Zim Online
Thu 7
September 2006
HARARE - Pressure mounted against the Zimbabwean
government yesterday
as the country's National Constitutional Assembly (NCA)
civic alliance
announced it will next week join worker and student protests
to press the
administration to halt a seven-year crippling economic
recession.
The NCA, which campaigns for a new and democratic
constitution for
Zimbabwe, is a coalition of opposition political parties,
human rights and
pro-democracy groups, media organisations, women and civic
rights groups,
labour and student movements.
NCA chairman
Lovemore Madhuku told ZimOnline that the alliance will
take part in next
week's protests led by the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade
Unions (ZCTU), adding
that NCA and ZCTU officials will meet this week to
cobble together a broad
alliance of the two groups ahead of the September 13
protests.
Madhuku said: "We are meeting to see how best we can work together to
push
efforts towards a common goal. Whatever the ZCTU does promotes (the
objectives of) the NCA and Zimbabweans cannot just stand by in this struggle
for freedom."
The ZCTU, the umbrella union body
for Zimbabwe's workers, says next
week's protests are meant to force the
government and employers to improve
living conditions of workers and to
accept linking wages and salaries to
inflation, at 993.6 percent the highest
in the world.
The union says the phased protests will continue
until employers and
the government acceded to worker demands.
The Zimbabwe National Students Union, a grouping of students at the
country's universities and other tertiary colleges, this week also served
notice to the government to reduce fees and improve conditions at colleges
or face protests by students.
Opposition Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan
Tsvangirai last week caught security
forces by surprise when he led his top
lieutenants in a march across Harare
he said was a warning of more
protests - along the lines of Ukraine's Orange
Revolution - to force
President Robert Mugabe to accept sweeping political
reforms.
Mugabe has however promised to ruthlessly crush protests
against his
rule and last month boasted that the security forces would "pull
the
trigger" against protesters.
Zimbabwe's economic crisis,
described by the World Bank as the worst
in the world outside a war zone,
has spawned shortages of fuel, electricity,
essential medicines, hard cash
and just about every basic survival
commodity.
Critics blame
the crisis on repression and wrong policies by Mugabe,
in power since
Zimbabwe's 1980 independence from Britain. The veteran leader
denies ruining
the economy and instead says Zimbabwe's problems are because
of Western
sanctions meant to punish his government for seizing land from
whites for
redistribution to landless blacks. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Thu 7 September 2006
HARARE - President Robert Mugabe's
wife, Grace, used her position to
pressure Harare municipality officials to
allocate residential land to her
friends, including her favourite musician,
who were not on the city's
waiting list for residential stands, a senior
municipal official has
disclosed.
The cash-strapped Harare
municipality has a housing backlog running
into several hundreds of
thousands people. Municipal regulations and policy
are that residential land
is allocated on a first-name-first-served basis.
But the city's
acting director for housing and amenities, James
Chiyangwa, earlier this
week told a committee probing the dismissal of
Harare Town Clerk Ngoni
Chideya that on countless occasions he had been
pressured by "influential
people", among them the First Lady, to allocate
land to people who were not
on the waiting list.
Chideya, suspended by the government-appointed
commission last month,
is accused of failing to solve cases of senior
officials suspended from
council service as well as failure to ensure the
allocation of scarce
residential stands was done in accordance with laid
down procedures and
rules.
Chiyangwa, who testified to the
probe committee headed by Harare
magistrate Mishrod Guvamombe on Tuesday,
said: "There are more cases where
influential people put pressure on me to
allocate stands to individuals who
were not on the waiting
list.
"One clear instance I can cite was when the First Lady
recommended
that we consider allocating stands to Mercy Mutswene and
Fungisai
(Zvakavapano) Mashavave as special cases. I could give you more
names that
benefited the same way if the hearing goes into
camera."
Mutswene and Mashavave are among Zimbabwe's top female
gospel music
stars. The First Lady has publicly admitted that Mashavave is
her favourite
musician and has always included the songbird at events she
has organised to
raise money for charity.
It was not possible
to immediately get comment on the matter last
night from Grace's
office.
Chiyangwa, who painted a picture of rampant favouritism in
the
allocation of housing land, also cited another case where he had
allocated
land to one Senior Assistant police commissioner Murindi who was
not on the
waiting list because he (Chiyangwa) was scared of the policeman's
high rank.
Harare - where the government seized political control
in 2003 after
firing an elected opposition mayor and his council and
appointed a
commission to run the city - is in a state of dereliction
chiefly because of
corruption and mismanagement by the state
commission.
But this is not the first time that Grace has been
caught up in
controversy over land and houses. She is accused of seizing a
lucrative
Iron Mask farm in Mazowe district near Harare from its white
owners at the
height of her husband's farm seizure programme.
She has however argued she wants to use the farm to establish a centre
to
look after homeless children.
In 1997, Grace looted money from a
government fund that was meant to
provide housing loans to low-paid civil
servants and used it to build a
three-storey mansion in Harare's Borrowdale
Brooke suburb of the rich. She
later resold the house to the Libyan embassy
in Harare at a huge profit. -
ZimOnline
Zim Online
Thu 7 September
2006
PLUMTREE - Two Botswana journalists accused of violating
Zimbabwe's
tough media and immigration laws will face trial in November
after their
application to have the case dismissed failed.
The
two, Beauty Mokoba and Keketso Seofela, had argued that they
qualified for
"sovereign immunity" as they had been arrested while working
on a project on
behalf of the government of Botswana.
Plumtree magistrate, Mark
Dziva, dismissed the application and
remanded the two journalists who work
for Botswana Television (Btv) to
November 7 for trial.
A lawyer
representing the journalists, Kucaca Phulu, immediately
attacked the ruling
saying the magistrate had erred in arriving at the
verdict as his clients
had not applied for "diplomatic immunity" as hinted
by the
magistrate.
"The magistrate dismissed my client's application after
arguing that
the two journalists were not employed by the Botswana embassy
and did not
therefore qualify for diplomatic immunity but the application by
my clients
was for a discharge on sovereign immunity and not diplomatic
immunity,"
Phulu said.
The two journalists were arrested last
May in Plumtree near the
Botswana border after they entered the country to
cover a story on the
outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease and suspected cases
of cattle rustling
between the two countries.
They are being
charged with violating the tough Access to Information
and Protection of
Privacy Act (AIPPA) which bars journalists from practising
their profession
without first seeking accreditation from the state's Media
and Information
Commission.
If convicted, the journalists who are out on Z$4
million bail, face
two years in jail or a fine of $20 000 or both. -
ZimOnline
Zim Online
Thu 7
September 2006
HARARE - At least 40 passengers have been "marooned"
in Harare since
last Sunday because floundering Air Zimbabwe does not have
aircraft to ferry
them to London while the few international airlines still
landing at Harare
International airport have declined to accommodate the
passengers.
Air Zimbabwe, once one of the biggest airlines in
Africa, only has one
plane plying international routes at present after most
of its aircraft were
grounded because of a critical shortage of spare
parts.
The national airline, which has received several planes from
China but
that can only fly shorter domestic routes, had apparently accepted
bookings
for the stranded passengers hoping that one of its planes which is
undergoing engine repairs in Germany would be ready to resume
operations.
"The hope was that we would have both planes back in
the air but that
was not to be and this is how we ended up with passengers
stranded here,"
said a senior official at Air Zimbabwe who refused to be
named because he is
not authorised to speak to the press.
The
passengers have been holed up at Crowne Plaza Monomotapa Hotel in
Harare
since last Sunday.
A shortage of foreign currency to buy spares for
repairs, years of
under-funding, mismanagement and downright corruption have
crippled Air
Zimbabwe. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Thu 7 September 2006
Violet: Welcome to part two of
the teleconference discussion with the
women leaders of the opposition
movement in Zimbabwe debating the issue of
mass action unity in the
pro-democracy movement.
Our guests are Jenni Williams, the
co-ordinator of the pressure group
Women of Zimbabwe Arise or WOZA; Zimbabwe
Women's Activist and former
chairperson of the NCA Thoko Matshe; Secretary
for Policy and Research in
the Tsvangirai MDC Sekai Holland and Deputy
Secretary General of the
Mutambara MDC Priscilla Misihairabwi
Mushonga.
Thoko Matshe picks up from where the debate ended last
week on whether
or not the people have become spectators waiting for change
to happen.
Thoko: There's a lot of things that are happening. I
was at a meeting
with about 180 women that were dealing with the issues of
the struggles that
we've had; the Murambatsvina's and all that. OK? That
was another group
looking at how to survive, how to empower themselves, how
to go over their
fear. There are different initiatives that are going. For
me, I'm saying two
things alright.
Those initiatives need
somehow to link together to be able to be then
something that is at a
certain point that can push with the same force.
But, secondly, I still
think, yes, some people they might not be
spectators, but they are not
putting their mouth where their money is. They
are more about just the
survival, the fighting of the poverty and things
like that and we still have
a big chunk of people that think there's
politics out there and there is
food that I have got to get and there's
complaining about this and this; me;
politics, it's something that I don't
want to. I still think we have a
large chunk of that.
Sekai: I agree with you Thoko, but I think
that really the important
thing there is that the Zimbabwean people again
don't have the situation or
the environment of understanding where
historically we are at now. There's
been a sixteen year guerrilla war of
which nobody knows about because
there's no inter-generational connectivity.
All we hear is people saying
they fought the war.
They are
the ones who are beneficiaries; people know they lost
relatives in the war.
What have they benefited? No one tells them why they
have not benefited. You
have all sorts of divide and rule refined on the
ground. The processes you
are talking about Thoko are extremely necessary.
When you cut a tree down,
when the leaves start coming out again; that's
where we are at. And, that
the linkages you are talking about are actually
taking place and I really
believe that we are on course and we are really
going in the correct
direction.
In the multi-faceted thrust that are taking place,
there's been huge
things achieved by yourself when you were in the NCA, by
the women's
movement. I keep saying this to everyone all the time that the
linkages are
occurring. We don't have a tradition as Africans, as scholars
in Africa of
taking the correct subjects in our environment to write and
then see how and
what we have achieved, in what time frame and where we need
to go.
Violet: Now, Jenni, let's get your thoughts on this. You
know, even
though there is unity of purpose, do you think it's essential
that people
with different approaches find different paths?
Jenni: I think you know we shouldn't over-theorise this problem
because I
think that we might think that we are theorising and we will find
a
solution, but I think actually therein lies our problem; we have theorised
too much. It's time to stop talking and start doing something. And, if we
start to do something, all those initiatives that are happening here and
there could become more focused and when you start to do things those people
who are wanting to do and stop talking will begin to take steps in one
direction and focus.
The bottom line that we have is we can
call an election as part of
mass action, but the point is that we have
someone who's an expert at
rigging elections. We now can no longer exercise
those democratic rights.
The only way open to us is people power and that
involves doing things and
not theorising, and I think, for me, that is the
bottom line. The other
issue is on the liberation war. Yes, a liberation war
was fought, but what
is the result? T
he result is further
disempowerment of the people. The result is there
is no health, there are no
jobs, no facilities, there's no education; all of
those things. But, it's
time to stop complaining about those. Remove the
system that has put this
further persecution in place, and the only way we
can do that is by doing
something.
If we talk of social justice we can now complain on and
on and on, but
now the time is to demand it. And, the only way we can demand
it is people
power in the street with those brave enough to do it. If
they're not brave
enough and they want to spend time cooking it in the
kitchen, please let
them stay there and let other people get out and
actually start doing it.
