[ This report does not
necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]
HARARE, 28 Nov
2005 (IRIN) - The two factions of the Zimbabwean opposition
Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) could engage in a war of attrition over
the
ownership of the organisation's name and assets, some party office
bearers
are predicting.
After most voters responded to Tsvangirai's call to
boycott the weekend
senate elections, MDC officials said the factions were
positioning
themselves to wrest control of the party's assets.
Except
for Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second city, where pro-senate faction
candidates
swept all the seats, other MDC strongholds, like the capital,
Harare, and
Matabeleland North and South provinces, heeded Tsvangirai's call
to boycott
the elections.
Even in one of the constituencies in Bulawayo with a
registered 75,000
voters, the winning MDC candidate managed just under 2,000
votes.
On Monday the ruling ZANU-PF seemed set to win an overwhelming
majority,
bagging 21 out of the 31 contested seats in the results declared
so far,
while the rift in the MDC deepened.
The MDC's pro-senate
faction announced that vice-president Gibson Sibanda
had suspended
Tsvangirai last week on Thursday, after a disciplinary
committee found him
guilty of violating the party's constitution by issuing
a call to boycott
the poll.
Ironically, Sibanda chairs the disciplinary committee of the
MDC. "Mr
Tsvangirai is suspended from performing any functions as MDC leader
and will
not be allowed to hold meetings under the MDC banner. He has also
been
barred from visiting MDC offices, including Harvest House [the party's
headquarters] and is to surrender all MDC property except two vehicles
issued for his personal use," Sibanda told journalists.
Tsvangirai
told IRIN on Sunday that his suspension was unconstitutional.
"The attempt
to suspend me is an unfortunate disaster by my colleagues in
the struggle.
Their actions indicate that they are desperate for power and
... will only
play into the hands of the government, which wants to see the
MDC weak and
divided."
Tsvangirai said only the party's congress, expected to be held
in February,
had the power to suspend him.
However, Gift Chimanikire,
the MDC's deputy secretary-general, who is in the
pro-senate camp, said the
disciplinary committee could suspend anybody,
including the president.
"Nobody is above the law, and we will not allow
another dictator to emerge
from our ranks," he asserted.
Senior MDC officials in the pro-senate camp
told IRIN that if Tsvangirai did
not abide by the terms of the suspension,
they would seek relief in court.
"We are simply going to ask for the
protection of the courts if Tsvangirai
does not abide by the
suspension."
There is a perception among political observers that the
judges, some of
whom are sympathetic to the ruling party, would grant the
use of the party's
name and emblem to the less popular pro-senate faction to
further
destabilise the opposition.
Hundreds of MDC supporters in
Harare thronged Harvest House on Monday saying
they wanted to ensure that
Tsvangirai was not hindered from working there.
Some told IRIN that the
pro-senate faction would not be allowed to set foot
at the Harare
offices.
[ENDS]
[ This report does not
necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]
JOHANNESBURG, 28
Nov 2005 (IRIN) - Zimbabwe's National Association of NGOs
(NANGO) has called
on the International Criminal Court (ICC) to prosecute
government officials
responsible for the country's controversial urban
clean-up campaign five
months ago.
UN special envoy Anna Tibaijuka visited Zimbabwe in July to
assess the
aftermath of campaign, which began in May 2005, and compiled a
scathing
report that called on the government to punish those who, "with
indifference
to human suffering" had carried out the evictions and
subsequent destruction
of homes and informal markets.
The envoy, also
the director of UN-HABITAT, labelled Operation Murambatsvina
a "breach of
both national and international human rights law provisions
guiding
evictions". NANGO wants Tibaijuka's report to be implemented, and
the
perpetrators brought to book.
The ICC, unlike the International Court of
Justice, can try individuals and
investigate crimes, such as drug
trafficking and genocide, referred to it by
governments as well as the UN
Security Council.
Rejecting the NGOs' call, Public Service, Labour and
Social Welfare Minister
Nicholas Goche said the government was not going to
arrest anyone for
pursuing a national programme.
"Like those
international organisations that want to say we committed a
crime against
humanity by destroying illegal, degrading and inhumane
shelters, local
organisations demanding spurious prosecutions know that they
are fooling
themselves. It is funny that no one is saying anything about the
follow-up
housing programme that has already borne so much fruit," Goche
said.
