Zim Online
Thursday 12 October
2006
HARARE - Zimbabwe's spy Central
Intelligence Organisation (CIO) this
week began a witch-hunt among Air
Zimbabwe workers to find out moles leaking
what the agency considers
sensitive information to the media and causing
embarrassment to President
Robert Mugabe, sources told ZimOnline.
The sources, who work at the
struggling national airline and did not
want to be named for fear of
victimisation, said chief executive officer
Oscar Madombwe ordered all
workers normally assigned to accompany Mugabe on
his many foreign trips to
present themselves for interviews at the CIO
offices at Hardwick House in
central Harare.
Air Zimbabwe workers under investigation include
engineers, pilots,
flight attendants and security personnel who travel on
presidential flights.
"We are going there in batches of six to be
vetted," said one
employee, who endured several hours of questioning this
week at Hardwick
House.
Another worker who has travelled with
Mugabe said they were being
interrogated on nearly every aspect of their
lives and were required to
provide details of where they stay, who they stay
with, details of all their
friends as well as spouses.
Transport Minister Chris Mushowe, under whose portfolio Air Zimbabwe
falls,
was not immediately available to take questions on the matter, while
his
deputy Hubert Nyanhongo fatly refused to discuss the matter saying he
knew
nothing about it.
Madombwe was also not available for comment and
the CIO said would not
confirm nor deny quizzing Air Zimbabwe workers,
saying it never discusses
its activities with the media as a matter of
policy.
Zimbabwean newspapers have always paid particular attention
to what
goes on during Mugabe's many trips, with insiders travelling with
the
82-year old leader happy to leak some of the juiciest bits.
But some of the information that has been leaked in recent months may
have
caused some embarrassment to the Head of State such as the incident
involving a mis-spelt word on the President's menu card during
flight.
According to the story, flight attendants gave Mugabe's
family menu
cards showing traditional food, the President's
favourite.
There was however an unfortunate typographical error on
one of the
cards that should have read Dovi and Chimukuyu, which means dried
beef meat
cooked in peanut butter - a delicious Zimbabwean
meal.
However, because of a horrendous error in typing, the "v" on
the word
Dovi was replaced with a "d" to form the word "Dodi", which in the
Shona
language means faeces.
And to make matters worse it was
Mugabe's young son Robert Junior who
stumbled on the typographical error and
then alerted the veteran liberation
war leader and the rest of family of the
abnormality.
The CIO is also said to be unhappy about media reports
detailing how
the veteran President has commandeered Air Zimbabwe's only
working long haul
jet for some of his junkets abroad. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Thursday 12 October
2006
MUTARE - On 18 September 1961, United
Nations secretary-general Dag
Hammarskjold was killed in a plane crash in
Zambia, derailing his frantic
efforts to stop the then ravaging civil war in
the Congo.
Hammarskjold, then 56, was on the brink of peacefully
resolving the
Congo conflict. He had responded positively to a request for
UN intervention
from Patrice Lumumba, the country's first post-independence
prime minister
who had been installed a year earlier.
Now, in
the 45 years after the UN chief's life was snuffed out in the
jungles along
the Zambia-Congo border, peace and stability continue to be
elusive in the
Congo, which has since been renamed the Democratic Republic
of the Congo
(DRC).
On the surface, it may appear as if Hammarskjold, a Swedish
national
who took over the UN's top job in 1953, may have died in vain - his
dreams
and aspirations gone to waste. But a closer examination of
developments then
and now paints a different, somewhat less dismal
picture.
"What is clear is that (Hammarskjold's) core ideas remain
highly
relevant in this new international contest," says Kofi Annan, the
outgoing
secretary-general of the UN.
"The challenge for us is
to see how (the ideas) can be adapted to take
account of it," says Annan,
perhaps one of the most qualified individuals to
comment on the
subject.
At the same time, more and more people in the academia,
politics,
business, public service, civil society and the uniformed services
are
enlisting in greater numbers than before to join the peace and conflict
resolution movement in one capacity or another.
This
groundswell of interest on the subject is undoubtedly testimony
to
Hammarskjold's vision and enduring legacy, his supporters assert.
Meanwhile, other proponents of peaceful resolutions to conflicts
attribute
this deepening interest in the subject to the images of horror and
destruction that are now a mainstay of most news programming in the
electronic, print and interactive media.
"We're being bombarded
daily with horror images and reflexively you
suddenly feel you want to do
something about it, anything, to promote peace
and end the suffering," says
one peace activist, a lecturer at Africa
University, the Methodist-related
institution just outside this eastern
border city.
The
lecturer, who declined to be identified, adds: "Just think Darfour
in the
Sudan, ethnic killing in the Great Lakes region of Africa,
diamond-spawned
killings in West Africa or the senseless killings in Iraq
and Chechnya. You
begin to get the picture."
It was, perhaps, with this in mind that
scores of Zimbabwe-based
diplomats, top military officers, heads of
universities, academics, civic
leaders and - inevitably - politicians are
gathered this week at the Africa
University.
In a programme
that kicked off on Monday, these delegates are
attending five days of
presentations, workshops and demonstrations that are
part of the
"Hammarskjold Commemorative Week", sponsored by the Swedish
Embassy and
hosted by the university.
The commemoration is taking place jointly
with "Gender Week" under the
theme, "Peace, Leadership, Gender and
Development in Africa." Said Rukudzo
Murapa, the university's
vice-chancellor: "Peace is a precursor for
develoment and
growth."
First-day discussions began in earnest, participants did
not mince
words, displaying bare knuckle tactics in their presentations in a
packed
lecture theatre in the faculty of theology.
"Peace in
the DRC is non-existent. It remains an unfinished business
and let's all
remember that," asserted Philomena Makolo, a retired diplomat
and UN
official who holds a doctorate degree in public administration.
A
native of the DRC, Makolo is currently a visiting professor at
Africa
University, on leave from the University of Ottawa, Canada, where she
teaches. She has held senior diplomatic postings in several African
countries.
In a no-holds-barred session, Tinaye Chigudu, the
provincial governor
in Manicaland, accused "some developed nations" of
hypocrisy over the peace
and conflict issue.
"They talk loudest
about the need for peace but will be secretly
manufacturing arms and weapons
to distribute to those engaged in the
conflicts. It's sheer
double-standards," he declared.
A trained military officer based in
Zambia during Zimbabwe's
liberation war, Chigudu did not identify the
countries concerned. The
governor described Hammarskjold as a "visionary"
who supported the
liberation of blacks, although he was born to
aristocracy.
Said Chigudu: "Dag Hammarskjold's plane was shot down
to ensure a
bleak future for the blacks of central and southern
Africa.
Hammarskjold took over as the UN's second secretary-general
after his
predecessor, Trygve Lie of Norway, suddenly resigned from the
post. He was
born and grew up in Uppsala, just north of the Swedish capital
Stockholm,
where his father was the provincial governor. He later worked as
a top civil
servant in his government before joining the world
body.
Sten Rylander, the Swedish Ambassador, said: "It is pleasing
to note
that conflict prevention has been at the top of the agenda not only
of the
United Nations, but also of the African Union."
The
ambassador then reeled off sobering statistics on the subject. He
said, for
example, that between 1945, when World War II ended, and the end
of the
1990s, an estimated 30 million people were killed in wars and
conflicts.
Rylander said the majority of those killed were
civilians and, among
these, women and children topping the list. Yet, he
pointed out that the
views of
members of this most victimised group
were rarely sought out or
included when drawing up conflict resolution and
peacekeeping resolutions.
More fireworks are expected as the week
progress with presentations
expected from such illustrious individuals as
General Emmanuel Erskine, a
Ghanaian national who formerly commanded UN
peacekeeping forces in Lebanon
and Cyprus.
Brigadier General S
B Moyo of Zimbabwe's Ministry of Defence and
Siteke Mwale, Zambia's former
foreign minister who has intimate knowledge of
Hammarskjold's work and
leadership, are both expected to make scintillating
presentations, among
other notable delegates.
While the world has changed - for better
or worse - since the death of
Hammarskjold, one gratifying fact remains: the
late UN boss set such high
standards for public duty and service his
successors have conceded that his
is a tough act to emulate. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Thursday 12 October
2006
HARARE - Ruling ZANU PF party thugs
this week reportedly set on fire
three houses belonging to an opposition
candidate in Mudzi district as
violence flared ahead of rural district
council elections set for month-end,
ZimOnline has learnt.
Goodwell Mazarura, who is representing the Movement for Democratic
Change
(MDC) party in the October 28 elections, told ZimOnline on Tuesday
that he
was now sleeping in the open following the attack.
Mudzi, in the
north-east of Zimbabwe, is a stronghold of President
Robert Mugabe's ZANU PF
party.
Mazarura identified some of the arsonists as Maron
Kazingizi, Norman
Chiripanyanga and Alfonse Kapanga, all staunch ZANU PF
supporters in the
area.
The MDC official said the three had
been arrested by the police
earlier this week but were later released in
unclear circumstances.
"I was away at the home of a party colleague
who had been brutally
assaulted earlier that day by ZANU PF
thugs.
"But when I came back, I saw that my three houses were on
fire and I
identified three out of the seven people who ran away when they
saw me," he
said.