Violet: Priscilla, can you comment on
this? Jenni says people want to
see tangible results
Priscilla: I think what the problem is, the basic problem in this
country
is that we have created individuals and institutions who believe
that they
are the only ones who are able to do certain things in a certain
way, and we
therefore create a crisis of expectations. I still go back to my
point
Violet.
Mass action is only but one; going into the streets is only
but one
way of pushing and pressurising the regime. There are other ways and
other
methods of pressurising the regime so that it can open up spaces. In
fact,
sometimes I actually think that it is because we have become so
one-dimensional that we create the kind of problems that we face as
Zimbabweans.
We go out and we say to Zimbabweans: the only way
to get rid of this
regime is for people to go into the streets. Some of us
have participated in
mass actions and final pushes before. We have had women
getting raped, we
have had homes being destroyed and there has not been any
support system in
this country; not any support systems in the international
world, not the
view to create strategy in different areas.
In
Nkayi it may be a different thing altogether, it may be about
mobilising
people and making sure that they go and say 'we will not have a
ZANU PF
representative in this place, whether it's in council, whether it's
in
parliament, whether it's in Senate.' Elections are part of a legitimate
struggle in this country. We will not remove the Mugabe regime until we are
able to get people to get into those areas and vote, and I don't agree with
people, I know that elections have been rigged, but they've been rigged
because we have not been able to sufficiently move the numbers that we need
to be able to ensure that this regime does not.
And, even when
it's done, we need to have the legitimate basis to
mobilise people. People
don't get mobilised if they don't see something has
been stolen from them at
this time. It doesn't matter which country you look
at where people have
gone to the streets and been able to push a regime to
change a position.
It's been after people have been pushed either told that
something have been
stolen from them, which is why we all say that 2002 was
probably the time in
which we could have been able to mobilise the
sufficient numbers that are
there.
But, my basic line Violet is that let's start appreciating
that
everybody who's doing anything in this country is doing a good job.
We
only need to begin to live. It's not the person just going into the
street
and been arrested who is doing something that will remove the regime.
It's
that woman who like I said walks 85kms to go to a rally, knowing pretty
well
that they will be in trouble tomorrow, they are doing something to
remove
the regime.
Let's encourage them and let's say 'you are
doing a good job, and what
more do you need to do? The WOZA women who get
arrested over the weekend or
over one weekend and stayed singing in the
cells, lets encourage them so
that the regime is dealing with multi faceted
processes and procedures. So,
not one person has an answer to the problems
of this country. You can say
that, then you can begin to move together. But,
unfortunately, we have a
situation when somebody says that their strategy
and their way of doing
things is the only way that you can get the regime
out. That is not true,
and it will not happen.
Violet: Now
Thoko what can you say about this? It seems, if I heard
Jenni correctly, she
says that it's time for action and Priscilla says mass
action is not the
only way. Now it seems there is a huge divide in terms of
social standing
such that people don't agree on the formula for the
Zimbabwean crisis. You
know, some say there appears to be a shared goal but
there seems not to be a
united view. Shouldn't there be a meeting of minds
between feminists,
intellectuals and the grassroots?
Thoko: Ah it would be ideal to
have a meeting of the minds and we all
go on, but also I think people are
saying different things in a certain way,
and, I think I do agree with
Priscilla where she says our definition of mass
action is wanting to see
people in the streets tomorrow kind of thing. I
think that is
problematic.
That also negates, like Sekai said, all the other
things that are
happening and the other co-operation that is happening. And,
for me, it's
saying that all those should be encouraged so that we have more
people
actually taking part because my point of contention is that there
are too
few people struggling. There is that woman who walks that much,
there are
those 100 and whatever women from WOZA who do something, there is
the MDC
trying to mobilise within their structures, but, we do not have the
critical
mass that is relevant and that talks to actually the hardships of
this
country.
And, I think the hardships of this country, the
response from me as an
individual old Zimbabwean does not match what we want
to do. Yes, there are
quite a lot of people doing a lot of things, but
those quite a lot of people
and a lot of initiatives need much more of us to
do. And, there is also the
need then to recognise that there will be
different strategies and that bit
where people are working together, they
should strengthen that and make it
visible most probably.
Also,
the other thing is that people want to see what they want to
see, and they
will then not see what might be there. But, my contention is
that with all
of us Zimbabweans that we really need to be involved in some
of all those
initiatives and processes that are happening and maybe have a
way of
strengthening them so that the pockets of action can also build a
bulk work
to pushing what we want to push through.
Jenni: What I'm concerned
about.
Sekai: There was something about theory and that people
should stop
theorising.
Violet: Sekai, just a sec, I think
Jenni wanted to comment to what
Thoko has just said, is that
correct?
Jenni: Yes, I wanted to respond to Thoko and also maybe
to ask a
question of Priscilla. Here, I want us to be very clear, because
activists
like myself, radical activists like myself look at the definition
of mass
action in terms of non-violent people power demanding social
justice,
demanding their rights on bread and butter issues. And, we are
just
concerned, as the women of WOZA that there is a re-defining of that
word
mass action.
It is re-defined by politicians, it's being
re-defined by the media
and it's something that we are very worried about
and, perhaps, for
purposes of this interview, it is important for us to
define what we are
referring to because I have no objection to what
Priscilla is doing, to what
Amai Holland is doing. Those are important
processes, I have no wish to be
in Parliament, but we need a democratic
system that will come into place and
be ready to bring a new democratic
dispensation when the people power have
achieved their demand for social
justice. We must be clear, but for me a
woman walking 65 kms to go and
attend a rally is exercising her political
right but it is NOT mass action.
Mass action for me is action and it is by
the masses in one fell scoop in a
non-violent activity.
Violet: Priscilla, can you
respond?
Priscilla: In fact, that's where the problem is. For me,
it's about
civic disobedience; it's about pressurising the regime. Elections
in this
country are in fact about pressurising the regime. Elections are not
a
luxury in this country. Anybody who decides to stand for election in this
country is basically standing up to a regime.
They can die,
their children can die, they can lose their jobs, they
can literally lose
their livelihood. So for anybody to think that because
they have walked in
the streets and they have been arrested that is mass
action. That is not
true. Civic disobedience comes in various forms and it's
important that we
respect that. We respect the fact there are certain
individuals right now
who are in civic movements who are unable to live in
their homes because
just the mere fact of being said you are in the ZCTU,
the mere fact of
being called you are in the NCA, the mere fact that you are
Pius Ncube means
you have stood up to a regime.
This is an activist Pius Ncube by
what he's saying and what he's
doing, he's mobilising people power. So it's
not about the person who's
going into the street only who can call
themselves a radical activist.
Anybody who stands up to the regime is
having some form of civic
disobedience, they are beating on the system.
There are risks one way or
the other and the more we begin to appreciate
that it doesn't matter what
they have done or what we are doing, everything
is equal in terms of beating
the system.
In fact, it goes back
to the ZANU PF mentality where ZANU PF believes
that the only person who is
said to have dealt with the Smith regime is the
one who held the gun. They
are not the only people that were in the struggle
that got the Smith regime
down. The people that were in outside that
mobilised the international
community to put sanctions on the Smith regime
were standing up to the
regime; they were fighters. The women that carried
the sadzas on their back
during the pungwe were beating on the regime.
They may not have
held the guns, they may not have shot the soldier,
but they did a part and
everybody is a radical activist in whatever manner.
And that woman who is
walking, as far as I'm concerned, it is not just
exercising a political
right, it is saying a statement; it is saying 'to
hell with you Robert',
deny me food but I will continue to be publicly
associated with something
that you say should not happen in this country.
That's where we
need to get back to and that's where my bone of
contention is. The more we
respect and thank everybody, no-one is having a
luxury in this system.
Everybody, in whatever way they are doing are having
disobedience; they are
beating on the system and trying to weaken the
system. You may not think it
is the right way, but they are doing something.
Violet: Amai
Holland we will come to you just now but I just.
Sekai: I have no
electricity, I haven't had water, it's now dark, I
can't even write things
down so I can go on with the conversation as well,
but can I just say
something I am thinking about now about what Priscilla
and Jenni are
saying?
Violet: Alright, OK
Sekai: Really, time for
clichés is gone, if we don't have our theory
right our practice also doesn't
come out right. If we understood more our
history of what happened before us
we might get our mass action correct
because all the actions that people are
taking now in their different
outposts, which is how it looks now, is
working towards the actual action
that we all want.
So, I
really think that we should, when we have a debate like this,
try and listen
to what each of us is saying. Because, what each of us is
saying is
extremely important in putting in the big pot. I'm sorry I'm
talking in the
dark because it's quite dark now and we have no water or
electricity here in
Woodville.
Violet: That's Zimbabwe for you! Now, I just wanted to
go back to
Jenni Williams because I am sure she would like to respond to
what Priscilla
was saying. And, I wanted to add a question for Jenni that do
you believe
that the intellectual and/or the feminist agenda is relevant to
the daily
existence of people in Zimbabwe at present?
Thoko:
Hey! Violet why do you divide and rule us!
Violet No
I.
Jenni: Firstly, I think, what I wanted to clarify, and this I
think
this is why we could have been more focused on exactly what we were
debating, because I agree that civil disobedience comes in many forms and
that many Zimbabweans are not spectators; they are civilly disobedient or
respecting their rights more than anyone else.
But, you know, I
still come back to the point here of we need to be
more responsible in what
we are defining mass action as, and, when we talk
about it, what exactly are
we talking about. And why we have a special
point, and I am belabouring
this, is because it's something, mass action is
a terminology and words
that is thrown out, in my view, very irresponsibly.
It's something
that needs to be planned and done very, very carefully
and non violently.
So I still want us to be clear are we talking of mass
action or are we
talking of civil disobedience because we can argue all of
those points but
get nowhere.
The other issue here is it is very important that
every single person
is engaged in the Zimbabwean struggle and they are
engaged because there
aren't special shops for intellectuals, there aren't
special shops for ZANU
PF people, there aren't special shops for feminists.
There's only one place
and one type of bearers cheque, courtesy of Gideon
Gono, that you buy with.
They all have to be engaged. But for me
the bottom line is it's the
mothers who are facing most of the burden; the
women in Zimbabwe who are
carrying most of that burden on their shoulders
and they aren't really
interested in great intellectual discourse and they
don't even really want
to know what a feminist is because what they want to
know is how can I
demand a socially just Zimbabwe where I will genuinely
have rights and my
children will have those rights and I can feel that the
liberation struggle
has come to something, because right now, most
Zimbabweans think it came to
naught.
And I think that for me is
the major, major thing, we don't want to be
divide and rule but right now,
unless an intellectual and a feminist is
prepared to come and rub shoulders
with those ordinary people in the street
who make up the masses, that's why
it's mass action, we aren't going to get
very far.
Violet:
That was Part Two in a series of discussions with the women
leaders of the
opposition movement in Zimbabwe. There clearly needs to be
a uniting force
to bring groups together to fight for change and Zimbabweans
are looking
for role models.
But, there are concerns that divisions still
exist within the
opposition movement. In next week's discussion we see
that feelings
between the camps are still raw and that a level of mistrust
continues to
haunt the opposition groups. The key issues are given a full
airing as the
debate continues, so don't miss the final segment next
Tuesday.
IOL
September 06
2006 at 01:47PM
Harare - Witch doctors in Zimbabwe have been given
the authority to
issue their patients with sick notes allowing them time off
work, it was
reported on Wednesday.
A senior official in the
ministry of health also said that
conventional doctors should be allowed to
refer problem cases to the nangas
or traditional healers.
But
the healers will not be allowed to give their patients more than a
week off
work, Deputy Health Minister Edwin Muguti was quoted as saying by
the
state-controlled Herald newspaper.