NANGO spokesman Fambirai Ngirande told IRIN that the NGOs were
also
concerned about the growing needs and sense of insecurity of the
clean-up
campaign victims still in transit camps.
Over 700,000 people
were displaced in the operation that was part of the
government's urban
renewal programme, which critics have claimed was a
poorly planned,
pre-emptive security-led strike against the disgruntled
urban population,
carried out amid fears of a post-election uprising against
government.
"Organisations are not allowed free access to the
affected people - it is
very difficult for anyone to state their exact
needs. Besides, there is a
lot of ongoing police-enforced movement of people
from one transit camp to
another. As a result, people are not secure at
all," Ngirande told IRIN.
In a statement, NANGO welcomed the Zimbabwean
government's recent acceptance
of UN assistance in providing shelter, food
and basic needs to those
affected by the clean-up exercise.
The
Bulawayo-based NGO, Christians Together for Justice and Peace (CTJP),
has
also voiced an appeal for those affected by Operation Murambatsvina. The
organisation called on the government to address the problems of
homelessness, poverty and unemployment, and implored all churches to provide
support to the poor and the victims of political abuse, in defiance of
government restrictions.
Relations between government and NGOs have
deteriorated since the
announcement of a new policy last month, which makes
it mandatory for all
NGOs to apply to their respective provincial governor's
office for
permission to operate. NANGO has ordered its members to ignore
the policy,
seen as an interim measure until the controversial NGO bill of
2004 is
approved.
The bill, which will ban the activities of
organisations involved in human
rights and civic education campaigns, also
outlaws foreign funding of NGOs,
and would subject NGOs to strict vetting by
a committee appointed by the
government, with minimal NGO
representation.
The bill was passed by parliament late in 2004 but
President Robert Mugabe
has refused to sign it into law and referred it back
to parliament for
further discussion.
NANGO has argued that its
members were not consulted about the new policy
and said it would ignore the
directive until the government had canvassed it
with the affected
organisations.
Goche denied that government had come up with an
alternative policy to the
bill, saying it had only drawn up interim
guidelines to supervise aid
distribution while final amendments were made to
sections of the NGO bill.
"In the meantime, all organisations are
encouraged to co-operate with their
relevant governors. The policy is not
meant to sideline anyone, but to
ensure accountability among NGOs so they
can remain true to their stated
agendas," Goche told IRIN. "Those with clear
agendas should not complain
when supervisors come around."
[ENDS]
NASDAQ
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP)--A farmers' support group Monday
called on Zimbabwe
authorities to take swift action to end lawlessness in
rural areas after the
gruesome weekend slaying of a white dairy
farmer.
Intruders strangled Don Stuart and torched his body and his
homestead with
gasoline siphoned from farm vehicles in an attack on his
property 30
kilometers southwest of Harare early Sunday, the Justice for
Agriculture
Trust said.
"The Trust finds the nature of this killing
particularly abhorrent at this
time of Zimbabwe's acute humanitarian food
plight and foreign currency
shortages," it said in a statement which
described Stuart as "another of
Zimbabwe's few remaining productive
commercial farmers."
Police said the attack was under
investigation.
The support group said Stuart's death underscored what it
called "the abject
breakdown of the rule of law in commercial farming
areas." Few items
appeared to have been stolen from the dairy, horticulture
and vegetable farm
in the Norton district.
About 20 white farmers
have died in an often violent campaign to seize some
5, 000 white-owned
farms since 2000 in a program launched by President
Robert Mugabe
purportedly to correct imbalances in colonial era land
ownership.
Less than 250 white farmers are still running productive
farms. According to
Justice for Agriculture, about another 60 have been
driven off their land in
the past three months as land confiscations were
stepped up after a lull.
A week ago, a Danish-owned dairy farm south of
Harare was ordered to
surrender part of its land to a High Court judge, a
businessman and a group
of black settlers.
Humanitarian agencies
estimate about a third of the population of 12 million
are currently in need
of food aid in Zimbabwe, once a regional breadbasket.