Mazarura said property worth about Z$1.5
million was lost in the
blaze.
"It is surprising that those
that I positively identified as being
behind the criminal act were arrested
but released after only three days at
Nyamapanda police station," he
said.
Police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena could not be reached for
comment on
the matter last night. ZANU PF spokesman Nathan Shamuyarira could
also not b
reached for comment on the matter.
But Shamuyarira
has in the past dismissed charges of violence by the
MDC saying the
allegations were trumped up to tarnish the image of the
party.
The MDC and human rights groups have often accused Mugabe of using
violence
to win elections. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Thursday 12 October
2006
HARARE - A Zimbabwe High Court judge
has given state authorities up to
next week to present arguments in
opposition to an application by the
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU)
challenging the deportation and
banning from Zimbabwe of South African trade
unionist, Zwelinzima Vavi.
The ZCTU wants the court to declare null
and void a decision by Home
Affairs Minister Kembo Mohadi and Chief
Immgration Officer Elasto Mugwadi to
declare Vavi persona non
grata.
Mohadi and Mugwadi are opposing the labour union's
application but
Justice Felicitus Chatukuta rejected papers submitted to
court by their
lawyers yesterday saying they were not in order.
Vavi, who is secretary general of South Africa's COSATU workers'
union, was
barred from entering Zimbabwe last May to attend a ZCTU congress
at which
the labour union undertook to engage in street protest to press for
better
pay and living conditions for workers.
Immigration authorities
declared Vavi a threat to security and
permanently banned him from visiting
Zimbabwe.
But Harare lawyer Alec Muchadehama, appearing for the
ZCTU, said Vavi's
deportation was improper because the labour leader was
never served with a
formal deportation order. - ZimOnline
SABC
October 12,
2006, 07:15
National Blood Services Zimbabwe (NBSZ) has stopped blood
supplies to
hospitals after a generator at its complex went up in flames,
Harare's
Herald newspaper reported today.
Its website said the
generator in Harare was used to power refrigerators, 14
cold rooms and
laboratories. The damage to the generator meant staff at NBSZ
were working
manually, increasing the risk of mix-ups that could lead to
patients
receiving blood not properly managed.
As a result, blood supplies to
hospitals and nursing homes were halted. It
was not clear how the
85-kilovolt generator caught fire yesterday.
By late afternoon, officials
were still battling to repair the imported
generator, while others tried to
secure places to store blood specimens.
Officials were still to decide
where to take blood components or products,
which included fresh frozen
plasma and platelets usually given to patients
with such deficiencies in
their blood. Emmanuel Masvikeni, the NBSZ
spokesperson, said the service was
considering taking all of its blood
samples to health institutions where
they would be taken care of.
"Some of the blood should be stored in
temperatures that are minus eight
degrees Celsius and we cannot delay the
relocation or else it will go to
waste," he said. - Sapa
Business Day
Posted to the web on: 10 October 2006
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
GOVERNMENT
was set to seize two more white-owned farms - one of them run by
a church -
to fast-track land reforms to rectify apartheid-era imbalances, a
top land
official said yesterday.
Chief land claims commissioner Tozi Gwanya
said: "The land affairs minister
has signed the notices of expropriation and
they have been sent.
"The owners have 30 days to respond, following which
we will begin
expropriation procedures."
Gwanya said one farm was
near the mining town of Cullinan, where the world's
biggest diamond was
found, and the other in Northern Cape.
"The claimants to the Cullinan
farm are two local families while the local
African Pniel community is
staking claim to the Northern Cape farm, which is
owned by the Evangelical
Lutheran Church of SA," he said.
Gwanya said that negotiations in
both cases had been dragging on for two
years.
He said the state
had offered R520000 in compensation for the 106ha Cullinan
farm while the
owner, OJ Botha, was demanding close to R1m.
The church wanted R70m
for the other property of 25200ha, while the state
has offered R35,5m, which
"was higher than the market rate when the
negotiations began three years
ago", he said.
"The more they delay, the more the land prices go up,"
he said.
The land affairs minister is in the process of finalising four
more
expropriation notices for four more white-owned farms in northern
Limpopo.
Government has set itself a target of settling nearly 7000
rural land claims
before a December 2008 deadline.
Pretoria is
keen to finalise its lands claims and at the same time assure
foreign
investors that it will not be following the same path as
neighbouring
Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe's economy was plunged into crisis when white farms
were seized and
given to landless blacks. Sapa-AFP
Business Day
Posted to the web on: 12 October 2006
Dumisani
Muleya
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Harare
ZIMBABWE
has secured five agreements with Russia on trade, investment and
economic
co- operation worth $300m.
The accords are between "designated"
Russian investment company RusAvia
Trade and the transport and
communications ministry.
In addition, four parastatals - power utility
Zimbabwe Electricity Supply
Authority, Hwange Colliery, the Zimbabwe Tourism
Authority and the Civil
Aviation Authority of Zimbabwe - expect to benefit
from the investments.
The Russian involvement follows similar investments
from Chinese and South
Korean companies in June, giving faint hope to the
fastest shrinking economy
in the world. Inflation was at 1023% this
week.
The country's hostile investment climate, coupled with political
instability
and lawlessness in the form of property rights violations, as
well as
continued shortages of foreign currency, fuel, electricity, spares
and basic
commodities, have deterred foreign direct investment from
traditional
western companies. It is unclear how Russian investors plan to
sidestep
these pitfalls.
The accords follow a visit last week by
a 48-member Russian delegation,
which included 17 journalists, in the
country to ex-plore investment
opportunities.
RusAvia
Trade deals in Russian aviation products, including new and used
aircraft,
helicopters, spare parts and related services. Its parent company
is RusAvia
Group, a group of Russian and western companies involved in the
aviation
business.
The group includes design and production companies, exporters
and companies
related to the Russian aerospace industry.
Zimbabwe is
trying to buy commercial aircraft from Russia to boost its
depleted national
fleet. Government recently ordered several Russian planes
for national
carrier Air Zim- babwe, but the airline's engineers have
rejected the
aircraft, saying they were "flying coffins".
RusAvia director for
external affairs Yury Panchenko said the group of
Russian investors who had
visited Zimbabwe last week would return in a month
to follow up on their
deals.
"We will create a website to tell the Russian business
community about
investment opportunities in Zimbabwe," Panchenko said at the
weekend.
Russians were already working on the expansion of
the Buffalo Range Airport
in the Lowveld for bigger aircraft, he said.
October 10,
2006
VOA,
By voanews
Some money transfer agencies in Harare
conducted business as usual on
Wednesday despite an order earlier this week
from the central bank
cancelling operating licences on grounds that the
firms had been violating
foreign exchange regulations.
Reserve Bank
of Zimbabwe Governor Gideon Gono said Monday that his
institution was
cancelling the licenses of 16 agencies. But employees in
some of the
agencies, contacted by telephone from Washington, said they had
permission
to continue operations until the companies had exhausted appeals
against the
order.
Office staff at Western Union and Fredex in Harare said they were
operating
normally. But Stanbic Bank and the Commercial Bank of Zimbabwe
closed their
agencies.
Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono, also
contacted from Washington, declined
to comment as to whether the central
bank had deferred enforcement of the
order.
Economist and central
bank advisor Eric Bloch told reporter Carole
Gombakomba of VOA's Studio 7
for Zimbabwe that while Gono may have
over-reacted by pulling the licenses
of the transfer agencies, he had seen
no indication that the central bank
order had been rescinded or suspended
pending appeal by the
agencies.
The Zimbabwean
Part One: Forced to
Leave
BY MIKE ROOK
This is the story of two exiles, father and teenage
son, forced to leave
Zimbabwe in March 2006.
I guess the die was cast at
the turn of the Millennium.
It was around that time that Zimbabwe began its
long and painful slide into
perdition. Sinking slowly at first, but soon
destined to plummet into the
abyss with the speed of a lead weight falling
through space.
The cost of living had already started its long climb towards
the stars; and
retrenchments, joblessness and abject poverty had become the
order of the
day.
There were two mortal blows that eventually led to
Zimbabwe's economic
implosion.The first was the extensive and often violent
farm invasions.
These acted as a catalyst for unplanned fast track
appropriation of
lucrative and productive farmland.
The second was the
unscheduled, unbudgeted payouts made to placate angry and
frustrated war
veterans. In almost the blink of an eye the Zimbabwe currency
started to
depreciate against the hard currencies of Europe and America, and
what was a
strong and vibrant economy commenced its plunge into an era of
self-destruction.
The land reform in particular was a contentious issue.
What should have been
a noble cause turned into a fiasco. It was more a
scramble by the rich and
the powerful for the biggest and the best
agricultural enterprises, rather
than a well executed exercise to resettle
and economically empower the
majority of rural Zimbabweans.
With the
value of hindsight critics allege that in fact the rural folk were
subjected
to a gigantic confidence trick in order to curry votes and favour.
It was
unscrupulous political thugs and opportunists posing as hungry
landless
peasants that were responsible for the violent land invasions, and
not the
majority of peace-loving Zimbabweans from the countryside.
This dastardly
act of denigrating rural Zimbabwean was carried out to lend
some credibility
and respectability to the official policy, often denied, of
unlawful and
forced evictions of large scale commercial farmers nationwide.