"It has become obvious that
conventional medicines are not the be all
of medicine for if they were, why
else would we still have HIV, BP, asthma,
all of which have no cure," Muguti
said.
"It is important that we encourage our traditional
medical
practitioners and conventional doctors to work together for the
benefit of
our people," he said.
Rising medical costs have put
conventional medical treatment out of
the reach of many and increasing
numbers of Zimbabweans are reported to be
turning to nangas for
help.
There has also been an upsurge in the number of faith
healers, some of
whom dangerously claim to cure HIV and Aids, which affects
around one in
five Zimbabweans.
There are at least 1 500
registered traditional healers in Zimbabwe,
the Herald reports. Only those
registered with the Traditional Medical
Practitioners Council will be
allowed to give patients off days, it added.
Zimbabwe, which is in
the middle of a severe economic crisis, is
critically short of qualified
medical doctors and nursing staff, many of
whom have left the country to
practice abroad.
Traditional beliefs still hold a lot of sway in
Zimbabwean society.
In July, President Robert Mugabe warned
officials from his ruling
Zanu-PF party not to consult witch doctors over
the thorny issue of who will
succeed him.
The president, who
has been in power for 26 years, is expected to step
down when his current
term ends in 2008. - Sapa-dpa
IOL
September 06
2006 at 12:50PM
Harare - Zimbabwe's police chief said his force is
starved for funds
and lacks basic equipment to carry out its job, a local
newspaper reported
Wednesday.
"We as police are at a minimum in
terms of resources," the private
Daily Mirror quoted the police
commissioner, Augustine Chihuri, as saying.
Chihuri told a
parliamentary committee on defence and home affairs
that the police force
was given Z$1,4-billion (R40,3-million) this year but
the money ran out in a
month.
"We had to make an urgent appeal to government saying they
have to
give us money or we close shop and stop operating, and we were given
Z$15-billion dollars," the state-run Herald newspaper quoted him as
saying.
The police boss said the criminal
investigations department (CID) was
operating with makeshift equipment, or
none at all.
"The CID needs basic equipment like brushes, rape kits
and DNA testing
equipment," Chihuri told the Daily Mirror.
"In
most cases we end up using mechanical evidence rather than
scientific
evidence which is more reliable."
Zimbabwe's police force, often
accused of brutalising civilians during
protests, is one of various state
departments bearing the brunt of the
country's economic crisis.
Police officers often use commuter buses or cycle or walk to crime
scenes as
police stations either do not have cars or fuel to run the few
available
vehicles.
They were dealt a further blow when a British vehicle
manufacturer
stopped suppling them with spares following an embargo by
Zimbabwe's
erstwhile partners in the West.
The southern African
country is in the throes of economic crisis
characterised by record
inflation which peaked at nearly 1 200 percent in
April and chronic
shortages of fuel and basic foodstuffs. - Sapa-AFP
VOA
By Blessing Zulu
Washington
05 September
2006
Zimbabwe's ruling party has come under fire for
demanding donations of cash,
cattle or maize from civil servants, farmers
and businesses to help finance
the party's annual conference to be held in
Goromonzi, Mashonaland East, in
December.
The unwelcome solicitations
have been organized by by Rural Housing Minister
Joe Biggie Matiza, also
finance secretary for ZANU-PF's Mashonaland East
organization. The
conference will be held at a school in Goromonzi, 40
kilometers from
Harare.
Business sources including bank executives who spoke on condition
that they
not be named, said they have been pressured by ZANU-PF to make
cash
donations.
ZANU-PF insiders said party finances are in bad shape
because companies
controlled by the political organization, such as Zidco
Holdings, M&S
Syndicate, First Banking Corporation, Jongwe Printers and
Treger Holdings,
are deep in the red.
U.S. and European sanctions may
have had something to do with this. M&S in
2004 was placed on a list of
sanctioned Zimbabwean businesses which are
denied access to the U.S.
financial system, among other so-called targeted
sanctions.
An
investigation by ZANU-PF Finance Secretary David Karimanzira and
ex-finance
Minister Simba Makoni was launched upon receipt of a damning
external audit
which cited serious problems in party finances. Political
Commissar Elliot
Manyika declined to comment on the probe or donation
requests, referring all
questions to Matiza.
For commentary and perspective on the ruling party's
solicitation of funds,
reporter Blessing Zulu of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe
turned to human rights
lawyer Jacob Mafume, who is also coordinator of the
Crisis in Zimbabwe
Coalition.
Business Report
September 6, 2006
By Justin Brown
Johannesburg -
Zimbabwe Platinum Mines (Zimplats), which is 87 percent owned
by South
Africa's second-largest platinum mining company, Impala Platinum
(Implats),
is concerned about Zimbabwe's deteriorating power supply
infrastructure,
which is a critical factor in the company's overall growth
strategy.
Implats chief executive David Brown said last week that a
key issue for the
company in Zimbabwe was certainty of electricity
supply.
"Power supply is critical to the success of future development,"
Zimplats
chief executive Greg Sebborn said in the company's 2006 annual
report, which
was released yesterday.
"Zimplats will urgently engage
the government and the Zimbabwe Electricity
Supply Authority on ways to
source and secure adequate power supplies for
its growth plans," Sebborn
added.
Zimplats current electricity base load is projected at 50
megawatts during
the company's year to June 2007.
Zimplats produced
90 000 ounces of platinum in the year to June and the
company wants to
increase output to 160 000 ounces at a cost of $258 million
(R1.9 billion)
by financial 2011. The Ngezi expansion on the Great Dyke in
Zimbabwe will
see two new underground mines built, as well as a smelter. In
addition, the
group has initiated a study to increase its platinum
production to 300 000
ounces an annum. Over 15 to 20 years, Zimplats would
increase its annual
platinum output to 1 million ounces.
During the phase one
expansion to 160 000 ounces, Zimplats power need was
expected to grow to
about 75MW, followed by 125MW during phase two, over
200MW in phase three
and 400MW during phase four, according to the Zimplats
annual
report.
Zimbabwe is vital to Implats production growth as the company has
limited
options in South Africa.
Zimplats faces a number of threats
in Zimbabwe, including uncertainty over
the indigenisation requirements and
skyrocketing inflation. An
indigenisation requirement of 30 percent was
realistic, while the Zimbabwean
government persisted with 51 percent, said
Brown. "The economic and
sociopolitical environment in Zimbabwe has
unfortunately deteriorated
further," said chairman Mike
Houston.
Houston also expressed concern about the negative impact that
the extended
economic downturn was having on Zimbabwe's infrastructure, in
particular the
power supply, which might impact on Zimplats operations.
VOA
By
Jonga Kandemiiri
Washington
05 September
2006
Taxpayers who want to block the sale of a house in the posh
Highlands
section of the capital to Harare Commission Chairwoman Sekesai
Makwavarara
for a fraction of its value are stepping up action following
news she made a
deposit on the deal.
Reports said Makwavarara made a
Z$1.4 million ($US5,600) down-payment last
week on the property. The payment
was regarded by many as a tactical move in
a battle to conclude the sale
that will be decided by a committee her
commission appointed.
Critics
including he Combined Harare Residents Association have objected to
the sale
because the house on Reinfontein Close has an estimated market
value of
Z$13.75 million but is proposed for sale to Makwavarara for just
Z$5.5
million dollars.
The basis for such a deeply discounted sale is the
so-called "standing
resolution" that the Harare City Council passed in the
days before 2002 when
it was controlled by the ruling Zanu-PF party. The
government installed the
commission in 2004, setting aside an MDC mayor and
most of the capital's
elected city council.
Former Harare Mayor Elias
Mudzuri, now a top official in the opposition
Movement for Democratic Change
faction led by party founder Morgan
Tsvangirai, said the value of such a
municipal property, and the discounted
price, should be set by the elected
council, in the absence of which the
sale to Makwavarara should not go
through.
Residents have until September 13 to make known their objections
to the
sale.
Opponents of the sale include the ZANU-PF Harare
provincial party. Its
spokesman, William Nhara, told reporter Jonga
Kandemiiri of VOA's Studio 7
for Zimbabwe that his party also wants to
dissolve the commission and hand
local government back to an elected council
once the Makwavarara housing
saga has been resolved.
VOA
By Jonga Kandemiiri
Washington
06 September
2006
Though the maize harvest season is well past and planting season
is coming
up fast, Zimbabwe's Grain Marketing Board state monopoly has still
not
collected thousands of tonnes of maize sitting in piles by the country's
rural roadsides for lack of trucks and fuel. This and other factors are
leading experts to revise down harvest estimates.
Agriculture
Secretary Simon Pazvakavambwa told the parliamentary committee
on
agriculture this week that there remains much maize to be collected. He
also
told the committee that staff members of the GMB intelligence section
had
been dispatched in advance around the country to determine the actual
collection situation.
The government has estimated the maize harvest
at 1.35 million metric
tonnes, but some experts say that it is not likely to
exceed 700,000 tonnes.
Asked for figures on how much maize it has
collected and how much is
estimated to remain in the hands of producers, the
Grain Marketing Board
referred the request to the Agriculture Ministry,
which did not respond to a
faxed questionnaire. The GMB said recently that
it has already collected
230,000 tonnes of maize.
Opposition
agriculture spokesman Renson Gasela, a member of the Movement for
Democratic
Change faction led by Arthur Mutambara, told reporter Jonga
Kandemiiri of
VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that official delays in collecting
maize and
paying farmers could lead farmers to reduce acreage planted in
maize next
season.
pbs.org
Digging Deeper
by Mark Glaser, 11:23AM
The government shuts down
independent newspapers. It jams radio signals
from outside the country.
Internet access is sporadic. Inflation is out of
control. A bill is in
Parliament that would allow the government to censor
private email
communications.
Welcome to Zimbabwe, the south African country born out
of the former
Rhodesia in 1980 and led by strongman President Robert Mugabe
every day
since its independence from British colonialism. Though the
country has
immense natural beauty including the Victoria Falls and
wildlife, it also
has a rough recent history for punishing and censoring the
press. Reporters
Without Borders rates Zimbabwe's press freedom as a very
serious situation .
(You can read the country's capsule history here
.)
Authorities closed down four newspapers after a 2002 law was passed,
the
Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA), which made
it a
crime to be a journalist without a special government-issued
license.
Recently, I received an email from Zimbabwean freelance
journalist, Frank
Chikowore (pictured above), who was looking for
assignments from Western
media outlets. I had written about the trouble for
the Zimbabwean media
before for Online Journalism Review, covering the Daily
News moving
operations online. Chikowore, 26, updated me on the
deteriorating situation
there for independent journalists, who he says now
have to live like "street
beggars" if they aren't working for the state-run
media.
While former Zimbabwe-based journalists have moved out of the
country and
set up their own news sites such as ZimOnline and NewZimbabwe ,
the
remaining journalists are faced with a choice of toeing the party line
for
Mugabe or facing possible jail time or worse for reporting the truth.
Chikowore spent a horrifying night in jail in 2005 after filming police
beating street vendors.
The following is an edited version of my
email correspondence with
Chikowore, who told me how bad things were for
journalists in Zimbabwe - and
he has little hope for the Internet becoming a
transformative force inside
Zimbabwe, where so few people have access to the
Net.
Tell me a bit about your background in journalism.
Frank
Chikowore: I started my journalism in 1999 with a provincial newspaper
called The Nation that was covering stories for Matabeleland North Province,
a province for the Ndebele minority. By then I was 19 years old and now I am
26. Because I could not pay for my rentals and bills with the salary I was
getting, I took the "hard decision" (by then) to be a freelance journalist.