Disruptions in the
agriculture-based economy have been blamed for acute
shortages of food, hard
currency, gasoline and essential imports as the
nation faces its worst
economic crisis since independence in 1980.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
CNN
Monday,
November 28, 2005; Posted: 11:44 a.m. EST (16:44 GMT)
President
Robert Mugabe's party has taken a near 90 percent majority in the
66-seat
Senate.
HARARE, Zimbabwe (Reuters) -- President Robert Mugabe tightened
his grip on
Zimbabwe on Monday with victory in a Senate poll seen by critics
as a mere
formality, but analysts say low voter turnout showed deepening
dissatisfaction with his 25-year rule.
Mugabe's ruling Zimbabwe
African National Union-Patriotic Front party went
into Saturday's elections
for a new upper chamber of parliament a certain
winner, thanks to an
opposition boycott in many constituencies and electoral
laws that reserve
seats for loyalists such as tribal chiefs.
Final results announced Monday
showed the ruling party won 24 of the 31
seats that were up for grabs
against seven for the main opposition, giving
it a near 90 percent majority
in the 66-seat Senate that will have the final
word on any new
laws.
But analysts say that despite this victory, the government had been
embarrassed and Mugabe's own credibility hurt by a voter turnout of 10
percent after a boycott campaign by the main opposition leader, Morgan
Tsvangirai.
"The government's confidence has been shaken ... and
there will be many
people in his camp who will be looking at this as a sign
that they are
isolated and are losing support," said Eldred Masunungure, a
leading
political commentator.
"What this might do is to undermine
their loyalty to Mugabe and ZANU-PF, and
although we might not see public
desertions, some of his lieutenants will be
wary of taking open positions
against the opposition," he said.
Tsvangirai, whose opposition Movement
for Democratic Change split into two
bitter factions over the November 26
polls, claims most Zimbabweans believed
it was pointless to "continue taking
part in fake elections."
The MDC chief ordered a boycott, saying
participation would lend legitimacy
to a government that routinely rigs
votes.
But a rival MDC faction said Tsvangirai had lost an internal vote
on the
issue and took part in the polls, fielding 26 candidates and winning
seven
seats.
Analysts say the low turnout reflected some support for
Tsvangirai's MDC
faction, but mostly growing voter cynicism and fatigue
after a string of
major elections that have brought no change in Zimbabwe's
fortunes.
"I don't think this is essentially an endorsement of Tsvangirai
as a leader,
but a reflection of the national mood," said one southern
African diplomat.
"I think this is more of an indictment against the
current government of
Zimbabwe and against President Mugabe," he
said.
A senior government minister dismissed claims that voters had
backed
Tsvangirai by boycotting the poll or that Mugabe's credibility had
been
dented, saying many had stayed away because it was not seen as a
decisive
election.
"It's not so much a matter of how many people have
voted in that election.
It's about how it was run, it's about whether they
were incident- and
violence-free, which is what this election was about,"
said Chen
Chimutengwende, a Cabinet minister in charge of government public
relations.
The MDC was formed in 1999 by trade union officials led by
Tsvangirai,
student leaders and human rights activists, who accuse Mugabe of
ruining one
of Africa's strongest economies.
The party says it would
have won elections held in recent years if Mugabe
had not rigged the
votes.
Mugabe insists he and his party won fairly, and dismisses the MDC
as a pawn
of former colonial power Britain and other Western critics of his
government.
Political analysts say that although the MDC remains the
most serious threat
to Mugabe's rule, the party has been weakened by years
of infighting over
strategy and voter apathy.
News24
28/11/2005 16:45 -
(SA)
Harare - Senate polls held in Zimbabwe at the weekend recorded a
historically low voter turnout, said election observers on Monday,
describing it as a silent protest against President Robert Mugabe's
regime.
The average percentage of voters that bothered to cast their
ballots was
less than 30%, the lowest recorded in 25 years, while taking
part at all
split the main opposition party.
Reginald Matchaba-Hove,
head of the respected Zimbabwe elections support
network, said: "It's a very
low voter turnout.
"We believe this is the lowest turnout ever polled in
Zimbabwe... it's the
lowest ever recorded from 1980.
"This clearly
implies a protest vote by Zimbabweans against the status
quo."
Over-dominance of one party
But, analysts expressed concern
that the low turnout effectively helped
Mugabe, 81, cement his grip on power
on the southern African country he had
led since independence from Britain
in 1980.