A punitive
side effect of the unseemly land grab was the adverse effect it
had on the
many companies servicing and supplying the agricultural industry.
The company
that I headed became one of the first of many to suffer serious
collateral
damage. As a result the jobs and livelihoods of myself and my
colleagues
were prematurely demolished. I had been involved in the
production of
farming periodicals since 1979.
Although it was a shocking revelation when
the axe fell, I was not too
concerned as I had received immediate offers of
freelance work. This kept me
busy while at the same time creating additional
earnings to supplement my
pension.
I had a long-standing annuity that had
accumulated over two decades, and
that had been continually topped up by
dual contributions paid in by both
myself and the company. I had a house and
late model car fully paid up.
Under normal circumstances I should have
looked forward to a relaxed happy
secure and trouble free
retirement.
However circumstances were far from normal, as Zimbabwe's
agriculture the
bedrock of the economy, was relentlessly pilloried and taken
apart. Crop
volumes dropped causing basic commodities to become scarcer and
more
expensive, and the large spectre of foreign currency shortages became
more
horrible and scary by the day.
Most citizens including myself failed
to realise that the stage had been set
for an unprecedented economic
collapse unheard of in a peacetime
environment. As 2002 gave way to 2003
Zimbabwe's malaise irrevocably
gathered pace as fast as the quality of life
faded.
It was exceedingly tough for almost everyone. Except of course for the
ruling party hackers and politicos. For those like myself with a child or
children at school, budgeting for the inflated fees became a terrible
financial burden. The words 'disposable income' had disappeared from the
vocabulary.
A frightening aspect of the tottering economy was the
shortage of some
essential drugs and the escalating charges of medical
attention and
prescriptions. Health care was beyond the pockets of most
adults, and
tragically for their babies and elder children.
Average life
expectancy was on a downward trend. Aids fatalities in
particular were on
the increase due to sufferers being unable to either
afford or to find the
medication.
Even those fortunate enough to source the medication through a
non-governmental organisation were losers, because the lack of a proper diet
totally negated the medication's usefulness.
Month on month inflation was
creeping up to a shocking and unbelievable
official figure of one thousand
and two hundred per cent, reminding
terrified Zimbabweans that worse was yet
to come.
There were no queues for the staple food mealie meal or for fuel,
because
neither were available. The long queues for food and fuel had moved
to the
passport offices up and down the country. Every day hundreds of
Zimbabweans
were desperately trying to get out and seek sanctuary elsewhere.
The United
Kingdom and South Africa were choice destinations.
It wasn't
long before the United Kingdom and South Africa were forced to
implement a
closed door policy, imprisoning desperate potential economic
refuges and
asylum seekers in their own country. In fact most of the horses
had bolted
before the stable door was closed, and it is estimated that over
three
million souls made the great escape and are living and working in the
diaspora.
My ability to ride out the storm started to seriously crack in
June 2005.
Income from my informal freelance work had shrunk; and at my
advanced age,
and with the formal unemployment figure running at over ninety
per cent, I
found myself at the end of a cul-de-sac.
To keep my son at
school and meet cost of living expenses I sold my car and
then my house. The
rationale behind such a crucial and momentous decision
was to increase my
capital, and in so doing increase my income from the
additional
interest.
What was desperately needed was more time. My son was in form four
and
writing his Cambridge ordinary level examinations and I was trying to
build
up my media business.
During the September of 2006 my son and I,
there are only the two of us,
moved to a two bed-roomed flat in Harare's
Avenues. We went in on a sixth
months' lease at a monthly rent of Z$30
million.
The end for us came suddenly and brutally January 2006, a month
before the
expiration of my lessees' contract. It was in the form of a
letter in the
post from the estate agent giving us notice. The owner was
selling the
property. Enquiries confirmed that if alternative accommodation
was
available the rent would be pitched at approximately twice the amount
we'd
been paying, around Z$60 million per month. I didn't ask about the
deposit.
As carefully and as many times as I did my sums I found it was
mission
impossible to make income meet expenditure. It was at last time up
and time
to leave. The only silver lining in a black cloud of despair was
that my
son had successfully completed his school curriculum and his school
year.
A few hours before heading for the airport we packed what clothes we
could
into two suitcases. Shortly before the issue of a new Z$100,000 bearer
cheque, my son and I were on our way out of Zimbabwe in search of a new
life - out of Africa.
The Zimbabwean
HARARE -
Zimbabwe's government has announced plans to make national youth
service
training compulsory for all aspiring journalists, a move that has
been
widely condemned by civic and opposition groups.
Deputy Youth minister
Saviour Kasukuwere told State radio weekend that high
school graduates eager
to practise as journalists would be required to
undergo youth training first
to instil them with "patriotism" and what he
called an "unbiased
understanding of the country's history."
But the opposition claims that the
youth groups are basically unarmed
militia that have been used to assault
and intimidate critics of President
Robert Mugabe.
Kasukuwere said
journalists were "misleading international opinion on
Zimbabwe" because they
have not been inculcated with patriotism.
"That is why we need all aspiring
journalists to first undergo this
programme. It also dovetails with the
Chitepo Ideology College we intend to
set up. Its all part of our party's
roadmap," Kasukuwere said. "Journalists
are giving Zimbabwe a bad name; they
are also giving our President a bad
name."
Civic groups said Mugabe was
"attempting a draw an iron curtain" around
Zimbabwe by installing a
sycophantic press that dances to the tune of his
dictatorship.
The main
opposition Movement for Democratic Change called on the government
to
disband the youth training altogether. The opposition blames the groups,
many dressed in green military-style uniforms, of disrupting its meetings
and rallies.
"It is crazy," opposition spokesman Nelson Chamisa said. "It
shows the siege
mentality which is increasingly gripping the government." -
Own
correspondent
The Zimbabwean
CHINHOYI - Bishop Dieter B Scholz
SJ, the new bishop for the Chinhoyi
Diocese, recently gave an interview to a
German Jesuit magazine in which he
said:
"What would have been
unthinkable a few years ago is now happening daily:
families no longer
collect the dead bodies of their loved ones from the
deep-freeze mortuaries.
Since they anticipate this even when bringing the
sick to the hospital they
give false names. .Now and then the corpses are
being burnt and the ashes
buried in a mass grave. They call it a pauper's
burial. But it is no proper
burial at all, and the paupers are not the dead,
but the surviving family
members who somehow try to survive on the
borderline between life and
death.
"Whoever is familiar with the respect given to the dead in traditional
Shona
culture knows that a family by abandoning their dead abandons the past
as
well as the future. Once people turn their backs on the dead they lose
their
very being as a community, and the good relationship between the
living and
the dead, so necessary for the common good, is being
disturbed.
"Of course I feel anger about the suffering which is inflicted
deliberately
on the people of Zimbabwe. This anger is good and necessary. It
gives us the
courage and the energy to act. Whoever always wants to see both
sides of an
evil situation, sitting on the fence, will rarely take decisive
action.
"But we must not allow this anger to embitter us. That anger must not
destroy my inner freedom. Cold rage and a relaxed attitude can well go
together in the same person. My anger must not penetrate that inner space of
my heart which belongs to the people with whom I live and work. And
certainly not that free space which is reserved for God and my relationship
with Him." - In Touch, Jesuit Communications
The Zimbabwean
BY
GRACE KWINJEH
'I know they will not manage or contain a rolling programme of
mass action'
As her little fingers smoothly rubbed the cream all over her
mother's
bruised back, Little Ashely could ask was 'what were these people
thinking?
What were they thinking mama?' Lucia Matibenga had been subjected
to a 20
minute beating and torture by five armed police men. After being
released
from police custody and receiving medical treatment for her
fractured arm,
battered buttocks, and perforated ear, Lucia immediately
hiked home to Gweru
to her daughter, Ashely, aged 7.
The only thing
within Robert Mugabe's power is to delay the revolution -
each beating, each
broken bone, each day spent in police detention has only
strengthened our
resolve to fight the dictatorship to the end.
I, together with others from
the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and
civic groups, joined the
Zimbabwe Congress Trade Unions (ZCTU) in their
demonstration some weeks ago,
in which about 30 of us were arrested and some
severely tortured.
I was
given a public beating at the point of assembly at Construction House,
one
officer held me by the hand while another beat me up with a baton stick,
mostly on my shoulder. I was then taken to an open truck in which they had
already put our deputy secretary for Health, Kerry Kay.
The man who drove
the truck went across to the Anglican Cathedral next to
Parliament Buildings
to talk to two Asian gentlemen whom I suspected to be
Chinese, which was to
be confirmed in a Mail and Guardian article days later
of the deal between
the Zimbabwe and the Chinese aimed at capacity building
the regime to quell
any mass protests.
The Chinese gentlemen wore smart suits and held long-lens
cameras, he spoke
to them briefly then came back and drove us to Harare
Central police
station.
There we found comrades including Raymond
Majongwe, a freelance journalist
and the rest of the members of the ZCTU
General Council already in custody.
We at this point did not know we had
been saved from hell. I say hell
because my arm, often massaged by Kerry,
was painful until the following
night when our fellow protestors - the rest
of the ZCTU leadership, MDC's
Ian Makone and Tondepi Shonhe - were
transferred from Matapi Police Station
to Harare Central. What a sight.