My work was published by several media organizations, both print and
electronic. That was before I was employed by the Weekly Times in 2005 as a
senior reporter. Unfortunately, the paper was banned by the government in
the same year and I was rendered jobless together with other employees. Up
until today, I have been freelancing.
What's the current state of the
press in Zimbabwe?
Chikowore: The media in Zimbabwe is so polarized. The
government controls
the majority of the newspapers. It also runs all the
radio stations and the
only television station that the country has. We have
only one independent
daily newspaper which is not so independent as it is
being run by well-known
state security agents who were exposed in what
became to be known as the
Mediagate scandal . I am talking of the Daily
Mirror which is published by
the Zimbabwe Mirror Newspapers Group. The group
also publishes one weekly
paper, The Sunday Mirror.
Four newspapers
have been closed by the government since the promulgation of
the Access to
Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) in March
2002. These
include the Daily News, the Daily News on Sunday, The Weekly
Times and The
Tribune. Several journalists are living like street beggars as
a result of
these closures.
Tell me about the time you were arrested in 2005 by
police. How long were
you in jail and how did you get out?
Chikowore:
I had just finished an assignment when I bumped into police
details beating
vendors whom they accused of illegally dealing in foreign
currency and
making the city of Harare dirty. I started filming the
incident. The police
pounced after realizing that I was capturing their
heinous activities on
camera. They assaulted me with cleched fists, booted
feet and butts of their
guns. The police details used the sharp-pointed
front part of the gun to
assault me. It was really painful. If the trigger
had been pulled by mistake
during the beating, I would have been history by
now. At one point the gun
was pointed onto my head. I am short of words to
explain how I felt at that
moment.tears. That was the first time I turned to
God.
They took me
to Harare Central Police Station, beating me along the way,
accusing me of
being an enemy of the state. It was difficult for my lawyers
to locate me as
I was being taken from one room to the other. They found me
after about
three hours of searching. Normally it takes less than five
minutes to locate
a prisoner at the station. What boggles my mind is that
the police went on
to assault me even though I had a government license to
practice journalism.
Even if I didn't have the accreditation, the police had
no right to assault
me. It was horrible, the cells were overcrowded and they
were very
filthy.
I was in jail for one night, in an overcrowded cell with no
access to food
and water. For me, a night in jail was like a decade because
of the inhuman
conditions that prisoners are living in. If I had a choice, I
wouldn't go
there (to the police cells) again. It was like I had been
sentenced already.
They accused me of all sorts of things, including
mercenarism. They asked me
about a shadowy organization calling itself
Zvakwana that is a strong critic
of President Robert Mugabe's
administration. Frankly, I do not know who
was/is behind this shadowy group.
I am actually interested in getting to
know who is calling the shots in this
organization just like the police are.
But the police would hear none of
it.
I was released without charges being leveled against me, thanks to
the Media
Institute of Southern Africa and Harare lawyer Jessie Fungai
Majome who
facilitated my release. The police could not charge me because I
was doing
my duties lawfully, they had not basis whatsoever for leveling
criminal
charges against me.
[For first-person accounts from
Chikowore on his jail experience, read this
story and this one .]
Do
you fear that reporting news in Zimbabwe is dangerous and that you could
be
arrested again? How do you protect yourself from that?
Chikowore: When
one is a journalist in Zimbabwe, he or she must be prepared
to be arrested
anytime. I remember a time when I lost my girlfriend because
she didn't want
to be associated with journalists for they are always
targeted by the state.
The fear of being arrested has caused many
journalists not to do their work
effectively in some instances. But that is
no excuse for not following the
ethics of the profession; one really has to
be serious and aggressive to get
the readers and listeners informed.
Be that as it may, I have always
tried to be very objective in my reporting.
One cannot claim that he is a
protected journalist unless he is working in
cahoots with the state. We are
informed that the intelligence has planted
some of its operatives in the
media and there has killed debate among
journalists on key
issues.
How do journalists get the news out around the censorship? Do
they use the
Internet or blogs?
Chikowore: Unfortunately blogging is
still very unpopular in Zimbabwe and
most African countries. Of course the
use of the Internet has enabled
journalists to transmit their news and
information to their readers and
listeners but the cost of doing so is very
[high] considering that several
journalists are not gainfully employed and
they live by the grace of God. In
fact, journalists have been reduced to
beggars in Zimbabwe. Journalists now
use pseudonyms as the government
continues with its onslaught against
independent journalists. The cost of
registering as a foreign correspondent
has become inhibitive for journalists
to register - hence they prefer using
pseudonyms.
Do more people have
Internet access now than a few years ago? Are there
cyber cafes? Who can
afford Net access?
Chikowore: The majority of the people have no access
to the Internet in
their homes. People rely on Internet cafes while those
who are privileged to
be working access the Internet at their work places.
Even some of the
employed citizens do not have Internet access as it is only
restricted to
their bosses. There is generally no improvement in terms of
access to the
Internet by the people. Although there are quite a number of
Internet
service providers in Zimbabwe today, the only fixed telephone
provider,
TelOne, is taking too long to connect phone lines which are used
by
subscribers to connect to the Internet. Radio link is still very
unpopular
and expensive for Zimbabweans.
Has the government tried to
block Internet sites or access? Which ones?
Chikowore: The government has
not blocked any Internet sites but has
proposed a law that will allow state
agents to censor email communication
which several human rights activists
have condemned saying it undermines the
right to privacy. The bill is before
Parliament and it will become law once
Parliament approves it. The chances
of it being approved are very high as
President Mugabe's party has a
two-thirds parliamentary majority and it is
known for rubber-stamping
anything that is brought to Parliament by Zanu PF
[ruling party]
members.
The state is currently jamming Studio 7 broadcasts to Zimbabwe.
The station
broadcasts Zimbabwean news and information from Voice of America
studios in
Washington, DC, and is run by exiled Zimbabwean journalists. The
government
has described Studio 7's broadcasts as hostile. The privately
owned Voice of
the People (VOP) radio station was also closed recently.
Capital Radio was
also closed and SW Radio Africa was jammed at several
occasions. The same
happened to Joy TV that was owned by veteran
journalist-cum-politician James
Makamba. The media is really not
free.
Is there a way for us in the West to help out the situation with
journalists
there being beggars?
Chikowore: I would want to urge our
media colleagues in the international
community to continue condemning the
harassment of media practitioners as
and when it is necessary. This would
help in keeping the government on its
toes and at the same [time] I think
this would make the operating conditions
better for journalists. I would
really encourage other media organizations
to adopt some of the journalists
that were left jobless after the closure of
their organizations. That would
make them people of better standing in
society. Even getting scholarships
for them would be another great idea. At
least that would rehabilitate their
disturbed minds.
Do you have hope that things might change there
politically or in the media?
What might happen?
Chikowore: The only
solution to all the problems we are facing in Zimbabwe
[is] a political
solution. The present government has no new ideas and what
is needed is
fresh blood. We can still give them the benefit of doubt but
there must be
political will which is currently lacking. The media has a
greater potential
of developing as the literacy rate is getting higher by
the day, but there
is no one who is prepared to invest in the media today
because of the tough
legislations that govern the operations of the media.
Until such draconian
laws like AIPPA are scrapped, that is when we can talk
of development in the
media sector.
*****
CPJ's Take and More Resources
Elisabeth
Witchel, the journalist assistance program coordinator for the
Committee to
Protect Journalists , has followed the plight of Zimbabwean
journalists
closely. She told me via email that Chikowore's comments about
the terrible
situation in Zimbabwe was in line with what she had heard from
other
journalists who had left Zimbabwe. Here are some of the main points
she made
to me:
It is important to understand that many journalists who were
forced out of
work [in Zimbabwe] are extremely vulnerable to arrest and
other forms of
persecution without the protection of established media
outlets. Moreover
those who have been driven out of the country are often
victims of smear
campaigns by the government. Competition, cultural
differences and legal
obstacles make it very difficult for even an
experienced, well respected
journalist to find work in his field in a new
country.
Many journalists I met are resourceful, adaptable people who
are willing
to work in any capacity they can and have taken service sector
and factory
jobs to get by and help their families. Unfortunately when a
journalist is
squeezed out of the field and into this kind of work, it gives
fodder to the
Mugabe administration to paint an unfair, demeaning picture of
its critics.
Zimbabwe media outside the country - online, print and
radio - plays an
important role in keeping the news coming out of Zimbabwe
and into the
international community. Sadly penetration of exile media into
Zimbabwe is
quite limited, but some does get through and circulates. It also
keeps the
Diaspora engaged and informed and able to develop campaigns to
bring global
attention to the problems in their country, which many
Zimbabwean
journalists feel are underreported in the international media.
Blogs can
certainly help bring attention to this and add to the diversity of
views and
number of platforms for political debate.
September 6,
2006,
By Michael Appel
Johannesburg (AND) Following
the expulsion of white farmers from
Zimbabwe in 2002 under the countries
controversial land reform project, more
white Zimbabwean farmers have been
welcomed in Nigeria in an effort to
further boost the country's agricultural
sector.
The first group of white Zimbabwean farmers entered Nigeria
in 2004,
and immediately began work at Shonga, 110 km north of Ilorin, and
harvested
their first maize and soya bean crop this year.
The
Nigerian government on Wednesday said it will invite more white
Zimbabwean
farmers to come and farm its land, in an effort to boost existing
agricultural programmes, reported the News Agency of Nigeria
(NAN).
Nigeria's state agriculture commissioner, Saka Onimago, said
that the
white farmers had brought a lot of economic development to the
state.
The NAN reported that he added, "The project is becoming
more
interesting as it has changed the perception of most traditional
farmers
about mechanised farming".
He said Nigeria's commercial
farmers were impressed by the farmers
expertise and skill in the mechanised
farming.
20 000 hectares of land are set to be allocated to
Zimbabwean farmers
entering the country to boost the agricultural sector of
the economy.
AND Agencies
By
Lance Guma
06 September 2006
It could be double whammy for
Mugabe's regime if lawyers representing
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
(ZCTU) Secretary General Wellington
Chibhebhe have their way. What started
out as an alleged attempt by the
police to cover up the assault of the union
leader is now threatening to
snowball into a test case on the legality of
both the Criminal Codification
and Reform Act and Presidential Powers
(Temporary Measures) (Currency
Revaluation) Regulations 2006.
Chibhebhe is on trial for allegedly assaulting a police officer and
resisting arrest at a roadblock manned by police searching for large sums of
money under the controversial 'project sunrise' exercise launched by the
Reserve Bank. Chibhebhe denies the charge and claims it's actually the
police officer that assaulted him. Alec Muchadehama the lawyer in the case
has given notice to the Mbare magistrate court that they want the matter
referred to the Supreme Court so as to challenge both the law being used to
charge his client and the one that empowered the police to search Chibhebhe
in the first place.
Prosecutor Edmore Nyazamba has indicated
that they will oppose the
request by the defence. Meanwhile Mbare magistrate
Never Katiyo is expected
to make a ruling on the application on Thursday.
Muchadehama says they do
not expect to get a negative decision unless the
magistrate decides to take
the view that 'the application is frivolous or
vexatious.' This he says will
require that they appeal, but either way the
matter would wind up in the
Supreme Court.
Police at a
roadblock assaulted Chibhebhe before arresting him.
According to ZCTU
spokesman Mlamleli Sibanda, Chibhebhe was travelling from
Masvingo to Harare
over the Heroes holiday in August before being stopped.