Matchaba-Hove said it "effectively entrenches the over-dominance
of one
party".
The ZESN also attributed the dismal turnout of as low
as 16% in some parts
of the country, to "dwindling interest in the integrity
of the ballot, the
economic hardships and the political crisis".
At
least 80% of Zimbabweans lived under the poverty threshold, more than 70%
were jobless, inflation was more than 400% and aid agencies estimated that
some 4.3 million people in the 13-million population needed food assistance
this year.
Party elections spokesperson Webster Shamu said the ruling
Zimbabwe African
National Union Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF) said elections
"have once again
demonstrated that the people of Zimbabwe can't be bought or
sold; they have
matured in their pursuit of democracy".
Divided MDC
Zanu-PF won 42 of the 50 contested seats to the upper house of
the country's
parliament, with the results of two seats outstanding.
The opposition
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) went to the polls
bitterly divided -
one faction behind participation in the elections and
another headed by MDC
leader Morgan Tsvangirai advocating a boycott.
The MDC garnered only six
seats.
MDC vice-president Gibson Sibanda said a party national
disciplinary
committee resolved to suspend Tsvangirai from his position as
president with
"immediate effect".
Tsvangirai was barred from
visiting any of the party's offices and told to
surrender all party property
in his possession.
In response he said the "attempt to suspend" him from
the party leadership
was unfortunate and against MDC rules.
Mugabe's
party went to the polls with 19 of the 50 contested seats in its
bag after
the opposition failed to field candidates in all the seats.
The long-time
leader had the prerogative to appoint six members of the
senate, while
another 10 were traditional chiefs who were known to be
pro-government.
The divisions in the MDC were also seen to have had
an impact on the low
turnout.
News24
28/11/2005 10:06 -
(SA)
Harare - In cash-poor Zimbabwe, where Aids affects one in
five people,
Clever Nyowani is one of the lucky few.
Three years
after he became severely ill, suffering through long bouts of
diarrhoea that
left him weak and walking with an improvised crutch, the
imposing rank
marshal is back on his feet and has regained weight.
"Luckily I have a
sister who travels regularly to Botswana and buys me
anti-retroviral drugs.
Otherwise I could have simply waited to die because I
could have never
afforded the drugs and they are not so easy to get
locally."
With
only 20 000 Zimbabweans living with Aids on life-prolonging
anti-retroviral
(ARV) treatment, Nyowani has had to take an alternate route
to get the
life-prolonging drugs.
After announcing plans to provide free ARVs to 100
000 Zimbabweans by year
end, the government recently acknowledged that it
would not meet its target
because of a foreign currency
shortage.
Cannot afford the drugs
"We were targeting to provide
free ARVs to at least 90 000 HIV-positive
people but due to the shortage of
foreign currency, we are unable to meet
that figure," Obert Mugurungi an
official in the health ministry was quoted
as saying in privately-owned
Daily Mirror.
Last month the state-owned Herald reported that stocks of
the locally
manufactured drugs have dwindled due of shortages of foreign
exchange.
Drug stocks at about 48 public health centres across the
country were not
expected to last until December, according to sources who
attended an
emergency meeting called by the government last month to discuss
the looming
crisis.
Zimbabwe is one of the countries hardest hit by
the HIV and Aids pandemic
with an infection rate of 20% and at least 3 000
people dying weekly from
Aids-related illness - or about one person every
three minutes - according
to the National Aids Council.
"Many people
are trying herbal medicines while others are just waiting to
die because
they can't get ARVs," Angeline Chiwatani, spokesperson for
Network for
HIV-positive Women in Zimbabwe, told AFP.
"Because of lack of foreign
currency most hospitals have run out of ARVs and
it's a dangerous
situation."
"We are advising people not to start taking ARVs because
there is a risk of
drug resistance if they take the drugs and later stop
because the drugs are
no longer available.
"ARV treatment is supposed
to be uninterrupted for life," said Chiwatani.
Opposition lawmaker
Blessing Chebundo, who chairs a parliamentary committee
on health said fewer
than 20 000 people were receiving ARVs out of an
estimated 300 000 people in
need of the life-prolonging drugs.