Wellington Chibebe was bleeding from the
head, he had blood all over his
clothes, they all could hardly sit because
they were in such pain. Lucia
came and sat next to me and Kerry showing us
her blue and black body. They
looked like victims of a terrible car
accident. It was an awful sight. The
whacking I had received now felt like a
mere mosquito bite.
It is only
the flesh that they could hurt or break, but our spirits, our
resolve was
strengthened at that moment. The ZCTU leadership put up brave
faces and
accepted that this was the nature of the struggle and there was
more of this
to come. Robert Mugabe has made it a point since then to remind
us that he
will not hesitate to kill us. He has proved to all including his
African
allies how his continued rule can only be extended through a reign
of
terror.
It took us days, weeks and months of preparation for this moment.
Days in
which we psyched ourselves to the cost of confronting the regime on
the
streets, not just to us but our families too.
It is easy for desk top
activists or theorists to analyse and theorise on
the Zimbabwean question.
But for us it is about our lives, it is about how
long we stay out of
prison, it is about how long we can sustain the struggle
until the regime is
dislodged. We are in the trenches facing Zanu (PF)
everyday of our
lives.
For me it is about when I will ever be reunited with my children again
in a
free Zimbabwe, when I can make them breakfast or watch a movie with
them.
Something at the moment that seems too far away, a luxury.
And so I
cried for our children when Lucia told me little Ashely's story.
All this
comes at a time when parliament is debating the Domestic Violence
Bill, a
noble process indeed, but almost meaningless for me as a political
activist
if it cannot shield me or my children from state sponsored violent
tyranny.
Domestic violence in Zimbabwe should be viewed as a symptom of the
patriarchal, dictatorial Mugabe regime, whose solution lies only in a change
of Government.
When the Bill becomes law, at the moment with the Public
Order and Security
Act (POSA) and other draconian legislation still in
place, it will not
shield our society from the amount of psychological
damage to our children,
the psychological rape when they are exposed to
horrific stories of us their
mothers, who are often arrested, tortured and
go missing for some time, or
are denied access to lawyers and even
food.
My uncle cried when I visited him after the ordeal. Holding me in his
arms
he said 'wofa here muzukuru', (should you die my niece?). I looked at
him
and said, uncle someone's niece, daughter, mother, father, husband, wife
or
friend has to stand up and do it; unfortunately, I am that mother, niece
or
daughter who has stood up to fight.
I always tell myself that we have
come this far as a civic and political
leadership to give up, we have lost
so much, sacrificed so much, endured too
much pain and suffering at the
hands of the dictatorship to just give up.
However I am aware that as things
get tougher in the next months we are
going to lose many of those in the
leadership as the weak fall by the
wayside.
But for some of us there
shall be no retreat and no surrender. Instead the
more the regime raises its
tempo against us, we have to prepare each willing
person and organization
for the ultimate confrontation. We have to raise the
tempo too, and make it
costly for Mugabe to arrest, torture or kill any of
us. We need that
critical mass comrades, to achieve this we have to create
centres of
resistance in each person, community or organization, across the
country.
Our arrest confirmed that it is easy to stretch the regime, they
had to bus
in youths from the Border Gezi training camp, they had few cars.
Many were
parked at Harare Central Police Station with no fuel. I know they
will not
manage or contain a rolling programme of mass action, in different
forms
from rate boycotts by the residents to the National Constitutional
Assembly
and WOZA-style street marches.
As a comrade on the ground I feel
it that the people are ready for a
courageous, resolute leadership, to lead
the final phase of the revolution
out of this tyranny. As little Ashely
asked her mum 'what were these people
thinking?' I will ask fellow comrades
and Zimbabweans, what are we thinking?
For the sake of our children may
Zimbabwe be free. Aluta Continua!
The Zimbabwean
HARARE - Militants
occupying white-owned farms in support of President
Robert Mugabe's land
seizure program have burned thousands of acres of
pastures and timber
plantations in Zimbabwe in the last weeks, the farmers'
union and timber
producer federations said this week.
The Timber Producers Federation (TPF)
said about 12 fires have razed down
timber worth more than $1,2 billion
since August and, another two fires last
week destroyed 20 hectares of
forests at Tarka and another 20 hectares at
Cashel Valley in Chimanimani.
"The presence of these unauthorized settlers
are of great concern, as the
majority of fires we have noted are linked to
authorized settlement of
forest land," TPF chairman Joseph Kanyekanye told
The Zimbabwean. "Twelve
fires have been linked to the presence of the
illegal settlers and they are
allegedly felling timber at Charter, Martin
and Skyline."
A Commercial
Farmers' Union official told The Zimbabwean that the government
had been
informed, but the burnings were continuing.
"This is a very distressing
development because not only are farmers losing
their valuable timber, but
this is also endangering farm and wild animals,"'
said the official who
refused to be identified. - Own correspondent
The Zimbabwean
HARARE - Zimbabwe's media
hangman Tafataona Mahoso is in hot water after
being found in contempt of
Parliament for lying about the agenda of a
meeting between the Media
Alliance of Zimbabwe (MAZ) and a Parliamentary
Portfolio Committee which
discussed the setting up of a Press Council which
is poised to ban the Media
and Information Commission (MIC) that he runs.
The chairman of the Transport
and Communications Parliamentary Portfolio
Committee Leo Mugabe said Mahoso
was in contempt of Parliament by "grossly
misrepresenting facts" adding "we
are taking steps under the Parliamentary
Privileges and Standing Rules to
correct this misperception."
Writing in his usual politically correct
bootlicking drivel in the last
issue of the Sunday Mail, Mahoso said the
media reform meeting held in
Harare last week, which was attended by Zanu
(PF) MP Daniel McKenzie Ncube,
Chitungwiza ruling party Senator Forbes
Magadu and President Mugabe's nephew
Leo, was called to plot a "regime
change agenda."
Mahoso wrote: "The meeting was to create a stilted platform
from which the
activists may engage in an orgy of anti-Zimbabwe diatribe
intended to
coincide with other recently staged events."
In his article,
Mahoso urged the ministry of Information to investigate the
activities of
ZUJ, which he accuses of being part of a lobby group to
discredit the
government.
Media experts said the threats by Mahoso mirrored a renewed
government
crackdown against the media aimed at outlawing criticism and
entrenching
Mugabe's rule. - Own correspondent
The Zimbabwean
HARARE -
Zimbabweans are again paying with thick wads of local currency
bulging in
their bags despite the move by the Reserve Bank to lop off three
zeros from
the country's battered currency three months ago.
A KFC burger on average now
costs $10,500 following daily hikes in the price
of virtually everything
since the currency reforms came into force. Three
months ago a KFC burger
cost $2,100.
On the black market, the value of the Zimbabwe dollar fluctuated
wildly on
Monday. By the afternoon, US$1 bought 1,500 Zimbabwe dollars
compared to
Friday's 1,200.
"The rate is changing by the hour," said one
black market dealer on
condition of anonymity. The official rate stands firm
at 250 to 1.
Meanwhile, exasperated officials at the central bank are running
out of
local currency as black marketeers and money launderers withdraw
massive
amounts of bank notes to buy hard currency. The regulation to limit
withdrawals to $100,000 has started being flouted by bribe-taking bank
tellers for a "fee."
Central bank officials said they would monitor large
cash withdrawals from
banks of more than $100,000 Zimbabwe dollars in a bid
to trap "unscrupulous"
dealers.
Unofficial trading has been spurred by a
severe hard currency shortage
stemming from political instability that has
disrupted the main hard
currency earning industries: tobacco, tourism and
gold mining.
Independent economists say the black market exchange rate has
been pushed up
by desperate state enterprises seeking hard currency at
unofficial rates to
pay debts for oil, imported electricity and external
fees and debts owed by
the state airline. Many of those debts face
foreclosure and the termination
of supplies such as coal, seed, fertilizers
and other services. - Own
correspondent
The Zimbabwean
COMBINED HARARE RESIDENTS ASSOCIATION
P O Box HR
7870
DAVENTRY HOUSE ROOM 103,
HARARE
CELL: 011 862 012, 011 612
860
091 924 151, 011 443 578
E-mail: chrainfo@zol.co.zw
Website: www.chra.co.zw
The Zanu (PF) government,
whose insatiable desire is to reap where it did
not sow, has imposed the
Zimbabwe National Water Authority (ZINWA) on
uninformed Harare residents. It
is a pity that the introduction of ZINWA was
initially welcomed by
overzealous women from the political structures of the
ruling party in
Mabvuku and Tafara.
These women were caught on national television in May
2005 expressing relief
that the government through ZINWA had finally come to
the rescue of
residents, long suffering from acute shortages of
water.
Little did they know that the same ZINWA they were celebrating was
actually
sheep in wolf's clothing.
CHRA, from the onset was adamant that
the intervention of the government was
ill-advised and projected it would
bring more chaos to the issues of water
administration and supply.
Today,
residents are being forced to pay huge water bills directly to the
City of
Harare, and not to ZINWA. Yet it is clear that the government has
given full
authority to the water authority to set the prices of water for
all
users.
The irony of the whole arrangement is that ZINWA has been given this
role
without the approval of Harare residents. Obviously the government is
eyeing
the municipal water infrastructure without paying a single dollar
towards
the hostile and illegal takeover of residents'
infrastructure.