He is said to have
challenged the legality of the currency searches at which
point an officer
throttled him and slapped him twice in the face while he
was still sitting
in the car wearing his seat belt. All this happened in
front of his wife and
children. The state media quickly went on the
defensive with ZBC Radio
reporting that he had been arrested for assaulting
a police officer and
refusing to co-operate at a roadblock.
SW Radio Africa
Zimbabwe news
zimbabwejournalists.com
By
Tabani Moyo
ON the 29th of July 2006, an estimated 500 leaders
from the church,
student movements, labour, political parties, women's
movement and the civil
society at large convened at the Rainbow Tours
grounds under the umbrella
banner of The Save Zimbabwe
Convention.
The convention was in response to the intricate
Zimbabwean crisis
borne out of the corrosive government policies and equally
so the
illegitimacy of the Robert Mugabe led government. This article shall
revolve
around the out come of the convention and how it feeds to the grand
picture
of liberating the country from the precipice of socio-political and
economic
demise.
The convention, which was convened by the
Christian Alliance came out
with seven noble resolutions and adopted the
Democracy Charter as the main
instruments of challenging the enigma
demeanour of Zanu PF holding into
power till perpetuity.
Chief
among them is resolution number one, which saw the afore stated
pro-democracy movements pledging unity against the faggots of the oppressive
regime that has clung to power for the past quarter of a century through
both hook and crook.
On the other end, the Democracy Charter,
which is modelled on the same
lines of the Freedom Charter of South Africa
that defined the tone of the
struggle against apartheid, was found against
the austere of the weakening
of the bodies that have been relentlessly
engaging the regime for the past
twenty-five years.
The outcome
of the convention, if enforced will definitely brew a
democratic storm.
Kindred storms which defined the face of local politics
such as the students
uprisings in the let 1980s against corruption by Robert
Mugabe's "holy
cows", the workforce causing pandemonium in the late 90s, the
peasants
genuinely roaring for equitable land distribution programme, the
constitutional processes which led to the 2000 referendum, and the gallant
victories in the 2000, 2002 and 2005 elections which were robbed by Zanu PF
through defective electoral processes and constitutional framework will
become inevitable.
It is in tandem with resolution number one,
that the above stated
movements which long graduated from the brutality of
the incumbent state
should enforce the resolutions in a bid to save the
nation from the razor
sharp jaws of Zanu PF. The Democracy Charter will
serve as the campus and
glue to keep the mammoth ship on course. This
approach has produced
favourable results in the land mine political
environment in countries such
as Kenya, Sebia, South Africa to mention just
but a few.
The Unity resolution, is a milestone in that it notes
the religious
task by the government since the early 1980s of using both the
legal and
illegal means of weakening progressive forces in its bid to
maintain the
status quo.
The state footprints are evident in
the formation of surrogate
organisations to promote the state citadels
against its dwindling power
base. Sullenness organisations such as ZICOSU,
Zimbabwe Federation of Trade
Unions, National Development Assembly (as
revealed by Professor Jonathan
Moyo) sprouted from the Zanu PF coffers to
undermine the splendid work of
Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU),
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
(ZCTU) and National Constitutional
Assembly respectively.
The recent co-opting of the Bishop Manhanga
led church wing forms part
of the dragnet strategy of the regime, which it
has been employing for the
better part of its existence. The realisation by
Zanu PF of its power
erosion led to the manifestation of the one party state
agenda through the
use of coercion and extra-legal methodologies, firstly
culminating in the
subjugation and imminent swallowing of Zapu. The
co-option of the war
veterans, peasants from the broader impetus movement
spell out with alacrity
the need of a unified approach towards the
regime.
Resolution number five is quoted as saying: "We resolve
that there is
need for sustainable and peaceful democratic mass resistance
to create a
situation where the government is compelled to talk to its
people to resolve
the crisis. This should be done through the creation of a
broad alliance for
coordinated efforts."
It is in this area
that both the civil society and the opposition
political parties have been
limping specifically in the aftermath of what
the late Professor Masipula
Sithole referred to as the "stolen election".
There has been a lack of
consistence in the opposition after the 2002
presidential election towards
exploring this avenue, with the June 2003
"final push" being the exceptional
case in settling for the democratic
resistance as a viable option of holding
the regime accountable for its
record high human rights abuses and the
prevailing kwashiorkor mind set on
national issues.
The
opposition political parties have an umbilical role of providing a
democratic alternative and raising the cost of authoritarian rule to the
citizenry. The post 2002 period generally been barren of such a leadership
role from the opposition, failing to capture the pregnancy of anger that was
boiling in the majority of the oppressed people of Zimbabwe. In this the
opposition political parties should redeem themselves by committing to the
execution of resolution number five, failure of which the people of Zimbabwe
shall render them irrelevant. Politicking has got a limit, sloganeering does
not aid in any form to the political, social and economic solutions that are
long overdue.
Instead, the civil society has been on the
forefront engaging in
sporadic protests against the iron feast rule of the
regime. Institutions
such as the NCA, ZCTU, ZINASU, WOZA have been
persecuted for engaging in the
constitutional processes. I am not taking
anything away from these brave
efforts, but their demonstrations were not
continuous and persistent, in the
process injuring the cadres who took time
to recover from the police
brutality before engaging another protest. In the
spirit of the Save
Zimbabwe Convention, there is a paradox need for keeping
the protests
impetus rolling to rejuvenate the nation's spirit of
participating in the
political processes and re-igniting the ever fading
hope of a new political
dispensation that is found on firm foundation of
constitutionalism,
separation of institutional power, independency of
electoral organs and
respect of the rule of law.
The opposition
has remained without response as Mugabe and his cronies
trudged on the
vulnerable groups of the society through the execution of
crude Operations
such as Operation Restore Order (Murambatsvina) and
Operation Sunrise. It is
in such moments of national adversity that the
opposition is mandated to
behave like an alternative option by undermining
the regime's misconstrued
assumption of being the deity status by virtue of
having led the nation
during the liberation struggle.
During Ian Smith's tenure of
office, what made the nationalist
movements relevant was the ability to
offer an alternative to the prevailing
political order that was marred by
segregation, repressive laws and the
minority hegemony over public goods
such as the land. What made Smith gave
in to a negotiated settlement was not
imbedded in the globe trotting
packages nor empty sloganeering which will
sound nothing closer to the
desire for change but more of career
politicking. In the people of Zimbabwe
will fall back into the nostalgia of
the gallant sons and daughters who lost
their lives in the struggle for a
just and free nation. Their names are
still written as the rocks and
foundations of the millennium struggles,
whenever the opposition fails to
forward the same cause they died for,
Zimbabweans will secure other
alternatives.
Everything under the sun is working against the
regime with inflation
in a quadrant digit, unemployment ragging at more than
85%, food shortages,
collapse in social services, escalating costs of
education and health among
other copious symptoms of the governance crisis.
Any opposition worth its
salt could harness such fertile soils as a platform
of exhibiting the
alternative solutions to Zimbabweans. The situation at
hand is not conducive
for personality parrot singing, for the majority it is
a matter of life and
death. The failure by the opposition to stick to its
perennial promises of
"change coming soon", is tantamount to dicing with the
same lives which
commissioned the formation of the same part. Opposition
political parties
should start behaving and start using the language that
resonates with the
people who were instrumental in its conception, the
workers.
A comprehensive constitutional framework was also
enunciated as one of
the panacea to the multi-layered crisis. This is yet
another milestone which
if engaged with persistence will lead to a new
people driven constitutional
settlement that would become a contract between
the people of Zimbabwe and
their government on how they want to be
governed.
The campaign for a new constitution should however be
unpacked into
messages that are familiar with the people in the marginalized
areas of the
country. The need for a new constitution should be outlined in
the bread and
butter issues. To the majority of the people of Gokwe for
example, their
lives revolve on farming the cash crop, cotton. What they
need is
fertiliser, logistics to the market place, the seed and calling for
a new
constitution will be a secondary issue. There is a need therefore to
marry
the constitution to the better selling conditions of the produce and
elaborating on how the constitution would stop the barbarism by the Grain
Marketing Board of confiscating the gain they laboured for the whole season.
Without such modalities being put in place, it will remain 'just another
concept'.
It is in this spirit that Jesus Christ, during his
last super,
converged with his disciples shared bread and wine and reminded
them to keep
on doing the same in his absence. The all stake holders should
make the same
commitment of facing the ghost in the eyes as they elaborately
spelt it in
the last paragraph of the resolutions, "In making these
resolutions the
convention is reminded that for them to succeed it is our
collective
responsibility to make them succeed. Like many before us we
therefore commit
ourselves to walking side by side in the struggle to
achieve the Zimbabwe we
want." The struggle for a free and just Zimbabwe
shall therefore continue,
aluta continua.
Tabani Moyo is a
journalist based in Gokwe. He can be conducted on,
rebeljournalist@yahoo.com
OMCT.org - World Organisation Against Torture
New information
ZWE 002 / 0206 / OBS 015.1
Not
guilty verdict / Arbitrary arrests /
Releases / Judicial
proceedings
Zimbabwe
September 5, 2006
The Observatory for the
Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint
programme of the World
Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) and the
International Federation for
Human Rights (FIDH), has received new
information and requests your urgent
intervention in the following situation
in Zimbabwe.
New
information:
The Observatory has been informed by reliable sources, including
Zimbabwe
Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR), that the Rotten Row Magistrates
Court
declared 63 members of the NGO Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA) not
guilty on
August 28, 2006. Yet, the harassment of WOZA activists
continues.
According to the information received, on August 28, 2006, 63
members of
WOZA were found not guilty in a ruling by the Rotten Row
Magistrates Court,
after a trial that lasted 14 days. The women were facing
charges of
"breaching the peace", under Chapter 9.15 of the Miscellaneous
Offences Act
Section 7 (C), whilst conducting a Valentine's Day protest
outside
Parliament in Harare on February 14, 2006 (See background
information).
The Observatory thanks all the persons, organisations and
institutions,
which intervened in favour of all WOZA activists in this
case.
However, on August 21, 2006, over 200 activists from WOZA took the
streets
in the city of Bulawayo in order to protest over the introduction
and
implementation of the Monetary Policy by the Governor of the Reserve
Bank.
Among the concerns of the women's organisation were the arbitrary
searches,
confiscation and subsequent depositing of old bearer cheques with
authorities from the Reserve Bank. In the open letter that WOZA members
wanted to deliver to the Governor, they protested against the government's
alleged solution to Zimbabwe's economic crisis, the so-called "Operation
Sunrise".
At around 11:15 am, the activists began their procession
along Main Street.
They were then intercepted by the police at the corner of
Leopold Takawira
Avenue and Main Street. The police arrested 153 of the
women, who were
brought to five separate holding places and police cells,
namely: Bulawayo
Central, Saucitown Police Station, Mzilikazi, Queens Park,
and Barbourfields
Police. Later on that day, their lawyers managed to secure
the release of 39
persons, on condition that they report to Bulawayo Central
Police everyday
until the date of the initial appearance in
court.
During their arrest, Ms. Ephy Khumalo, one of WOZA activists, fell
from the
police truck and sustained a fractured arm. Besides, several
juveniles
complained of beatings while being interrogated by members of the
Law and
Order Section at Bulawayo Central before being released into the
custody of
their lawyers.
On August 23, 2006, the activists appeared
in court and were charged for
contravening section 37(1) (b) of the Criminal
Law Codification and Reform
Act, which provides that "any person acting
together with one or more other
persons present with him or her in any place
or at any meeting performs any
action, utters any words or distributes or
displays any writing, sign or
other visible representation that is obscene,
threatening, abusive or
insulting, intending thereby to provoke a breach of
the peace or realising
that there is a risk or possibility that a breach of
the peace may be
provoked shall be guilty of participating in a gathering
with intent to
promote public violence, a breach of the peace or bigotry, as
the case may
be, and be liable to a fine not exceeding level ten or
imprisonment for a
period not exceeding five years or both". However, on the
same day, all the
WOZA activists were granted free bail and remanded out of
custody. They are
due to appear in Court on October 10, 2006.