"On World Aids Day, we should be
mourning the loss of lives that could have
been prevented or at least
delayed if drugs were available," Chebundo told
AFP.
About 90% of
people in full-blown Aids do not have access to anti-retroviral
drugs,
according to UNAids and the World Health Organization.
The majority of
the people infected by HIV get their supplies of drugs from
government
hospitals or clinics.
Daily Mirror, Zimbabwe
Givemore Nyanhi
issue date :2005-Nov-29
THE Zimbabwe
dollar weakened against the major US$ by about 5.9 percent last
week to
close on Friday at $68 802. 86 compared to $64 961.86 the previous
Friday
allowing the exchange rate to creep closer to the higher parallel
market
rates.
In the prior week, the dollar slid by some 6,8 percentage points
against the
US$ and that means the local currency has depreciated by more
than 12
percent in the last fortnight.
As a result of the movement of the
exchange rate on the inter-bank system in
the last fortnight the Zimdollar
moved closer to the parallel market rates
where the dollar is trading at
between $75 000 and $80 000.
The inter-bank mid rate represents the average
rate of exchange that the
country's banks arrive at in their foreign
currency trading amongst
themselves.
The significant movement in the
exchange rate is in line with October
monthly inflation trends that shot up
by some 10.9 percent compared to the
previous months.
However, foreign
currency dealers in most financial houses gave cautious
views on the
performance of the exchange rate in the past fortnight, saying
they did not
expect it to depreciate much further and catch up with the
parallel market
in the short term as this would have adverse implications on
the country's
import requirements.
Zimbabwe has been facing acute foreign currency
shortages for the greater
part of the year that has resulted in critical
sectors of the economy in
manufacturing and agriculture failing to import
inputs and spares for
maintenance and repairs.
These factors have
contributed to reduced national production and while the
central bank's
drive to promote the export sector to improve foreign
currency receipts into
the country has been lauded, the costs of importation
would curtail
production should the exchange rate catch up with the parallel
market.
The major reason behind the depreciation of the local currency
against the
US dollar and other major currencies is mainly the higher
inflation figures
reported for October.
Inflation figures for October saw
the month-on-month rate of inflation
increase by 10.9 percent.
Annual
inflation increased by 51.2 percent to 411 percent compared to 359
percent
previously.
Taking a cue from the central bank's stance on monthly inflation
outturns in
recent months the central bank has been explicit in its efforts
to align
inflation differentials to the exchange rate.
As a result, in
previous months when monthly inflation has increased, the
central bank has
also adjusted the exchange rate upwards to maintain
purchasing power
parity.
This was true for the months of June, July and August when the
exchange rate
was adjusted in line with negative monthly inflation figures
from around $17
500, $24 000 and $26 000 respectively to the US dollar on
the official
foreign currency market.
According to central bank governor
Gideon Gono, the adjustments were at the
behest of business and the private
sector in order to keep pace with
negative inflation out turns in those and
other months.
In addition Gono has, on a number of occasions, increasingly
made it public
that the central bank would make sure that the exchange rate
would keep pace
with inflation.
The significant depreciation of the
dollar and its movement closer to the
parallel rate is expected to attract
more people and organisations to bring
their foreign currency to the formal
market and deal a gradual blow to the
black market.
By Tichaona
Sibanda
28 November 2005
The chairman of the MDC in
the UK, Washington Ali said the majority of
party activists in the diaspora
fully support the decision taken by Morgan
Tsvangirai to boycott the senate
elections.
This was part of Ali's message to activists who braved
sub-zero
temperatures in central London for an all night vigil last week
Friday. He
also stressed the need for unity in the struggle for
change.
Activists in the UK believe the elections were
pre-determined because
of the unlevel electoral playing field. They said the
party should be
concentrating on bread and butter issues particularly the
humanitarian
crisis caused by Operation Murambatsvina.
Other
speakers at the vigil urged activists not to be distracted by
personalities.
Ephraim Tapa, chairman of the MDC London branch said the MDC
would solve its
internal differences and tackle Robert Mugabe and his Zanu
(PF)
head-on.
He said the Senate project was illegitimate and rejected
the argument
that by not participating the MDC was ceding democratic space,
adding that
energies should be going into finding other ways to achieve
change.
