompous lectures of political
failures who think they
can educate the party in political manners.
We heard all this preaching
when Mugabe got a ringing reception in
parliament a few months ago. "How
shocking," all his acolytes chimed. "They
need to learn appropriate public
deportment."
The MDC-T has nothing to learn from Zanu PF. That includes
suspect
dossiers being hawked around the region that Sadc leaders have seen
before.
We can hear their yawns from here.
Does anybody recall the
Cain Nkala affair? What happened to that
investigation, who got accused of
promoting terror, and what was the outcome
in court?
The Pan
Africanist Congress, which has been steadily losing support in
South African
elections because of its endless internecine squabbling, has
been expressing
solidarity with another bunch of losers, Zanu PF.
A representative of
the party, Mziwake Dlamini, told the Voice that
"Having gone through a
struggle, President Mugabe and Zanu PF are fully
aware that Zimbabwe did not
come on a silver platter, so whatever decision
they make is good for the
country as they would not want to see Zimbabwe
being colonised," he said.
"Zimbabweans should cherish the leadership of
President Mugabe as he has
shown he has the people at heart."
The paper is at least good for a
laugh!
It also contains amusing little contributions by old-guard
Stalinists
whose views are headed "Let's accept SSC as guiding
star".
Those not familiar with this particular "guiding star" may be
fascinated to know that SSC stands for Scientific Socialism and
Communism.
Would you believe that in 2008 Zanu PF is still churning out
this
antediluvian sludge?
It is not difficult to understand
that situated in the midst of this
putrid propaganda is Tafataona Mahoso who
has a regular column in which he
claims "Journalists (are) misleading people
on economic turnaround".
He doesn't mention what misleading he is doing
but here is an example:
"The value of the inter-party talks is that the
people have refused to fall
into the violent struggle which the sanctions
were meant to trigger.
Otherwise we are at war. And even after Sadc and the
AU endorse a
settlement, the original instigators of the MDC formations and
of sanctions
may want to keep the sanctions on. The people and the state
should be
prepared for such a possibility."
He is right. If Zanu PF
continues to be driven by a reactionary clique
around Mugabe that persists
in adopting policies that thwart recovery and
further damage the economy,
and with it people's livelihoods, then there is
every likelihood that the US
and EU will refuse to lift sanctions.
The people are only too
aware of the danger of Mahoso's party hanging onto power which is why
they
voted to throw the whole rotten bunch out in the March election.
Mahoso
uses "the people" as some sort of weapon but blithely ignores
the fact that
the people spoke in March and it was to say to hell with the
sort of views
Mahoso and his ilk are trying to perpetuate.
Harare mayor Much
Masunda is no doubt struggling with a multiplicity
of problems at Town
House. But he should have one of his officials
investigate the rubbish
collection department.
Last week a City of Harare garbage collection
truck drove into Milton
Park and proceeded to collect rubbish from outside a
Chinese restaurant. It
ignored the bags situated outside homes in the area
and drove off having
fulfilled its singular task. Meanwhile, the bags are
still lying around and
haven't been collected for weeks. City of Harare
rubbish collectors have
made it clear to residents of the area: If you want
your rubbish collected
you must pay us.
So what are the rates
for?
The Herald on Wednesday carried a front-page story on how Zesa
was now
accepting cheques following calls by Gideon Gono for public-sector
service
providers to do so.
"Zesa U-turn on cheques" the story was
headed.
The trouble is this was not true. They were, as of Wednesday
afternoon, still refusing to accept cheques at their headquarters on Samora
Machel.
Customers were told tellers were yet to receive a directive
from their
managers. People trying to pay by cheque were turned
away.
The Herald published an internal memo dated November 25 from Zesa
acting group CEO ET Chikwenhere to the head of the Zimbabwe Electricity
Transmission and Distribution Co, which is responsible for billing,
instructing his staff to accept cheques.
But on Wednesday Zesa
staff were refusing to obey both their own CEO
and the governor of the
Reserve Bank!
Only yesterday did they start accepting cheques, and
these had to be
for the exact amount, not future estimates. Clearly, Gono's
word is not Zesa's
command!