The system governing the supply of water in Harare today and
in any other
local authority leaves a lot to be desired. An illegal
commission that is
only accountable to the government through the vindictive
Ignatius Chombo
runs Harare. That leaves residents with this key problem of
getting things
moving.
There is no way that CHRA or residents for that
matter, to approach ZINWA to
say the water bills are just unaffordable.
Rather, we will deal with the
City of Harare, which in this case is totally
powerless to determine how
much residents should pay. The municipality will
not stand for the residents
because the commission is an imposed one while
ZINWA is a statutory body
with the full backing of the law. But the water
body has no institutional
structures to deal directly with Harare residents
except through its public
relations department, which issues statements
making corrections or
announcing places where there would be water
cuts.
What CHRA has been saying and still maintains is that ZINWA has no
business
in Harare's water issues.
Presently, to raise awareness on the
chaotic nature of water administration
in Harare, CHRA will continue to hold
public meetings in wards. This is
meant to ensure that all residents
understand how their water bills are
being manipulated by ZINWA and the City
of Harare to further their goals of
stealing from residents.
It is hoped
that by the time the awareness campaigns are done with residents
of Harare
will rise from their slumber and say enough is enough!
The Zimbabwean
Editorial 40
They
just don't get it do they? This week's hot news is that Zimbabwe is
setting
up "an intellectual desk" to be based at the ministry of higher and
tertiary
education to reverse the country's brain drain.
The permanent secretary at
the ministry, Washington Mbizvo, is quoted as
saying that they would like to
bring skilled manpower back into the country
to offer expertise on a
short-term basis - why short-term? What is the good
of such experts just
flying in and then out again? What is the point?
The problem with this whole
plan is that it has not been thought through
properly - as is the case with
so much of Zanu (PF) policy over the past 26
years. Many Zimbabweans in the
diaspora are desperate to go home. They will
not even need an invitation.
But there is no way they will consider
returning to Zimbabwe for as long as
the country remains in its present
state, under its present ruler.
The
reasons for their having left the country in the first place need to be
addressed. Economic mismanagement and state-sponsored corruption must be
stamped out.
People must know that they and their families are going to
have access to
decent health and education facilities, regular supplies of
water and power,
fuel for their vehicles, foodstuffs and medicines, not to
mention the simple
daily necessity of cash - a scare commodity in
Zimbabwe!
Even more importantly, there must be a return to the rule of law.
Police
terrorism must be stopped. Professional non-partisanship must once
again be
the hallmarks of all the armed services.
Once these problems are
effectively addressed, there will be no shortage of
skilled Zimbabweans
prepared to return home. They won't need to be enticed
with short-term
expatriate packages in foreign currency and ridiculous wild
promises.
The
country is kicking and alive, says Mbizvo. Really? We beg to differ. A
cursory glance at the pages of this newspaper, and even government
newspapers, tells a very different story. Zimbabwe is a failed state.
One
in four Zimbabweans now lives in exile. Can the honourable permanent
secretary please explain that?
VOA
By Marvellous Mhlanga-Nyahuye
Washington
11 October
2006
The Zimbabwe Union of Journalists has criticized an
official of the national
soccer team for retaliating against a reporter who
criticized the team in an
article.
Warriors Trust Fund official
Henrietta Rushwaya is said to have taken action
against reporter Phathisani
Moyo of the Bulawayo Sunday News for writing a
damning report on the
Warriors' defeat by underdog Malawi Saturday in a
Nations Cup
qualifier.
Union Treasurer Augustine Mukaro said his association is
investigating the
matter, but feels clearly aggrieved by what he described
as harassment of
Moyo. He said that the journalist had acted professionally
and ethically
when he wrote the article.
The official is said to have
removed Moyo's name from the list of
journalists whose hotel accommodations
are paid for by the team under a
longstanding arrangement, and threatened to
exclude Bulawayo journalists
from future Warriors trips.
Moyo, whose
publication is controlled by the state, confirmed the incident,
but declined
to make a recorded comment for broadcast by VOA.
Reporter Marvellous
Mhlanga-Nyahuye of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe asked
union officer Mukaro
what action his organization is considering in the
matter.
afrol.com
afrol
News, 11 October - In a bid to get total control over the large amount
of
funds being transferred from the Diaspora to Zimbabwean residents each
day,
the Central Bank of Zimbabwe has outlawed 16 private money transfer
operators, gaining an effective monopoly on the service. The large foreign
exchange revenues, due to a discrepancy between official and black market
rates, are to go directly into government treasury.
The announcement
to ban the 16 money transfer agencies from operating in
Zimbabwe was made by
Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono in a speech delivered
on Monday. Mr Gono
accused the foreign and local agencies of
"non-performance and deviant
behaviour by most players in this sector" that
was leading foreign exchange
from the Diaspora to end up at the black
market.
Most exiled
Zimbabweans have preferred to use channels that allow their
relatives in
Zimbabwe to cash out transfers in foreign exchange, which again
gives them a
much greater value on the black market. A large part of the
Zimbabwean
Diaspora is also strongly objected to the Mugabe regime, and does
not want
to contribute to its wealth by using official channels.
As of Monday, the
Reserve Bank's own money transfer agency Homelink was
given an effective
monopoly on transfers while other transfer agencies were
prevented from
operating immediately after the announcement. The 16 closed
agencies
included the global leader Western Union and other big institutions
belonging to the Standard Chartered Bank, Stanbic Bank, CBZ Bank, Interfin,
the Central Africa Building Society and TransAfrik.
Homelink was
established by the Reserve Bank in 2004 to assure increased
government
control over money transfers as inflation and a depreciated
Zimbabwe dollar
(Z$)led to an ever-growing black market. By now, black
market rates for one
US$ are up to five times the official rate. Homelink
was to capitalise on
this by only offering Z$ at official rates.
According to the Reserve
Bank, Homelink was met with "support and
enthusiasm" among the Zimbabwean
Diaspora at its launch as the emigrants
wanted "to assist Zimbabwe's
economy" by using the service. Homelink however
only has managed to gain a
very small portion of the money transfer market
during these two years,
creating doubts about the announced "enthusiasm".
Despite the known
desire by the Harare government to increase its control
over money
transfers, Bank Governor Gono announced the closure of the
agencies in a
move that totally surprised these companies. No first warning
was given.
"With immediate effect, all money transfer agency (MTA) licenses
are
cancelled. All local accounts for these entities should be closed
forthwith," he said in his speech, referring to "deviant
behaviour".
The announcement also meant that transfers from abroad to
Zimbabwe in order
were left in the air, causing desperation among many
Zimbabweans waiting for
an announced transfer yesterday. It could take a
long time before these
ongoing transfers reach their goal, as Mr Gono also
announced that "existing
contractual arrangements with Zimbabweans in the
Diaspora shall be dealt
with on a case by case basis."
Mr Gono
finally gave money transfer agencies a ray of hope, saying "any
aggrieved
party" would be left a two-week window to appeal the decision and
apply for
a new licence. "Such appeals will only be entertained and licence
reinstated
on the basis of strict performance and delivery targets," the
Bank Governor
added, meaning he would not tolerate anything less than total
state control
of money transferred by private operators.
An estimated 3.5 million
Zimbabweans meanwhile are living abroad, mostly in
Southern Africa, the US
and Britain. The outflow of Zimbabweans has
increased drastically since
President Robert Mugabe led the country into its
present crisis. Most of
those capable to spare some funds send money home to
their family, who are
mostly deeply affected by Zimbabwe's economic
collapse.
By
staff writer
The Zimbabwean
HARARE - Food
shortages in Zimbabwe have markedly worsened, causing massive
profiteering,
political interference in distribution and forcing the hungry
to survive on
wild fruits and roots, relief agencies said this week.
An estimated 3.3
million Zimbabweans, more than a quarter of the population,
are in danger of
starvation in the coming months because of food shortages
blamed on drought
and the government's chaotic program to seize thousands of
white-owned
commercial farms for redistribution to black settlers.
The Food Security
Network, a grouping of 24 non government organizations,
said household food
stocks fell to between zero and less than a month's
supply in all but one of
the country's 52 districts it monitored in
September.
Supplies of grain
dropped sharply, pushing up the black market prices of 20
kg of mealie meal
staple by five times the government's fixed price of $500.
Last week, a
faith-based rights organisation Zimbabwe Peace Project accused
the
government of withholding food from opposition supporters, interfering
with
distribution of international aid and prolonging the nation's grain
shortage
to protect its power.
Zimbabweans get mealie meal from government controlled
food-for-work
programs, government run grain sales or international donor
feeding
programs.
Last month, relief agencies said they had run out of
food. - Own
correspondent
The Zimbabwean
MBARE - There are still many
homeless people suffering as a result of
Murambatsvina and power
politics.
But there are also people sleeping outside in the open because of
the
callous disregard for their welfare by their neighbours or indeed family
members. Houses are being sold by people who do not own them. The same house
is being sold to two or three times. The family occupying it is evicted. The
buyers lose all their money and remain without shelter. Not hardened
criminals, but ordinary, apparently law-abiding citizens, like your in-laws,
do that and turn out to be crooks.