It was evident that the grass roots in Zimbabwe were
against
participating in the Senate elections. Activists from Dunfermline,
Rochdale,
Sheffield, Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, Leicester plus many
from
London and South East England attended the all night
vigil.
SW Radio Africa Zimbabwe news
28 November
2005
By Tererai Karimakwenda
On the day that low voter
turn-out characterised Zimbabwe's
controversial senate elections, proving
that people did not want a 2nd
chamber of government, the pro-senate faction
of the now split opposition
did not seem bothered, as they moved swiftly to
try and take disciplinary
action against the party president Morgan
Tsvangirai. A letter sent to
Tsvangirai by vice president Gibson Sibanda
said a disciplinary committee
had suspended the opposition leader Tsvangirai
for violating the party's
constitution, campaigning against the polls and
misrepresenting the party's
position on the polls, among others.
Pro-senate spokesman Moses Mzila Ndhlovu told us Monday that there is
only
one MDC and it is functioning from Harvest House. Asked if they had
access
to the Harare headquarters, Ndhlovu said some youth hired by
Tsvangirai had
assaulted their staff and hounded them out of the building.
As for the
committee that suspended Tsvangirai, Ndhlovu said it was properly
composed
according to the constitution and is chaired by MDC vice president
Gibson
Sibanda himself. Asked whether it was proper for Tsvangirai's
accusers to
sit on the committee as well, Ndhlovu said he saw nothing wrong
with a legal
institution of the MDC performing its functions.
As for the coming
congress, Mzila-Ndhlovu said the people will choose
new leaders and those
who violated the constitution or are guilty of any
infringements will not be
welcome. He said fugitives are not welcome and
Tsvnagirai was definitely a
fugitive.
SW Radio Africa Zimbabwe news
Centre for Security Studies, Switzerland
The international community has criticized Zimbabwe of
failing to heed its
recommendations as Washington slaps new sanctions on the
Mugabe government
in the wake of "Operation Drive out the Rubbish", in which
police razed
thousands of homes and small businesses, leaving hundreds of
thousands
without shelter or livelihood.
By Theodore Liasi for ISN
Security Watch (28/11/05)
Zimbabwe is being accused of reneging on
international agreements and
failing to respect the recommendations of
international treaty bodies.
The UN is holding the government of Zimbabwe
responsible for the
humanitarian disaster that has followed Operation
Murambatsvina - or
Operation "Drive out the rubbish" - claiming that the
operation was carried
out in an "indiscriminate and unjustified manner, with
indifference to human
suffering and, in repeated cases, with disregard to
several provisions of
national and international legal
frameworks".
Operation Murambatsvina is estimated to have affected some
700,000 people
earlier this year when police and soldiers razed thousands of
homes and
small businesses, leaving people in cities across the country
without
shelter or livelihood, or both.
Zimbabwean nongovernmental
organizations (NGOs) have appealed to the African
Union's (AU) human rights
body to help the hundreds of thousands of people
left homeless by the
government's recent campaign.
As the leaders of the Commonwealth nations
meet in Malta this week for their
twice-yearly gathering, the Human Rights
Forum has urged leaders to stay
engaged with the government of
Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe was suspended from the Commonwealth in 2002 after
elections that
observers said were marred by violence and
intimidation.
In December 2003, the suspension was extended indefinitely.
The Zimbabwean
government responded by announcing the country was leaving
the Commonwealth
for good.
However, the Zimbabwean Human Rights Forum
(HRF) has asked that the
Commonwealth "continue dialog with the Zimbabwean
government - as occurred
during the suspension/withdrawal periods in Nigeria
and South Africa - and
not to abandon the people of Zimbabwe".
In a
special report by the HRF detailing the forced evictions of supporters
of
the Movement for Democratic Change party (MDC), the Forum said it had
received disturbing reports from all around the country.
HRF said
that although many of those reports had come from partisan sources,
the
allegations of violence and denial of food aid were "remarkably
consistent"
with the reports of threats made prior to the recent
parliamentary elections
in March.
A spokeswoman for the HRF, a coalition of 17 Zimababwean NGOs,
said the
group was asking the AU's African Commission on Human and Peoples'
Rights
(ACHPR), which is in session in Gambia, to champion the cause of
those
affected by Operation Murambatsvina, claiming it was a "humanitarian
disaster".