The
Observatory expresses its deepest concern about this ongoing harassment
of
human rights defenders in Zimbabwe, who face serious risks to their
security
as well as infringements of their freedoms of expression and
association.
Background information:
On February 13, 2006,
approximately 181 persons, mainly women, who were
demonstrating under the
banner of WOZA, along with 14 children, were
arrested in central Bulawayo,
as they were dispersing from a peaceful
protest against human rights
violations. Among those arrested were four WOZA
leaders, Mrs. Jennifer
Williams, Mrs. Magodonga Mahlangu, Mrs. Emily Mpofu
and Mrs. Maria Moyo, who
were finger-printed and ordered to make statements.
The detainees were
charged with "organising an unlawful gathering" (Section
24 of the
POSA).
Those arrested were allegedly exposed to heavy rains as they were
detained
in the open police courtyard at Bulawayo Central police station for
several
hours, before being moved to cells at around 10:30
pm.
Moreover, on February 14, 2006, over twenty uniformed police, armed
with
baton sticks, and some sporting full riot gear, arrested between 60 and
100
women from WOZA in Harare at lunchtime, as they gathered in the city
centre
as part of a peaceful protest against social and economic
inequalities faced
by women in Zimbabwe. The women were rounded up and
callously loaded into
trucks marked "City of Harare Municipal Police" to be
taken to the Law and
Order section at Harare Central police station. Mr.
Tafadzwa Mugabe, a
lawyer from the Rapid Reaction Unit of ZLHR, was
harassed, verbally abused
and finally arrested and bundled into the truck
with his clients. Amongst
the detainees is a considerable number of elderly
women, as well as at least
one young child of around four years of
age.
Action requested :
Please write to the Zimbabwean authorities,
urging them to :
i. Guarantee, in all circumstances, the physical and
psychological
integrity of all WOZA members, as well as of all human rights
defenders in
Zimbabwe;
ii. Ensure that the 153 WOZA activists be
granted a fair and impartial
trial so that all charges against them be
dropped, as they are arbitrary;
iii. Put an end to all acts of
harassment against WOZA members and all
human rights defenders in
Zimbabwe;
iv. Conform with the provisions of the Declaration on Human
Rights
Defenders, in particular its article 1 which states that "Everyone
has the
right, individually and in association with others, to promote and
to strive
for the protection and realisation of human rights and fundamental
freedoms
at the national and international levels", and article 12.2,
providing that
"the State shall take all necessary measures to ensure the
protection by the
competent authorities of everyone, individually or in
association with
others, against any violence, threats, retaliation, de
facto or de jure
adverse discrimination, pressure or any other arbitrary
action as a
consequence of his or her legitimate exercise of the rights
referred to in
the present Declaration", as well as to comply with the
African Charter on
Human and Peoples' Rights, in particular articles 9, 10,
11 and 12, which
guarantee the fundamental freedoms of expression, assembly
and association;
v. Ensure in all circumstances respect for human
rights and fundamental
freedoms in accordance with international human
rights standards and
international instruments ratified by
Zimbabwe.
Addresses :
a.. President of Zimbabwe, Mr. Robert G.
Mugabe, Office of the President,
Private Bag 7700, Causeway, Harare,
Zimbabwe, Fax : +263 4 708 211
b.. Mr. Khembo Mohadi, Minister of Home
Affairs, Ministry of Home Affairs,
11th Floor Mukwati Building, Private Bag
7703, Causeway, Harare, Zimbabwe,
Fax : +263 4 726 716
c.. Mr.
Patrick Chinamasa, Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary
Affairs,
Ministry of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Fax: + 263 4
77 29
99
d.. Mr. Augustine Chihuri, Police Commissioner, Police Headquarters,
P.O.
Box 8807, Causeway, Harare, Zimbabwe, Fax : +263 4 253 212 / 728 768 /
726
084
e.. Mr. Sobuza Gula Ndebele, Attorney-General, Office of
the Attorney, PO
Box 7714, Causeway, Harare, Zimbabwe, Fax: + 263 4 77 32
47
f.. Mrs. Chanetsa, Office of the Ombudsman Fax: + 263 4 70 41
19
g.. Ambassador Mr. Chitsaka Chipaziwa, Permanent Mission of Zimbabwe
to
the United Nations in Geneva, Chemin William Barbey 27, 1292 Chambésy,
Switzerland, Fax: + 41 22 758 30 44, Email: mission.zimbabwe@ties.itu.net
h.. Ambassador Mr. Pununjwe, Embassy of Zimbabwe in Brussels, 11 SQ
Josephine Charlotte, 1200 Woluwe-Saint-Lambert, Belgium, Fax: + 32 2 762 96
05 / + 32 2 775 65 10, Email: zimbrussels@skynet.be
Please
also write to the embassies of Zimbabwe in your respective
country.
***
Geneva - Paris, September 5, 2006
Kindly inform us
of any action undertaken quoting the code of this appeal in
your
reply.
The Observatory, a FIDH and OMCT venture, is dedicated to the
protection of
Human Rights Defenders and aims to offer them concrete support
in their time
of need.
The Observatory was the winner of the 1998 Human
Rights Prize of the French
Republic.
To contact the Observatory, call
the emergency line:
Email: Appeals@fidh-omct.org
Tel and fax
FIDH: 33 1 43 55 55 05 / 01 43 55 18 80
Tel and fax OMCT: + 41 (0) 22 809 49
39 / 41 22 809 49 29
From The Daily Telegraph (UK), 5 September
Zimbabweans are being tormented by their central bank. The big
brothers at
the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe are on a terror campaign, and it's
been going
on since they lopped three noughts off the value of money on July
31, and
made old notes obsolete 21 days later. Last Saturday a businesswoman
spent
Z$175 000 or about £370 (at the official rate of exchange) on a
trolley full
of groceries for a month for her extended family. She was owed
about that by
a friend and as she issued her cheque at the supermarket she
phoned him and
asked to be urgently repaid by electronic transfer. On
Monday, (September 4)
an official at the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe phoned the
friend who had done
the transfer and asked about the recipient, asked what
the money was for and
why such a large sum of money was being transferred
and other questions.
Both of the people involved in this money episode were
shocked. Neither of
them knows if the answers they gave, which were entirely
truthful, were
accepted or if they are going to be arrested.
Mail and Guardian
Tiisetso Motsoeneng | Johannesburg, South Africa
06
September 2006 11:12
Zimbabwe's biggest labour movement, the
Zimbabwe Congress of
Trade Unions (Zactu), will be organising countrywide
processions on
September 13 to demand an end to poverty.
"Eighty percent of Zimbabweans are living in poverty because
workers' 'take
home' salaries cannot even take them home," the union said in
a statement
late on Tuesday.
Zactu demands that minimum wages and
salaries be linked to the
Poverty Datum Line (PDL) and that income tax be
reduced to a 30% maximum.
Other demands included tax exemption for workers
earning below the PDL and
stabilisation of prices of basic
commodities.
This comes amid concerted efforts by Zimbabwean
monetary
authorities to weed out indiscipline in an economy battered by a
high
inflation rate and poverty.
The Zactu leadership
also demands that police stop harassing
workers in the informal economy, as
well as free access to antiretrovirals.
A petition will be
delivered to the minister of public service,
labour and social welfare, the
minister of finance and the Employers'
Confederation of Zimbabwe in Harare,
while in other centres the petitions
will be delivered to the offices of the
chief labour relations officer.
The march on September 13
will take place between 12pm and 2pm
local time. -- I-Net Bridge
New Zimbabwe
By Lebo
Nkatazo
Last updated: 09/06/2006 06:27:54
ZIMBABWE'S central bank governor
Gideon Gono has moved to cool a public row
with Finance Minister, Herbert
Murerwa.
Appearing before a parliamentary portfolio committee on budget
and finance
Monday, Gono said there was "no time to quarrel on who was doing
what while
Rome was burning".
Gono and Murerwa first clashed when
Finance Ministry officials told a
visiting delegation from the International
Monetary Fund last year that the
Reserve Bank was engaged in "quasi-fiscal
activities".
Murerwa escalated the row two weeks ago when he appeared to
blow holes into
Gono's monetary policy reforms, saying that a central bank
policy to drop
three zeroes from the country's inflation-hit currency only
had short term
results.
Murerwa's comments, made before the same
committee which called Gono to give
evidence Monday, angered the central
bank chief who accused Murerwa of being
"devious".
Dzivarasekwa
legislator Edwin Mushoriwa (MDC) directly asked the central
bank chief if
there was "bad blood" between him and Murerwa, citing
Murerwa's comments
last week in which he said he had not been consulted when
Gono rolled out
his currency reforms.
Gono refused to answer how their personal relations
were, instead preferring
to focus on the relationship between the Ministry
and the Central Bank.
He said: "We work very closely that is as far as I
can say. This country
should stop being petty and realise that out there,
there is need for
development. There is no time to quarrel on who is doing
what while Rome is
burning."
Meanwhile, Gono also revealed that local
banks have failed to account for
$25 million earmarked for fuel imports, and
warned they faced a heavy
penalty if they misused the
money.
"Certainly a sledge hammer is coming and rest assured ... in the
event that
we get to know a bank which gave (foreign currency) above the
official rate,
serious consequences would follow that bank including the
withdrawal of
(its) licence," Gono stormed.
Zimbabwe is in the throes
of a punishing eight-year recession marked by
severe shortages of foreign
exchange, which has hit critical imports such as
fuel and
electricity.
The crunch worsened after international donors, including
the International
Monetary Fund (IMF), halted lending to the country over
policy differences
with President Robert Mugabe's government. It objected to
the seizure of
white-owned farms for blacks.
Most of Zimbabwe's
industries are operating below 30 percent capacity due to
the foreign
currency squeeze and rocketing production costs, stemming from
world record
inflation of nearly 1,000 percent.
In July Gono unveiled a set of
measures to kickstart the economy, including
a 60 percent devaluation of the
local dollar.
He allowed exporters, including gold producers, to keep 70
percent of their
earnings in foreign currency accounts
indefinitely.
The Nairobi-based PTA Bank said on Tuesday it would provide
$40 million in
credit lines this year to fund shipment of Zimbabwe's
exports, crucial to
generate foreign currency for the country's struggling
economy.
Last year the Preferential Trade Area (PTA) Bank -- which
provides trade
finance for its member states in eastern and southern Africa
-- extended $30
million in credit to Zimbabwe.
"We are looking at
providing $40 million this year which will be used to
finance short-term ...
exports," Michael Gondwe, the bank's president told
Reuters after signing a
$5 million credit facility with local bank ZABG
Bank.
Gono said the
country had this year raised $1.1 billion from exports.
New Zimbabwe
By
Terence M Mashingaidze
Last updated: 09/06/2006 08:44:55
ZIMBABWE'S
political and economic fortunes are at their lowest ebb in its
twenty-six
year history as an independent state.
For the past half a decade violent
elections, chaotic land reforms, a
plummeting economy, unemployment,
increasing levels of food insecurity,
debilitating brain drain,
international ostracisation, high-level corruption
and constriction of the
media and citizens` basic freedoms have been the
dominant aspects of
Zimbabweans' daily experiences.