The ruling elite is looting and
amassing illegitimate wealth. Their
immorality is now spreading like a
contagious disease to the people of
Zimbabwe at large.
Are you getting
value for your money when shopping? Check your change! Is
your tank empty
when you get your car back from the garage? Go and raise
hell with the
garage owner!
Not only politicians tell outrageous lies (e.g that the
inflation will come
down soon when in fact it keeps rising). Even your next
door neighbour can
no longer be trusted. You think him a person of
compassion and charity when
in fact he abuses the little niece he has
received into his home after the
death of his brother.
We need to resist
the looters and exploiters. But how? Their corruption and
depravity must be
resisted by the people's moral integrity, honesty, fair
dealing with one
another, by their refusal to be infected by the contagious
moral diseases of
the super-crooks.
Their time is running out. The heroes' acres are claiming
them. We need to
prepare for the time after the curtain has come down over
their period of
history. Re-establishing moral integrity is the best way to
work for a new
Zimbabwe. - In Touch, Jesuit Communications
The Zimbabwean
BY WILSON BUTETE
HARARE -
Morgan Tsvangirai has urged Zimbabweans to re-organize against the
leadership of their ageing dictator and Zanu (PF) if they are ever to enjoy
freedom.
The Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader said Mugabe and
his party
"are the authors of the crisis" in Zimbabwe today.
"Let's not
forget that when we sleep without eating anything, when we are
not employed,
it's all because of the failure of Mugabe and his government,"
said
Tsvangirai
The MDC chief told about 10 000 people on Sunday who gathered at
the
ceremonial home of people power, the Zimbabwe Grounds in Highfields, to
commemorate his party's seventh anniversary that some top officials who
broke-away from the main rump of the MDC were not the real enemies of the
struggle for democracy in Zimbabwe.
"We are now a year away from the
so-called split of the MDC, let us forget
about that. Welshman Ncube and
Gibson Sibanda are not enemies of the MDC;
they are just misguided; the real
enemies are Mugabe and Zanu (PF) and we
should not forget that. Zvakanakawo
chaizvo kuti munhu anouya oti ndakatadza
vanhu vanokuregera sezvakaita
(Gift) Chimanikire akati ndakanga ndarasika.
We are opening our hands to our
colleagues who are misguided. They are
pursuing a dead end, they are
pursuing an unproductive agenda, they are
pursuing a parochial agenda that
does not take this country forward, let
them come back, let us resuscitate,
let us commit and re-convince ourselves
as the vision of the MDC", said
Tsvangirai.
Added Tsvangirai: "Let the CIOs who are here to go and tell
Mugabe that we
have not said we want to remove you through violence, we are
going to use
the power of the people. No dictator will survive the popular
resistance of
the people.
"You don't build a critical mass overnight, it
is a process. We have to
remove fear. The people themselves must be
convinced that they are doing the
right thing. Nyaya yekubvisa dictator ine
makuva, ine kuenda kujere.
Ndinogara ndichipopota kuti zvinhu zvaipa asi
magadzirira here kupinda
mumigwagwa? Zanu (PF) cannot be reformed; you have
to pull its branches and
roots from this society," he said.
"We need to
create conditions that guarantee free and fair elections in
Zimbabwe. The
Chikomba result of parliamentary by-election is clear evidence
of electoral
fraud. Where on earth would Zanu (PF) get those figures in
Chikomba? I was
there addressing the people and it is clear that the result
does not reflect
the will of the people there."
Tsvangirai challenged leaders in the southern
African leaders to take steps
against Mugabe.
"We are saying to the
regional leaders its time you took up your moral
courage and confront this
dictatorship, not only for our good but for your
own good. Mukasarega
mudhara uyu (Mugabe) achienda nemiyo muchatsvairwa
naye".
Tsvangirai
dismissed allegations by Mugabe and his party that the MDC is a
puppet of
foreign powers saying his party stands for the suffering people of
Zimbabwe.
"We are no puppet of anyone; we are not a puppet of the British
and the
Americans. We represent your interests", said Tsvangirai amid a
thunderous
applause from the cheering crowd.
The Zimbabwean
BY GIFT PHIRI
HARARE -
Zimbabwe's main opposition has said it has no legal recourse to
file a
petition challenging Zanu (PF)'s controversial victory in weekend
by-elections because the Supreme Court has declared the Electoral Court
unconstitutional.
The main faction of the Movement for Democratic Change
(MDC) led by Morgan
Tsvangirai, which lost Saturday's widely condemned
Rushinga and Chikomba
Parliamentary by-elections, has accused President
Mugabe's ruling Zanu (PF)
party of stealing the victory. The MDC claims it
has "shocking" evidence of
fraud and is demanding fresh elections.
In
Chikomba, Zanu (PF)'s Stephen Chiurayi polled 11,247 votes, beating the
MDC's Amos Jiri who garnered 4,243 votes. Zanu (PF)'s Lazarus Dokora also
won the Rushinga by-election with 13,642 votes against 1,801 votes clinched
by MDC candidate Kudakwashe Chideya.
MDC Information secretary Nelson
Chamisa told The Zimbabwean that his party
is being denied its right to file
papers protesting the results in terms of
the Electoral Act, which gives the
party 30 days after the vote to lodge an
appeal.
"We have an
overwhelmingly strong case. We have uncovered mountains of
hardcore and
powerful evidence of electoral fraud, which includes ballot
stuffing in the
resettlement areas of Rushinga and Chikomba," Chamisa said.
"If the evidence
we have gathered is presented to an independent and
impartial court, I have
no doubt in my mind that it would undoubtedly result
in Zanu (PF)'s stolen
electoral victory being set aside," he said.
Independent observers said there
were flaws in the by-elections and that the
vote was marked by "numerous and
profound irregularities."
The Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN), which
fielded 41 accredited
observers for both the Chikomba and Rushinga poll,
said MDC and UPP party
agents were barred from the Maname Polling Station in
Rushinga despite
having the necessary documentation from Zimbabwe Electoral
Commission (ZEC)
and the required police clearance.
"By lunchtime these
agents had still not received clearance from the ZEC
officials at the
Constituency Command Centre in Rushinga," ZESN said in a
preliminary
election report. "ZESN is also concerned that one of its
observers was not
allowed to observe counting at Wiltshire HQ Clinic. ZESN
observers noted
that most people were turned away because they did not
appear on the voters'
roll."
Zimbabwejournalists.com
By Selbin Kabote
VETERAN
Zimbabwean Journalist, David Masunda, has been selected as
this year's Open
Broadcast Fellow for Africa.
David, who is the chairman of the
private radio station, Voice of the
People (VOP), is one of the candidates
who made it through the lengthy
selection exercise to represent Africa this
year.
With a wealth of experience in journalism, newspaper editing
and radio
broadcasting going back to 1983, and having been the first black
business
reporter at the Herald in Zimbabwe, David is well placed to
champion freedom
of expression issues when he comes to London next
month.
In his current position as chairman of the VOP, David
spearheaded the
re-launch of the radio station outside Zimbabwe after its
Harare operations
were closed down by the police in December,
2005.
The fellowship scheme offers David the opportunity to
experience
broadcasting in a liberal society, and to access ideas from other
broadcasters on how to shape the future for the media in
Zimbabwe.
The fellowship scheme is aimed at senior radio and
television
broadcasters from developing countries. The scheme brings a
select group of
broadcast professionals to the UK for a two-week period in
November.
This year's programme will run from the 30th of October
to the 10th of
November. During this time fellows go through a programme
tailored to meet
the interests of those selected to participate, looking at
the different
media environments they are coming from.
The
programme aims to provide an opportunity to contribute ideas,
share concerns
and develop new goals for the media personalities. It is also
a chance for
relationships and contacts to be made and equally important for
the UK media
to hear what overseas media professionals have to say and learn
from their
experiences.
The One World Broadcasting Trust was established in
1987. The trust
was set up to promote greater understanding between the
developed and
developing countries of the world through broadcasting and
related
educational activities.
The Zimbabwean
Human rights what?
"Beware the
fury of a patient man" (Dryden)
HARARE - The beleaguered Mugabe regime is
reported to be working hard to
create what Chinamasa has the audacity to
call a human rights commission.
How ironic! To me, it is akin to the devil
setting up a commission to
regulate the temperature in the pits of hell.
What is even more laughable is
that the gullible United Nations Country Team
(UNCT) in Harare seems to have
swallowed this grand deception hook, line and
sinker much to the chagrin of
legitimate civil society in this country.
Sadly, a few misguided NGOs also
fell for the trick when they agreed to
attend the UNCT sponsored planning
workshop in Kariba recently. In doing
this, they effectively legitimised the
illegitimate and evil Mugabe regime's
claim that it is actively consulting
all concerned parties, including civil
society, in the process of setting up
this pretentious commission.
What
befuddles the mind is that there has already been a precedent from
which we
could have learnt in this regard. Several months ago, the demonic
Zanu (PF)
regime set up the Anti-Corruption Commission while dancing to the
tune "We
are Fighting Corruption", but to date, that commission has amply
demonstrated lacklustre performance. Apart form a few "small fish" that have
allegedly been suspected of engaging in limited forms of rent seeking, that
commission is apparently doing next to nothing in fighting against
corruption in high places. There is no guarantee that the proposed human
rights commission will perform any better. There are numerous conditions
that the Mugabe regime needs to attend to before it can be taken serious
when it proposes to desire to set up a human rights commission.