HRF told ISN Security Watch that many of the thousands of
displaced people
were still being persecuted by the local authorities. "What
we know for sure
is that the people evicted are still being harassed by
police and there are
repeated attempts to disperse them.
"It will
take several years before the people affected and the society as a
whole can
recover. We therefore need to keep human rights violations in
Zimbabwe on
the agenda."
Bahame Tom Nyanduga, an ACHPR representative and special
rapporteur
responsible for refugees, asylum seekers, and internally
displaced persons
in Africa, attempted to gauge the impact of the operation
in July, but had
to leave the country without completing his mission after
his visit was
described by Zimbabwe's official media as "unprocedural"
because diplomatic
protocol had reportedly not been followed.
Early
this month, several hundred trade unionists and members of the
National
Constitutional Assembly, a pro-democracy civic alliance, were
arrested for
holding an anti-poverty demonstration.
"As the Zimbabwean crisis extends
into another year, the absence of national
dialog remains a deeply
disturbing feature of the political landscape [.] It
appears highly unlikely
that internal opposition forces will, in the near
future, be able to build
sufficient pressure to force [the ruling Zimbabwe
African National Union and
the Patriotic Front parties] ZANU-PF into a
political compromise," the HRF
report observed.
Human rights group Amnesty International has also called
for Zimbabwe's
government to implement the recommendations contained in the
reports of the
ACHPR and the UN Special Envoy on Human Settlement Issues, as
a "matter of
urgency".
Amnesty condemned the refusal of the
government to cooperate with the
special envoy of the African Union
Commission and for the immediate lifting
of all unnecessary restrictions on
the provision of humanitarian assistance,
including restrictions on the
provision of temporary shelter.
On Wednesday, US President George Bush
added further to the pressure on
Mugabe's regime, announcing that he was
targeting the wallets of the leading
government officials in Zimbabwe. Bush
said those who worked with Mugabe
must restore democracy or face further US
sanctions.
The White House announced it had signed an executive order to
block all
property and financial holdings in the US of 128 people and 33
institutions
in Zimbabwe. It also bars US citizens from having financial
dealings with
those entities and individuals.
"This action is not
aimed at the people of Zimbabwe, but rather at those
most responsible for
their plight," White House spokesperson Dana Perino
said in a
statement.
The Human Rights Forum welcomed Bush's intervention, telling
ISN Security
Watch: "We don't take a political stand on such issues, but
there are
certainly a lot of strong feelings. We can only hope."
Bush
had also issued sanctions against President Robert Gabriel Mugabe and
76
other Zimbabwean government officials in an executive order in March
2003.
The new order adds 51 people and applies to their immediate
family members.
It also allows the secretaries of the treasury and state
departments to
expand the list in the future without a presidential
order.
Bush said since he signed the first order, conditions in Zimbabwe
had
continued to deteriorate. "The government continues to suppress
opposition
groups and civil society, undermine the independent media, ignore
decisions
by its courts, and refuse to enter into meaningful negotiations
with other
political actors."
However, one of Mugabe's key ministers
said the executive order would affect
ordinary people more than government
figures.
The US ambassador to Zimbabwe, Christopher Dell, accused
Mugabe's government
of employing "Nazi" tactics to deflect criticism of his
country's worsening
economic crisis.
Dell was quoted in a local
weekly publication on Thursday as saying: "It is
interesting that the
government is using tactics used in Nazi Germany, where
you accuse another
of doing exactly what you are doing as a distraction."
His comments come
after Mugabe had likened Bush and British Prime Minister
Tony Blair to Adolf
Hitler and Benito Mussolini, respectively.
Mugabe has been isolated by
the West over his land-reform policy under which
white-owned farms were
seized and given to landless blacks. His relations
with the West have also
soured over charges of human rights abuses and
vote-rigging.
Theodore Liasi is ISN Security Watch's Special
Correspondent for
Humanitarian Issues. Theodore Liasi is a photojournalist
and writer with
over 14 years of experience covering war-torn countries
around the world. He
is the winner of the Amnesty International
Photojournalist of the Year
award. His work has been published in Newsweek,
the Financial Times, the
Daily Telegraph, and the Sunday Times.