Now we have the dubious distinction of
having the highest inflation record
in the world. Within seven years,
Zimbabwe turned into a regional basket
case and a test case for democracy.
Essentially, this is the Zimbabwean
entrapment, though some ruling party
aligned pundits mischievously, if not
sadistically, deny that the country is
in a crisis. There is need for
nonpartisan and resolute measures to
negotiate our way out of the morass.
The resolution of the crisis is
entirely up to Zimbabweans themselves. This
supposition does not
underestimate the role of multilateral institutions,
foreign governments,
international proactive engagement with Harare, quiet
or shuttle diplomacy
in effecting positive change in Zimbabwe, it is
informed by a historical
appreciation of the fact that in any nation major
questions of the day are
resolved by those who belong to and identify with
particular geopolitical
entities. The right political culture can not be
imported or imposed from
outside, it should be organic to a people. Citizens
must struggle for,
evolve, and nurture the best system of governance for
themselves.
In
this installment I am going to outline and critique some salient factors
that caused and still continue to aggravate the Zimbabwean crisis. I also
argue that the resolution of the Zimbabwean crisis is not exclusively about
changing personalities and political parties in power, at any level of
society and in any party, but about a radical paradigm shift in our
political culture and value systems. Right now, corruption, intolerance and
violence are not occasional inconveniences in our lives, they have become
regular, structural, deeply embedded and accepted modalities of doing
business and conducting other national affairs. We celebrate ill gotten
wealth, are indifferent to sloppy parastatal management, and extol violent
and self-serving politicians!
The Liberation Struggle: Abuse,
Appropriation and Instrumentalisation
The post-colonial era has witnessed
increasing appropriation and
instrumentalisation of the liberation struggle
legacy by ZANU PF. It has
become a discursive tramp-card and a convenient
weapon to defend itself,
attack its opponents, include and exclude some
citizens and organizations
from national projects. This has constipated the
Zimbabwean body politic.
The liberation struggle legacy is a cause for
celebration but,
paradoxically, due to the manipulative/exclusionary
politics of the ruling
elite, an albatross to the implementation of a
comprehensive nation-building
project. To a large extent, and history is
replete with such examples,
nation building is about inclusion,
incorporation and managing diversity.
ZANU PF, the ruling party, is
sardonically opposed to this philosophy. This
has negative effects on
national harmony and cohesion.
In the 1980s the Zanu PF nomenclatura
tried to underestimate and rubbish PF
ZAPU's liberation war credentials. In
the context of the Gukurahundi Crisis
PF ZAPU politicians were portrayed as
either disruptive political midgets or
ethnic political entrepreneurs rather
than nationalist politicians with
extraterritorial grievances and agendas.
Today opposition politicians suffer
the same fate. Nationalists such as
Ndabaningi Sithole, Sheba Tavarwisa,
Enoch Dumbutshena, Henry Hamadziripi
and James Chikerema lie buried in their
villages away from the National
Heroes Acre because they either contested or
tried to expand Zanu PF's
parochial approach to pertinent national
questions. Long after his death,
General Lookout Masuku's remains had to be
exhumed and interred at the
Heroes Acre after vigorous lobbying by his PF
ZAPU comrades. Why did Masuku,
a liberation war military supremo with an
unimpeachable nationalist record,
suffer such post-humous humiliation? He
had died at the wrong time in the
wrong camp.
The ruling elite have totalitarian approaches to nationhood.
They cannot
manage political plurality and harness diversity for
development. If you do
not belong to and identify with the ruling party and
did not participate,
under its banner, in the liberation struggle you are
vilified as unpatriotic
and a traitor without any rights to participate in
the country's body
politic. Those who try to get breathing space on the
political arena, as
individuals, organizations and political parties outside
Zanu PF set
parameters have to endure, diverse forms of violence, a hostile
state
controlled media, restrictive laws and labels of being stooges and
fronts
for Western imperial agendas. Zanu PF considers itself the national
vanguard
movement and every Zimbabwean should subscribe to its politics and
ways of
doing things. It operates as an intrusive and all permeating entity.
This
commandist thinking and approach to governance has constricted space
for
citizens` democratic participation, in the political, social and
economic
realms. The current political interference into the Zimbabwe Red
Cross
Society affairs is emblematic of this overbearing attitude. A
government
should not be a burden to citizens, it should be enabling and
empowering.
To a large extent the ruling party is still stuck in the
exclusionary mode
of liberation war politics (Then it was a convenient
survival strategy)
whereby citizens, groups of any nature and even countries
are separated into
neat binaries of friends and enemies, patriots and
traitors, western stooges
and anti-imperialists/Pan Africanists. The Third
Chimurenga/Liberation War
(Is it over?) and other associated fissiparous
struggles are being fought on
two fronts. On the domestic arena, they are
against (former) white farmers,
civil society and the legitimate domestic
political opposition. On the
international arena, they involve vitriol
against the United Kingdom, the
United States of America, multilateral
organizations and the international
community at large. This bellicose
stance obliterates sensible debate on
national issues and even Zimbabwe's
position in the community of nations.
On the domestic political arena,
Zanu PF refuses to engage the domestic
opposition, notably the MDC, because
they assume they are surrogates of the
British and in resolving the
Zimbabwean crisis they would rather engage
their principal at Number 10
Downing Street. This is incongruous thinking,
especially for a government
claiming to be on a warpath against foreign
interference, a government that
thinks it can go it alone. Do these arch
proponents of sovereignty and
territorial integrity still want a Second
Lancaster House Conference twenty
six years after uhuru? I thought, they
would look east, and have the Dragon
Diplomats intervene to hammer out a
modus vivendi on the polarized domestic
political scene!
The abuse of the liberation war legacy is partly
responsible for the
implementation of teleological and puerile intellectual
projects such as the
National Youth Service, National Strategic Studies and
television programmes
such as Nhaka Yedu/Our Heritage in the past few years.
In the post-2000 era
patriotic history emerged, a discipline whose writers
and articulators are
largely ruling party ideologues and politicians. A
monograph of President
Mugabe's speeches, Inside the Third Chimurenga, is
the trendsetting text in
this revisionist/authentication project.
The
National Strategic Studies curriculum is informed by this narrowly
defined
and partisan premise. It is designed to give Zanu PF a hegemonic
position in
the liberation war narrative, accord it all the kudos for
post-colonial
developments and simultaneously obliterate its political and
administrative
malfeasance. The elementary aim of appreciating history is to
enable us to
understand the present so that we can plan for the future from
an informed
standpoint. Therefore if we teach bad and partisan history to
what extent do
we comprehend the dynamics of our contemporary reality and
map out an all
inclusive well thought-out plan for the future?
Between 2000 and 2003
programs such as Nhaka Yedu (Our Heritage) and
National Ethos, whose regular
panelists were academics, were aired on
national television apparently to
revive national consciousness and
indirectly to teach the lost youths about
the country's past. These
programmes advanced ZANU PF political positions.
For example the central
tropes for the discussions were land and the ruling
party slant of the
liberation struggle. Topical issues such as the economy,
human rights, and
brain drain were skirted. This in a way was an abuse of
the public media, or
specifically taxpayers' money. The panelists rarely
critiqued and
synthesized contesting national perspectives on politics, the
economy or
even land itself. These people were simply making intellectual
noises on
behalf of the ruling regime. It becomes unfortunate when
intellectuals sing
for their meals, step on each other, and get out of their
way to scramble
for crumbs from the political high table. This is an
abnegation of
intellectual responsibility, to serve the powerless majority
not to coy up
to the powerful few.
Groping in the Penumbra: National
Policies and Planning
Since the penultimate stages of the previous
decade, the government has been
managing through ad hoc measures and
ministers have become inveterate liars
and gotten away with it. In 2001 we
almost starved simply because some
tetchy fellow had made some aerial
surveys in a helicopter and came to the
culpable conclusion that the nation
had ample food resources. Authorities
continue lying about the nation's food
stocks! The Land Reform, the Winter
Maize Fiasco and Operation
Murambatsvina, which resulted in the demolition
of urban slums in May 2005,
are just some of the telling cases of wacky
national planning. With the land
reform landless peasants, politicians and
their associates, and other
interest groups were simply encouraged to get
into the farms without proper
infrastructural back up and measures to ensure
agricultural viability.
Recent comments by some Zanu PF politicians in
parliament testify to
this.
Operation Murambatsvina/Restore Order was launched in May 2005 to
enforce by
laws and to stop alleged "illegal activities in areas such as
vending,
illegal structures, illegal cultivation" within urban confines.
(See UN
Report on Operation Murambatsvina). The operation resulted in more
than 700
000 people being rendered homeless overnight and close to 2, 4
million
people were indirectly affected. Most of these were illegal vendors
or
specifically informal traders. Operation Murambatsvina compromised the
livelihoods of the vulnerable members of society, women, children and the
youths. A significant number of those in the informal sector are youths. No
measures had been put in place to offer alternative accommodation and
livelihoods to the people. Because of pressure from the international
community and civil society, the government sought redress through Operation
Garikai/Hlanikuhle, an accelerated, but poorly funded, urban housing
development programme.
Once in a while the national television shows
some indolent and gaudy
minister or government functionary handing over
incomplete, structurally
deformed match box houses to desperate men and
women. Most of the associated
operations, commissions of enquiry, parastatal
restructurings reflect this
trademark insensitivity, ineptitude and lazy
thinking. Consider the on going
chaos at the Ministry of Agriculture, the
fuel procurement sector, Air
Zimbabwe, the Harare City Council, and the
Zimbabwe Broadcasting Holdings.
The maladministration is turning out into
something worse than a circus, its
becoming a strange game of agitated and
showy dimwits.
Youths co-option in politics is part of these ad hoc
measures as well. Their
involvement in politics at the instigation of adult
political entrepreneurs
and social manipulators has compromised good
governance in contemporary
Zimbabwe. Youths on both sides of the country's
political divide have
destroyed property, violated freedoms of assembly,
_expression and
association. Between 2000 and 2002, ruling party aligned
youths regularly
set up road blocks, conducted political party card checks,
declared certain
areas off-bounds to certain citizens and organizations.
This should not be
allowed in a civilized society with development oriented
people who deserve
to take themselves and to be taken seriously by others.
The political
co-option of youths has not been out of a desire to share
political space
with the young but to make them expedient political tools.
Instead of
working hard to improve the country's declining economy and
shattered
international image the leadership is busy lying, battering and
manipulating
poor, unemployed and disillusioned citizens.
Most of
those who went for National Youth Service training were poverty
stricken
rural and ghetto based youths. Due to desperation, they enrolled
for such
training in order to get preferential treatment for the few job
openings in
the army, police, urban municipalities, and parastatals, such as
the
Graining Marketing Board. Rarely were the children of the political
elite
enrolled for such training, therefore it follows that what is not good
for
the leadership's progeny should not be good for anyone. Such policies
should
simply not be implemented. Political leaders should disengage from
abusing
the young and seeing some citizens as weapons to fight perceived and
purported opponents. We should have respect and regard for fair play and the
rule of law, not rule by law.
Conclusion
In as much as the
ruling elite adopts diversionary tactics by projecting the
government's
criticism by civic society, fellow African governments and the
western
world, as nothing but imperial encroachment and snooping into the
domestic
affairs of a small nation the worsening macro economic environment
and
increasing cases, real and alleged, of human rights violations are not
doing
it any good. The continued defensive and truculent posturing lacks
moral
legitimacy considering the poverty and hunger that continues to
envelope an
ever increasing majority of the citizens.
