Subject: Joint DUA - EPP Conference in Capetown talks Zimbabwe
Date: Tue, 5 Nov 2002
Common resolution on occasion of a joint DUA-EPP Conference in Cape Town, 30 October 2002
Theme: "The future of Zimbabwe - A common concern for African and European Democrats"
We, Members of the South African, Zimbabwean, Namibian, Lesotho, Mozambican and the European Parliament; representatives of parties from Southern Africa and Europe; and representatives of NGO's and civil society in Zimbabwe and South Africa; gathered in Cape Town on 30 October 2002 to assess the effects of the current crisis on the people of Zimbabwe, civil society and the economy, and the negative impact on Southern Africa, have agreed to the following resolution:
A. whereas the current political crisis in Zimbabwe started with the rejection of a ZANU-PF sponsored constitutional proposal in 2000 indicating growing discontent by the people of Zimbabwe for the rule of President Mugabe;
B. whereas even though the opposition in Zimbabwe has won almost half of the contested seats in the 2000 Parliamentary elections, and there is no doubt that the election was not free and fair;
C. whereas despite the manifest concern of independent national, regional and international monitoring bodies the presidential election in 2002 was similarly not free and fair resulting in the current illegitimate Mugabe government;
D. whereas continued political pressure has been applied against political opposition, independent and privately owned media, the judiciary and civil society by the police, army, the Central Intelligence Organisation and ZANU-PF militia;
E. whereas repressive legislation has been enacted which destroys democracy and state institutions are less subject to the rule of law than to the will of a single person, this completed the domination of the judiciary and the emasculation of the legislature and thereby created a dictatorship; F. whereas the governing party makes the land issue a political platform, which is used to divide Zimbabweans along racial lines, while they themselves had not for more than 20 years pursued a sustainable land reform programme and have ignored calls for such a programme from inside and outside Zimbabwe;
G. whereas it is therefore evident that the land issue is used only as a pretext to retain power at all costs;
H. whereas, as a result of the expropriation and illegal occupation of commercial farms, and the deliberate terror campaign against hundreds of thousands of farm workers and their families, who as a consequence have lost their livelihood and have become internally displaced, the reality of starvation is now evident;
I. whereas imported maize and other emergency food supplies are being controlled for political purposes by ZANU-PF, leading to a policy of deliberate, selective starvation of Mugabe's political opponents and their supporters;
J. whereas some women and children are being abducted and raped because of their or their husbands' alleged political affiliation;
K. whereas there is a continued campaign of mass terror based on torture against suspected opposition supporters, civic activists, teachers and nurses by ZANU-PF supporters, and increasingly by the Zimbabwe Republic Police and the Central Intelligence Organisation;
L. whereas the local government elections on 28 and 29 September 2002, and the Parliamentary by-elections on 26 and 27 October 2002 were marred by political violence and intimidation;
M. whereas the overall economic situation is debilitating and characterised by hyper- inflation, a growing budget deficit and a breakdown of internal and foreign investment;
N. whereas as a consequence thereof a mass exodus of human capital to neighbouring countries and further a-field, cripples the economy further, and places undesired strain on the host countries;
O. whereas Zimbabwe's involvement in the DRC was also used by the governing party to exercise economic control over parts of this country, to gain access to natural resources, and for senior officers to enrich themselves from the country's mineral assets under the pretext of repaying Zimbabwe for military services, as outlined in the 8 October 2002 UN report on the illegal Exploitation of Natural Resources and other Forms of Wealth of the DRC;
P. whereas the failure to resolve the current crisis in Zimbabwe represents a blatant contradiction of the Peer Review Principles set out in the NEPAD initiative, and the principles of good governance as laid down in the Founding Charter of the African Union and SADC's own policy papers;
Q. whereas the SADC Summit on 2-3 October 2002 in Luanda discussed the situation in Zimbabwe, and the African Commission for Human and People's Rights' meeting in Banjul recently failed to discuss the Zimbabwe human rights situation due to lack of quorum;
R. whereas the Southern African governments have not successfully used their influence to convince Mugabe to reinstate democracy and the rule of law in Zimbabwe, but have instead exercised silent diplomacy which has failed, even though the Zimbabwe crisis adversely affects the region as a whole e.g. the flow of some two million refugees from Zimbabwe into South Africa;
S. whereas all Commonwealth initiatives on the Zimbabwe crisis have proved to be ineffective;
T. whereas the European Union has ceased its financial assistance to Zimbabwe and has introduced targeted sanctions against a list of high-ranking officials, but does not live up to its own commitment by relocating from Copenhagen to Maputo a SADC-EU Foreign Ministers' meeting, scheduled for 7-8 November 2002;
We therefore:
1. call for an immediate return to legitimacy by the setting up of a transitional government, constitutional and electoral reform, the setting up of an Independent Electoral Commission, and the holding of free and fair elections under international supervision;
2. call for an immediate return to the rule of law in Zimbabwe, and an immediate end to politically motivated violence and selective distribution of emergency food supplies;
3. demand the revocation of all legislation enacted to paralyse the democratic institutions and the basic freedoms of individuals, media and civil society institutions and associations;
4. demand the institution of a sustainable, legal and constructive agrarian policy that benefits those who need land most, while simultaneously maintaining the economic basis of successful land use in Zimbabwe;
5. welcome the continuous focus put on the developments in Zimbabwe by the European Parliament;
6. however also deplore the expediency of the European Union and its SADC partners in relocating the EU-SADC Foreign Ministers' Meeting from Copenhagen to Maputo in order to avoid confrontation over the principle of Zimbabwe's attendance, and expect the European Union to adhere to its own decisions concerning targeted sanctions for future meetings, and in particular the forthcoming EU Africa Summit in Lisbon in April 2003;
7. call on SADC to live up to its own written principles, commitments and minimum standards regarding democracy, the rule of law and the conducting of free and fair elections;
8. call on the peoples of Southern Africa to show solidarity with the people of Zimbabwe, also by strengthening their civil society ties and networks;
9. reject all attempts to reduce the NEPAD Peer Review Process to a mere economic appraisal;
10. invite all individuals, parties, NGO's and other stakeholders to endorse, promote and operationalise this resolution, and therefore welcome the invitation extended to Zimbabwean civil society organisations by the Deputy Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Foreign Affairs of the SA Parliament to brief said committee, during a Konrad Adenauer forum on Zimbabwe held in Cape Town on 29 October 2002, as an encouraging first step in this process.
Ends
Editors note: Jenni Williams representing Justice For Agriculture Zimbabwe attended and addressed the conference along with other Zimbabwean NGO's representatives. Request the list of participants from Hendrien Rust.
Contact Jenni Williams on
Mobile (+263) 91 300456 or 11213 885
Or on eMail
or Fax (+2639) 63978 or (+2634) 703829
A member of the International Association of Business Communicators.
Visit the IABC website www.iabc.com
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