First,
the regime has to repeal, or extensively amend, such diabolical
pieces of
legislation as the Public Order and Security Act (POSA), Access to
Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA), Criminal Law
(Codification and Reform) Act (CLCRA), and, of course, the offensive
Broadcasting Services Act (BSA). There is no meaningful way in which human
rights violations can be regarded as "unlawful" while these repulsive pieces
of legislation are on the nation's books. To date, there is no indication
whatsoever from the rulers of this bleeding country that these evil laws
might be amended or repealed. It is therefore an exercise in futility to
talk about a human rights commission under the current Mugabe
regime.
Mugabe himself underlined this very fact when he effectively
applauded the
ZanuPF Repressive Police (ZRP) for severely beating up the
ZCTU leaders when
they attempted to demonstrate against continued
deterioration of living
standards in this country. The NGO Human Rights
Forum has consistently
issued reports indicating that the chief perpetrators
of human rights
violations are the police, the army and the CIO. These are
all arms of the
repressive vampire state. So all this talk about a human
rights commission
is a deliberate attempt to hoodwink the international
community, so that
some may be able to justify their support for the
authoritarian regime in
Harare.
The UNCT ought to be ashamed of
themselves for allowing so much wool to be
pulled over their eyes. They
behaved like they have no diplomatic wisdom.
They indeed, owe the majority
of the people of Zimbabwe an apology,
especially after the ZanuPF regime has
continued to demolish poor people's
homes all over this country, more than a
year after Madame Tibaijuka's
damaging report on Operation
Murambatsvina.
What human rights can the blood sucking Mugabe regime claim to
seek to
protect and promote? It is my persistent view that the first step in
protecting and promoting human rights in Zimbabwe is regime change. Sadly,
this is a subject that the UNCT will not be particularly interested in
discussing with genuine civil society.
The Zimbabwean
By a
Correspondent
HARARE - The Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ), along
with two other
independent media-related organisations, was itself the
target of a
disgraceful attack by the state's Media and Information
Commission, backed
naturally by the regime's newspaper and broadcasting
mouthpieces.
In the week Sept. 25 - Oct. 1, the attack came almost as a
response to an
invitation to MIC chairman Tafataona Mahoso to attend a media
law reform
workshop organised by the Media Alliance of Zimbabwe (MAZ), which
consists
of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists (ZUJ), the media monitors and
the Media
Institute of Southern Africa (MISA).
The Herald and ZBH radios
reported the MIC attacking the three civic
organisations for "portraying
themselves to their foreign donors as regime
change activists"
who would
repeal internationally condemned laws banning press freedom and
freedom of
assembly, adding that they had clandestinely convened the
workshop.
The
state propagandists did not attempt to discuss the purpose of the
workshop
and simply allowed the MIC to vilify the civic organisations
without
question.
The Herald did carry a comment by ZUJ chairman Mathew Takaona at
the end of
an article. It claimed it could not get a comment from MISA and
made no
attempt to get one from the media monitors.
"Clearly, the
deliberate distortion of the truth and the hypocrisy expressed
in the MIC
statement demonstrates the depths of dishonesty the institution
is prepared
to employ in order to defend its intolerance of any debate about
the need to
encourage media development by repealing draconian laws that
throttle the
free flow of information," said MMPZ.
In the week reviewed by MMPZ, Robert
Mugabe was still praising the police
for brutal attacks on trade unionists
who attempted to demonstrate. This
makes subsequent claims by the police
that the trade unionists injured
themselves sound even more
fatuous.
Take, for example, ZTV, Spot FM and Radio Zimbabwe all quoting
Mugabe as
saying the police were doing fine job "to ensure peace and order,"
that
anyone who resisted police orders would be "dealt with forcefully," and
all
the rest. The official dailies, The Herald and The Chronicle, were
equally
keen to carry Mugabe's shameless defence of police brutality.
The
private media, with the usual exception of the Mirror group, challenged
Mugabe, viewing his comments as an illustration of state complicity in human
rights abuses, and carried expressions of dismay from the United Nations,
the International Bar Association and international trade unions.
Studio
7, the Gazette and the Zimbabwe Independent, for example, quoted IBA
executive director Mark Ellis saying that Mugabe's statements "added weight
to evidence that torture and other serious violations of international law"
were "sanctioned at the highest level in Zimbabwe."
Unfortunately,
nothing new in that. But Mugabe might even have been pleased
with the IBA
response, given how he praised the brutal assaults in the
police
cells.
The state media's coverage of forthcoming council and parliamentary
elections is true to form: most stories were simply advertisements for Zanu
(PF), some mentions of the Arthur Mutambara-led MDC faction, and nothing of
course for Morgan Tsvangarai's MDC.
"As a result, the electorate was left
no wiser on the state of the voters'
rolls, the number of polling stations
and their location, war and
constituency boundaries and identification
particulars required for voting,"
said MMPZ. "Neither was there any effort
to establish how many observers
would be accredited for the polls."
Well,
there wouldn't be, would there.
The Zimbabwean
Power to the Imagination!
This slogan
from the student protests in Paris in 1968 came to mind when I
read two
articles on Zimbabwe in the past week - one from within the
country, one
from without. Eldred Masunungure, from the University of
Zimbabwe, calls us
a 'risk- averse' people. We have been subjugated for so
long - in the
colonial years and latterly by our own government - we have
become used to
it. We have learnt that taking risks to obtain freedom
doesn't bring
results. So we have given up. Anyone who calls us into the
streets will have
little success. For the vast majority it literally isn't
worth the risk.
Better to just wait for better times.
Masunungure detects something even more
debilitating below the surface. We
now accept the abnormal as normal. (He
credits Jonathan Moyo with inventing
this phrase and since Moyo had a hand
in setting up the abnormal it seems
likely). He points to the constant
Zimbabwe habit of diffusing anger by
joking about adversity, a habit which
'creates and inculcates fatalistic or
defeatist values in our society,
presently and for future generation.' We
are 'immobilising ourselves.' When
ZESA cuts our power, says Masunungure, or
the City Council deny us water we
don't get angry we just buy a generator or
sink a borehole. If we can't
afford these we buy candles and draw water from
unprotected wells. But the
last thing we think of is a focused collective
response.
On the other
hand, he says, the government is a master at taking risks. They
learnt it
from Ian Smith whose gamble in 1965 paid off at least in the short
term. The
land grab and Murambatsvina were simply the most high profile of a
succession of risks taken by the present government. And the risks paid off.
No one responded effectively. The government has been strong, pro-active
and unpredictable while the people have been over-awed, cowed and at a loss
as to what to do.
The second article comes from a Ghanaian, George
Ayittey, of the American
University in Washington, and gives some kind of
answer. He begins by saying
the recent ZCTU protest was 'to put it mildly,
dumb.' While he sympathises
with the protesters he says they need a 'good
talking to' because they
'continually repeat old stupid mistakes.' He seems
to be deliberately harsh
so as to rouse his readers. So what does he advise?
'There are better ways
of fighting a tyrannical regime and they require a
huge dose of the
imagination and learning from the experience of other
countries.' He quotes
a number of examples from Africa but there is one from
Asia, which he could
also have mentioned.
Gandhi hoped for the freedom of
India in the 1920s but the struggle became
bogged down in frustrations on
every side. He used to go into retreat to
reflect and ponder how to move the
process forward non-violently. At one
point he came up with a 'huge dose of
imagination.' The British had imposed
a salt tax, which was a burden for the
ordinary people. Gandhi emerged from
his retreat to lead a march to the sea
where he invited them to help
themselves to all the salt they wanted. It
gathered it free and without tax.
Now, it is true that in Zimbabwe any kind
of marching attracts government
attention but it is not the march itself but
the imagination behind it that
catches out attention.
The Zimbabwean
HARARE - With over 3 million Africans evicted from their houses
since 2000,
forced evictions have become the most "widespread unrecognised
human rights
abuse" in the region, according to a report by Amnesty
International and the
Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions
(COHRE).
Forced evictions in Zimbabwe received international press attention
when
over 700,000 people were made homeless during Operation Murambatsvina.
However, despite having the highest rate of evictions in Africa, with 53 out
of 1000 people being evicted from their homes, Zimbabweans are not alone in
being the victims of this destructive government policy.
Over 2 million
people have been violently evicted from their homes in
Nigeria since 2001 in
order to implement a master plan drawn up in 1978 to
develop the city of
Abuja, and in Kenya over 70,000 people have been evicted
from forest areas
since 2005.
The practice of forced evictions has been recognised as a
violation of human
rights by the African Commission and the right to
adequate housing is
guaranteed under the African Charter on Human and
Peoples' Rights. However
governments in Africa continue to forcibly and
violently evict people from
their homes without any prior warning and,
according to the report,
evictions are usually accompanied by other human
rights violations such as
torture, rape, beatings and killings.
In
Zimbabwe, the consequences of Operation Murambatsvina are horrific; an
estimated 2.4 million people were affected by the evictions, 300,000
children were forced to leave school, and hundreds of thousands of people
had to sleep rough in the streets through the winter, 79% of people lost
their sources of income and over 4 million Zimbabweans are now in desperate
need of food aid. The government is refusing to allow NGOs into the country
to hand out aid to the most needy.