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/
Thursday, 27 November 2008 19:24
THE
government of President Mugabe is haunted by two issues, that of
legitimacy
and that of being found to be in the wrong.
The two issues once
again instructed the state's decision to block the
visit to Zimbabwe by
three members of a team of Elders led by former UN
secretary-general Kofi
Annan.
Government spin-doctor went into a spin this week to justify the
decision not to let in the team which wanted to assess the extent of the
humanitarian needs in the country. The visit had been "postponed" because
the team had not made adequate consultations with the Zimbabwean
authorities, was the main reason proffered. The truth was however soon
apparent. The Zanu PF government feared that a "damning report was in the
offing" from the team. Such a report was part of a regime-change agenda by
the United States and Britain.
This is the major source of our
predicament. The rulers of this land
have clung to the self-fulfilling
belief that all the ills bedevilling the
country have been caused by
exogenous factors mooted by evil conspirators in
the West. Zanu PF
politicians are afraid of losing power and the opportunity
of gorging
royally at the trough. It is important to remind President Mugabe
and his
cohorts that Zimbabweans do not need a visit by the Elders to
pronounce a
low score on the Zanu PF government.
The average Zimbabwean today knows
that this country is led by
flunkers whose handiwork is evident in the
humanitarian crisis that has
befallen this nation. The government is so much
afraid of international
condemnation as if it expects sympathy from its
long-suffering citizens. We
are fed up with the regime's stubborn
delinquency in attending to the huge
crisis facing us. Zimbabweans are not
interested in the regime's ability to
score points against the West. They
are not interested in the tired mantras
of nationalism and sovereignty. They
want food. They want to access their
salaries from the bank without
inhibition. They want efficient and
affordable service in hospitals. They
want to remove the obstacles
preventing them from having a decent way of
life. They want regime change
yesterday as confirmed by the March elections
results.
So it is insulting to the intellect of Zimbabwean who voted
against
Mugabe in March to suggest that the regime-change agenda is a
foreign
project. It is a Zimbabwean process which has been given fresh
impetus by
the failure of the state to expeditiously contain the deadly
cholera
pandemic wreaking havoc in Harare's southern suburbs and large parts
of
Mashonaland Central.
The regime's failure to provide Harare and
other urban centres with
clean potable water has resulted in this medieval
disease haunting us in
modern times. How embarrassing for a regime that
credits itself for taking
"strides in providing healthcare".
Treatment centres which have been set up to cater for cholera victims
do not
have adequate drugs. At times, the centres have turned away patients
because
of inadequate supplies of basics like gloves, buckets and
ingredients to
makes the salt/sugar solution. Aid agencies have come in
handy to provide
water, bedding and drugs but the problem requires greater
mobilisation of
resources.
There is all the evidence that the government does not have
the
resources to contain the outbreak. The country has no capacity to feed
itself, care for the elderly and young children.
Poor healthcare
and a failing social security system have seen the
life expectancy of women
dropping from 60 to just 34 in an 18-year period.
Men are expected to live
to the age of 37. There is a rapid increase of
child mortality due to
breakdowns at referral hospitals. According to the
2007-2008 United Nations
Development Programme Human Development Report
Zimbabwe has fared badly in
almost all key human development indicators.
There is ample evidence of a
sharp decline in lifestyles. We are getting
poorer daily.
Zimbabwe
needs help urgently yet our leaders don't appear to mind the
country losing
lives daily in the name of safeguarding national sovereignty.
The Elders'
visit was an opportunity for the state to harness more resources
from the
international community to save our desperate situation. There is
nothing
embarrassing about it because there is an international appeal
already out
for assistance. But donors have been lethargic relative to the
needs on the
ground. On the other hand, Zanu PF is bereft of any plan to
rescue the
situation other than shouting for the lifting of sanctions.
There is
such a thing as a failed state and Zimbabwe today can safely
be called one.
President Mugabe's bag of tricks is fast emptying. In the
past three years,
he thought he had a plan but this has failed as well. It
went like this:
"Where money for projects has not been found, we will print
it."
Can he print money to fight cholera, hunger and poverty stalking the
nation?
Not any more. His time is up. He must go.
By Vincent
Kahiya