Corruption, violence and the
government's shoddy planning record in the
immediate past makes one wonder
if we are going to reap the much anticipated
benefits from the 2010 World
Cup in South Africa. Given a sober political
and economic environment the
tournament should have a positive effect on the
economy. There will be
increased tourist visits and hotel patronization,
sales of sports goods,
crafts from the informal sector, fixed phone and
cellular phone usage, high
traffic flows and sales of even beer and soft
drinks. It will be an
opportune moment to show case Zimbabwe and boost
investor confidence once
more. The feel good factor to the nation will be
inestimable.
However, the unresolved succession question in Zanu PF,
in its strategic
position as the ruling party, is going to be a bane on
planning for the
event. Realistically, many people anticipate a night of
long knives within
the party. The Tsholotsho ghost might rise from the ashes
of its
destruction, if it comes back to life, this time around it will be
more
vicious. If the succession question goes beyond 2008 and the ruling
party
and opposition politicians continue bashing each other, sucking in
their
respective supporters in these vain struggles then the ides of 2010
will
simply come and pass.
A disturbing phenomenon in Zimbabwean
politics since the liberation struggle
days is the exploitation of ethnicity
as a coalescing factor in political
alliances. In fact, this is alleged to
be one of the major determinants of
struggles for power and domination
apparent in both Zanu PF and the MDC. Now
and again we get inferences from
the media that there are Karanga, Ndebele,
Manyika or Zezuru camps vying to
outwit each in achieving certain political
outcomes both in their parties
and in the nation. This is unfortunate and
those who aspire for national
office should realize that a nation is an
ever-evolving construct, with
strong centripetal forces generated by an
imaginative leadership who try to
transcend narrow ethnic, regional,
language, and historical cleavages to
establish communities that celebrate
unity in diversity. As I said in my
preamble, Zimbabwe's fate lies in the
hands of Zimbabweans, both at home and
in the diaspora.
Terence M Mashingaidze is an historian and an academic.
He can be contacted
at Mashingaidze2000@yahoo.co.uk
Institute for War and Peace Reporting
Simba Makoni emerges as the latest favourite in tough race to succeed
Mugabe.
By Nothando Bhebhe in Harare (AR No.76,
05-Sep-06)
There's been a new development in the struggle to succeed
Robert Mugabe,
with reports that powerful retired army commander General
Solomon Mujuru has
ditched his wife, Vice President Joice Mujuru, as his
ideal successor and is
now opting for former finance minister Simba
Makoni.
The cancellation of events arranged to promote Joice Mujuru's bid
for the
presidency confirmed that the vice president is no longer the choice
of the
Solomon Mujuru faction to succeed 82-year-old Mugabe when he finally
steps
down as head of state.
The programmes designed to lift his wife
to the pinnacle of power were
awaiting approval of the general, the tough
kingmaker - or queen-maker -
behind his wife's rise to the vice
presidency.
General Mujuru, although he retired as head of the army ten
years after
independence in 1980, has remained one of the most feared and
powerful men
in Zimbabwe. Under the war name of Rex Nhongo, he led Mugabe's
guerrilla
army during the 1970s war of independence against what was then
white-ruled
Rhodesia. Mujuru became a rich and ruthless businessman and is
rumoured to
own anywhere between six and sixteen former white-owned
farms.
Joice Mujuru - who earned the nickname Teurai Ropa, or Spill
Blood, after
becoming involved in the war for independence from white rule
at the age of
18 - has held various ministerial posts under Mugabe, who
appointed her as
his vice president in December 2004.
Makoni, who has
managed to remain outside the hurly-burly of the day-to-day
battles for the
top post, has always been "Plan B" for the Mujuru faction
and also for the
bitter rival group led by Emmerson Mnangagwa, the once
powerful
parliamentary speaker and secretary of Mugabe's ruling ZANU PF
party.
Eventful months loom ahead as the inner ZANU PF contest
intensifies to
replace Mugabe, who has ruled non-stop for more than 26 years
since
independence. Sources in Mujuru's camp confirmed to IWPR that the
general
has now opted for Plan B and that discussions with Makoni, a highly
educated
technocrat, are underway.
However, in the complex world of
Zimbabwe's tribal politics, a source close
to Mnangagwa's camp, said Makoni
was likely to reject the wooing of the
Mujurus, fellow members of Mugabe's
Zezuru sub-clan of the larger Shona
tribal nation: instead, Makoni is likely
to align himself with the small
Manyika sub-clan, most of whose important
officials - including Security
Minister Didymus Mutasa, Justice Minister
Patrick Chinamasa and Agriculture
Minister Joseph Made - are supporting
Emmerson Mnangagwa's bid for the
presidency.
There are also reports
that Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono, another
Manyika, is supporting
Mnangagwa, who is currently minister of rural
housing.
Mnangagwa
comes from a sub-clan called the Karanga. Tensions between the
Karanga and
the Zezurus of Mugabe and the Mujurus trace back to the war of
independence,
when the Karanga provided the bulk of fighters and military
leaders for the
ZANU movement. Since power fell into the hands of Mugabe - a
ruthless Zezuru
intellectual who led the ZANU movement but did no fighting
himself - many
Karangas feel he has ignored their contribution, sidelined
their leaders and
promoted members of his own clan.
Indeed, since ZANU PF's last electoral
congress, in December 2004, none of
the top five party posts have been
occupied by Karangas, despite the fact
that members of the clan make up some
35 per cent of Zimbabwe's 11.5 million
citizens. The Zezuru account for
around 25 per cent of the population. The
cabinet formed by Mugabe following
a general election last year is also
dominated by Zezurus, at the expense of
many influential Karangas.
Now is not the first time that Makoni's name
has been mentioned as a
potential successor to Mugabe. But he has failed to
make any headway
because, although he is a financial and economics expert,
he is considered a
political lightweight within the brutal world of ZANU PF
politics: his
potential ascendancy has always depended on the backing and
manipulation of
more powerful party barons.
A source close to General
Mujuru's faction said the strong backing its
members had given to Joice
Mujuru was more a means of blocking Mnangagwa for
the deputy post that fell
vacant with the death of former vice president
Simon Muzenda than anything
else.
"It was not that General Mujuru wanted his wife to be the next
president
when he pushed for her nomination as vice president but that he
wanted to
make sure that Mnangagwa does not get into that top position," the
source
confided to IWPR. "The game would have been over if Mnangagwa had
managed,
as he nearly did, to get into the presidium and become vice
president."
The cold-blooded succession battle pits the camp led by
Mnangagwa, regarded
as a tough man worthy of the nickname "Ngwenya"
(Crocodile) within ZANU PF's
inner circles, against the other led by
kingmaker Solomon Mujuru, who is not
interested in becoming president but
who wants to be the power behind the
throne, controlling its
incumbent.
As indicated, the two main camps mirror the political divide
between
Mugabe's Zezuru sub-group, which occupies the Mashonaland Central,
East and
West provinces in north and northeastern Zimbabwe and the most
populous
Shona group, the Karanga, which mainly occupies Masvingo and
Midlands
provinces in the south.
For many in the Zezuru faction, the
Karanga group represents a threatening
"third force". The Zezuru fear
relates particularly to Emmerson Mnangagwa,
because of his track record as a
once fearsome security minister and because
of the high esteem in which
Mugabe holds him. Paradoxically, Mugabe has
always had a soft spot for
Mnangagwa, despite his membership of a rival
clan.
When Mnangagwa
lost his Kwekwe seat, in central Zimbabwe, to the opposition
Movement for
Democratic Change, MDC, in parliamentary elections in 2002,
Mugabe cushioned
Mnangagwa's disappointment by decreeing that he be given
the parliamentary
speaker post. Again in 2005, when Mujuru's camp thought it
had finally
killed Mnangagwa's political career, after his second narrow
electoral
defeat to the MDC, Mugabe appointed him rural housing minister, an
influential ministry from where he could rebuild his political
fortunes.
Like Mugabe and other senior party officials, the source told
IWPR, General
Mujuru knows that if his wife is lucky enough to be elected
party leader at
the next ZANU PF congress, she will not have the ability,
charisma or
intellect to follow through and mount a serious challenge to MDC
leader
Morgan Tsvangirai in a general election.
General Mujuru also
realises, said the source, that he might not be able to
outmanoeuvre
Mnangagwa again at the next party congress in 2007. With Mugabe
now hinting
that he has dropped support for Joice Mujuru in preference for
Mnangagwa
because he doubts his vice president's ability to lead the nation
and ensure
that ZANU PF remains in power, General Mujuru now wants to find a
candidate
who he can sell easily not just to ZANU PF but also to the nation
and whom
also he can control.
Makoni is seen as just that person, said the source.
A chemist and financial
adviser by profession, Makoni is perhaps the most
widely liked figure in a
deeply unpopular and corrupt party. Friends and
critics alike agree that
Makoni is extremely clever and has a reputation for
integrity, unusual in
the murky world of ZANU PF politics. He is so far
untainted by scandals,
looting of state assets and the ruling party's human
rights violations of
the last two decades.
Makoni is widely seen as
the most presentable choice available for those
concerned to end Zimbabwe's
international isolation. "A lot has been
happening in ZANU PF," the source
from Solomon Mujuru's faction told IWPR.
"When people say a day is a long
time in politics that is so true. The
problem is that [Mrs] Mujuru has been
exposing herself [to public scrutiny]
and it is clear now that she will not
be able to win, in ZANU PF and let
alone in a general election.
"The
general knows that and what he wants is a winner. He wants someone whom
he
knows can give Mnangagwa a serious challenge, a person who, with their
[the
Mujuru faction's] help, can get the presidency and, more importantly, a
person who can beat Tsvangirai or any other opposition leader.
"There
won't be any point in winning in ZANU PF without ensuring that that
person
is accepted also by the ordinary Zimbabweans."
By choosing and
anointing Makoni, said another source in Mujuru's camp, the
general would be
resolving several tricky dilemmas he is wrestling with.
These problems
include the Ndebele, Zimbabwe's large minority tribe that
occupies the west
of the country and is descended from the Zulus of South
Africa, who are
highly resistant to the idea of a female state president.
In the internal
struggle between the Zezuru and Karanga sub-clans of the
Shona nation,
support of the Manyikas, from the Eastern Highlands and who
constitute about
15 per cent of the Shona population, is crucial: the
Manyikas can tip the
balance in the power stakes and drive a hard bargain
for themselves. By
backing Makoni, Mujuru hopes to appease the Manyika
people over the
mysterious 1975 assassination in exile of former ZANU leader
and liberation
war hero Herbert Chitepo. The death of Chitepo, who was
succeeded by Mugabe,
continues to incite conflict and controversy in
Zimbabwe's national
politics.
"Mujuru desperately needs the support of the Manyika people,"
said IWPR's
second source. "As it stands, he does not have their support
because they
feel they were robbed of a brilliant leader in Chitepo. After
Chitepo's
assassination on March 18, 1975 by a car bomb [in Lusaka, Zambia],
Mugabe,
who was in exile in Mozambique at that time, unilaterally assumed
control of
ZANU. It was General Mujuru [then operating as Rex Nhongo] who
implored
guerrillas, most of whom had never met Mugabe, to accept him as
their
leader.
"Rumours at that time said Joice Mujuru was personally
involved in the whole
assassination; hence the Manyika do not support her as
a successor to
Mugabe."
Standford Mukasa, one of Zimbabwe's leading
independent political
commentators, recently wrote that Makoni would be used
as cover to put a
human face on ZANU PF. But John Makumbe, a political
scientist at the
University of Zimbabwe and an anti-corruption activist,
said Joice Mujuru
had been so inept in her duties as vice president that it
had become obvious
she was unsuited to lead either the party or the
country.
"Genera