A delegation of four people from
different social movements in South Africa
visiting Zimbabwe in July of this
year found that people are still seriously
affected by Murambatsvina.
Despite government claims that those made
homeless would receive new housing
under Operation Garikayi, the delegation
found that the houses built
constituted only 5% of those destroyed. Reports
indicated that they were
only being inhabited by those with political
connections and some of the
hastily constructed houses were so badly built
that people are afraid to
live in them.
In addition to the suffering caused by evictions within the
country,
Operation Murambatsvina and other forced eviction campaigns have an
international impact as well. According to the International Alliance of
Inhabitants (IAI) over a billion people worldwide are threatened with
homelessness or bad housing conditions. Objective 11 of the Millennium
Development Goals laid out a target of reducing this number by 100 million
by 2015, however according to IAI it is more likely to increase by 700
million by 2020.
As Kolawole Olaniyan, Director of Amnesty
International's Africa Programme,
points out: "By failing to bring an end to
the practice of forced evictions,
African leaders are violating their
obligations to protect human rights and
undermining their expressed
commitments to development imperatives such as
the Millennium Development
Goals and NEPAD."
The IAI launched a campaign in 2004 to mobilize the
international community
into doing something about the evictions. However,
as pointed out in the
report, despite the right to adequate housing being
guaranteed under
international law, many governments in Africa continue to
evict thousands of
people every year. - KJW
The Zimbabwean
BY A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
Jonathon
Moyo recently featured on a double-bill version of the BBC's
Hardtalk
programme. Stephen Sacker is not my favourite interviewer. He
hectors
those to whom he speaks and seems to believe that people will spill
the
beans if they are sufficiently bullied. But it is not a style that
worked
with Jonathan Moyo because there's a gap where the beans should be!
I watched
like a rat entranced by a very smooth snake as Moyo sat in an
elegant
Johannesburg hotel room for the interview.
Was this the man who littered the
verge outside my house on Monday 2nd June
2003 with his ridiculous efforts
to win our hearts and minds during the stay
away? The thousands of
pamphlets had obviously been tossed out of a moving
car by the bundle. Each
one had a picture of our flag and said,
No to mass action
No to
violence
No to British puppets
No to Rhodesian Sellouts
No to the
MDC
Zvakwana. (Enough)
Not one positive suggestion! It was the politics
of his fertile imagination
against phantom foes and it offered no way
forward.
The pamphlet continued (brackets mine):
Enough is enough (There
isn't enough of anything)
Stand up for your rights (And be beaten and
tortured)
Let the workers go to work (Over 70% unemployment at that time but
it's
higher now)
Let the children go to school and let the banks and
businesses remain open.
(My children, one at primary school and one high
school, were both sent home
because the teachers were on strike.) At that
time the banks had no money
but you could buy Z$5,000 for Z$5,500 from
street touts! Many businesses
had been forced to close as the Zimbabwe
government continued its relentless
efforts re write the basic laws of
economics.
Moyo's pamphlet ended with, Rambai Makashinga. Carry on being
brave and
strong!
The question I would ask over three years later is the
same as I asked then.
For how much longer can people be asked to carry on
being brave and strong?
I'm constantly amazed that the spirit of some people
who live in desperate
circumstances is not diminished. It is so humbling
and so uplifting to meet
such extraordinary people. But this spirit is
being desperately abused
because they are so weakened by abject poverty.
Many simply don't have
enough to eat. And as for a balanced diet - what's
that?
The health of the general population is undermined by lack of protein.
A
young woman comes to my house to collect the fallen seeds of the Natal
mahogany (lucky bean) tree. She sells them for a pittance and last time she
came I noticed that the hair of her toddler is turning that gingery colour
associated with kwashiorkor. I gave them an orange each and a hand of
bananas from the garden, even local fruits have long since been a luxury.
But what she needs is milk, eggs and meat - all of which is way beyond her
reach.
I've seen people on ARV treatment for HIV who faint from hunger,
or vomit on
empty stomachs as they wait for supplementary food benefits.
ARV'S make you
hungry at the best of times and these are the worst of
times.
And the man who prevented the BBC from reporting on these things has
the
gall to tell us that his conscience is clear and that he simply did his
job!
There are many people in is country who do loathsome jobs. But I salute
those who refuse. I heard that there was a bulldozer operator who abandoned
his machine at the time of Murambatsvina. I hope it was true. There are
police and army officers and civil servants who have refused to behave as
the lackeys of a corrupt government. And some very brave
magistrates.
Those who remain doing jobs that entail behaving in a way that
is morally
wrong have the same gap in their heads as Jonathon Moyo.
Psychologists call
it denial and religious people call it conscience. Call
it what you will,
but hokoyo! The bottom line is that loathsome deeds keep
us awake at night
and torment our souls or spirits. We humans do not get
away with this kind
of behaviour. What we have done doesn't go away just
because we live in a
mansion, have high status or six cars.
We can tell
ourselves that we didn't really order that person to be killed,
or that
meagre home to be bulldozed, or that farm to be stolen, or that
tractor to
be taken away from its rightful owner. We can tell ourselves
that we were
just doing our job. But there is a deeper part of our
unconscious minds
that knows that we are lying to ourselves.
Jonathon Moyo was repeatedly
asked: "Why did you ban the BBC from Zimbabwe?"
He simply pretended that the
question had not been asked and waffled on in a
terrifying mixture of lies,
playing for time, half truths and the official
party line all couched in his
own spin.
But modern camera techniques are cruel and Moyo's upper lip
betrayed a sneer
that comes from deep within his arrogant heart.
The only
time I believed the man was when he was asked if Mugabe had
threatened him
when he left his post as Minister of Information. Otherwise
empty eloquence
and spin spewed out of his mouth on auto pilot.
Business Week
OCTOBER 11, 2006
Europe
By Marina
Kamenev
A study pulled
together from sources and surveys found that good health care
and education
are as important as wealth to modern happiness
Feeling sad? Researchers
at Britain's University of Leicester reckon you
might just be in the wrong
country. According to Adrian White, an analytic
social psychologist at
Leicester who developed the first "World Map of
Happiness," Denmark is the
happiest nation in the world.
White's research used a battery of
statistical data, plus the subjective
responses of 80,000 people worldwide,
to map out well-being across 178
countries. Denmark and five other European
countries, including Switzerland,
Austria, and Iceland, came out in the top
10, while Zimbabwe and Burundi
pulled up the bottom.
Not
surprisingly, the countries that are happiest are those that are
healthy,
wealthy, and wise. "The most significant factors were health, the
level of
poverty, and access to basic education," White says. Population
size also
plays a role. Smaller countries with greater social cohesion and a
stronger
sense of national identity tended to score better, while those with
the
largest populations fared worse. China came in No. 82, India ranked 125,
and
Russia was 167. The U.S. came in at 23.
IT'S SUBJECTIVE. White's study,
to be published later this year, was
developed in part as a response to the
British media's fascination with life
satisfaction. A recent BBC survey
concluded that 81% of Britain's population
would rather the government make
them happier than richer.
Despite its often bleak weather, England ranked
relatively happy at 41.
"There is increasing political interest in using
measures of happiness as a
national indicator along with measures of
wealth," White says. "We wanted to
illustrate the effects of global poverty
on subjective well-being to remind
people that if they want to address
unhappiness as an issue the need is
greatest in other parts of the
world."
To produce the "Happy Map," White dug deep. He analyzed data from
a variety
of sources including UNESCO, the CIA, The New Economics
Foundation, and the
World Health Organization. He then examined the
responses of 80,000 people
surveyed worldwide.
MONEY STILL COUNTS.
Good health may be the key to happiness, but money
helps open the door.
Wealthier countries, such as Switzerland (2) and
Luxembourg (10) scored high
on the index. Not surprisingly, most African
countries, which have little of
either; scored poorly. Zimbabwe, which has
an AIDS rate of 25%, an average
life expectancy of 39, and an 80% poverty
rate, ranked near the bottom at
177. Meanwhile, the conflict between the
Hutus and Tutsis gave fellow
Africans in Burundi, ranked 178, even less to
smile about, despite their
having a slightly lower poverty rate of 68%.
Capitalism, meanwhile, fared
quite well. Free-market systems are sometimes
blamed for producing
unhappiness due to insecurity and competition, but the
U.S. was No. 23 and
all the top-ranking European countries are firmly
capitalist-albeit of a
social-democratic flavor.
White says the only real surprise in his
findings was how low many Asian
countries scored. China is 82, Japan 90, and
India an unhappy 125. "These
are countries that are thought as having a
strong sense of collective
identity, which other researchers have associated
with well-being," he says.
ARE WE HAPPY YET? White admits that happiness
is subjective. But he defends
his research on the grounds that his study
focused on life satisfaction
rather than brief emotional states. "The
frustrations of modern life, and
the anxieties of the age, seem to be much
less significant compared to the
health, financial, and educational needs in
other parts of the world."
One of the study's intentions was to see how
Britain, given media
preoccupation with well-being, fared compared to other
parts of the globe.
His conclusion: "The current concern with happiness
levels in the U.K. may
well be a case of the 'worried well.