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In Nyathi, David Joubert, the farmer beaten and arrested yesterday was released on bail after being charged with assault, grievous bodily harm and malicious damage to property. The charges relate to an incident several days ago in which a gang of Zanu PF thugs who had been ferried onto his ranch in government vehicles, laid an ambush for the ranch’s game guards, The guards fired birdshot in self defence – slightly injuring some of the gang, and several people they had earlier abducted from a nearby mine to use as human shields. Joubert was not involved in the incidents but was charged anyway. The gang later burnt staff quarters in the ranch compound Joubert was severely beaten in the presence of several police officers, including Detective Inspector Marima from Bulawayo, who had arrived in the district to take charge of the local police force. No arrests have been made among those who assaulted Joubert or who ambushed his game guards and burnt the ranch buildings. Lawyers for Joubert say the police have told them that have orders from above not to investigate the incidents of assault and arson, or even to open a docket or issue a case number.

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Subject: Chinhoyi farmers

Dear All,

I received a call at 10pm last night from X (our friend in Chinhoyi) telling me that her husband and son , had been arrested along with about 15 other farmers for making the mistake of helping their neighbour whose home was being trashed by a gang of squatters and zanu thugs. By now you will know of those events. However, I decided to go to X early this morning and knocked on her door at 6 am and yelled for tea! At 8am I accompanied her to the Police Station at Chinhoyi to find out about her husband and son. As we arrived at the Police station we saw a large gang of youths - the rented thugs. In the Charge office was Dr. Flanagan, a man of 76 who had gone to find out how he could help, but was assaulted by the youths, in front of a policeman at the Station gate. The youth hit him with, he thinks, a cycle chain, breaking his spectacles and damaging his eye very badly. There was internal and external bleeding. His son was also hit with a stick and Lindsay Moyes (her husband also in the cells) was hit by a fist on her left temple. I was in the Charge office for over half an hour and in that time the Police REFUSED TO ACCEPT A REPORT OF ASSAULT on the old Doctor, his son and Lindsay. I asked for a Request for Medical Report Form which they refused to give me. Having been a regular member of the Police I can only say that I was absolutely aghast and disgusted at the behaviour of the Police. They either totally ignored the complainants or were blatantly rude. The Charge office soon filled up with zanu "heavies" one of whom just about sent me flying as he purposely knocked into my chest pushing his way past me. The tempers were rising and it looked like there could be trouble so I advised the farmers wives to go to the CFU office and suggested to Dr. Flannagan that he was wasting his time and would be safer away from the Police and the thugs. Four tyres on two of the wives vehicles had been let down outside the station. To cut a long story short, we went from the CFU office (flat tyres and all) to a venue where BBC were waiting to interview the women. Within 5 minutes of the BBC having left the interview venue we received a call to leave immediately as the thugs were on their way with the "heavies" to get the women who spoke to the Press. One young woman with a small child found her truck had flat tyre and she had her three dogs in the truck. Four women, one child and three dogs fitted very quickly into my car and a convoy of women fled the area to a farm 10 kms away. As I drove out, the zanu guys arrived. I did not look back, but concentrated on getting away with my precious cargo! It was a sickening feeling knowing that the people under oath to protect the citizens of Zimbabwe were very much a part of the violence. Thereafter the "rent a crowd" set about any white person in a car with rocks and stones, so Chinhoyi main street must have been a rather nasty place to be. ANARCHY - nothing can function in our country while there is this anarchy and it is getting worse. The Police are partisan and without any shadow of doubt come under the direction of the war vets and their thugs. We must not allow this to continue - this is only the tip of the ice berg because we have access to cell phones, two way radios and the Press. What about the rural population subjected to the squatter, war vet and Police brutality????

Matabeleland rancher David Joubert was yesterday ambushed in the Nyathi district by Zanu PF thugs, severely assaulted within the presence of seven police officers, and then arrested and taken to the local police station. He is expected to be charged with attempted murder today. This latest assault incident occurred after more than twenty farmers were arrested in Chinhoyi on Monday and Tuesday, and the death in hospital of Ralph Corbett, 76, a farmer from Kwekwe in the Midlands, who sustained fatal head injuries on Friday during an axe attack by a Zanu PF mob.

The same group who attacked Joubert had earlier been ferried onto his ranch near Turk Mine north of Bulawayo in government vehicles on Sunday evening. They camped overnight, and then on Monday abducted thirteen people from the nearby mine. Later that day they laid an ambush for Joubert’s game guards. In the melee which followed, in which the abducted people were used as human shields, the game guards fired shots from their shotguns, and several members of the gang, and the abductees, sustained minor birdshot injuries. The game guards managed to escape, but the mob then rampaged through the ranch compound and burnt several of the staff quarters to the ground.

It is presumed that the charges expected to be brought against Joubert relate to this earlier incident, although Joubert was nowhere near the scene of the ambush and subsequent arson. As has become the norm in Zimbabwe, Joubert – a victim of a severe assault – was arrested, while none of his attackers have been apprehended. In the more extreme cases such as this one, and the incidents in Chinhoyi yesterday, in which people were assaulted inside a police station, the police have stood by and watched as serious crimes take place.

After the Monday ambush of the game guards on Joubert’s ranch was reported, the Nyathi police had initially responded in a professional manner. However, after pressure from the governor of Matabeleland North, Obert Mpofu, and the arrival in Nyathi of Detective Inspector Marima from Bulawayo – notorious in the Matabeleland capital for being a Zanu PF placeman – the behaviour of the police changed. Marima was involved in the abduction and assault several weeks ago of the MDC MP for Nyathi, Fletcher Dhulini. A senior and reliable source within the Zimbabwe Republic Police in Matabeleland, known to be strongly opposed to the state-sponsored lawlessness which has spread across the country, confirmed on Monday that orders have been received from headquarters in Harare that violent incidents were to be "manufactured" in order to provoke farmers into reacting with violence – thus providing justification for the wholesale forcible removal of commercial farmers from their land, and/or the declaration of a state of emergency across the whole country.

A mob loyal to President Robert Mugabe went on what was described as an "orchestrated" rampage in Zimbabwe yesterday, beating whites at random and injuring at least 10. The scene of the attacks was Chinhoyi, a town 60 miles north-west of Harare, on one of the main tourist routes to Mana Pools national park and Lake Kariba. Supporters of Mr Mugabe's Zanu PF Party massed in the streets, stoning cars carrying whites and attacking shoppers, stabbing one victim. Police told whites to stay out of the town and after the violence many white townspeople fled to nearby farms. Mr Mugabe has lost no opportunity to vilify whites in public and has encouraged his followers to invade 1,700 of their farms. Critics have said repeatedly that his racial rhetoric would eventually provoke mob violence in a country where race relations have been generally harmonious. The violence was apparently provoked by the arrest of 22 white farmers on Monday night.

The men said they were responding to an appeal for help from Tony Barklay, a landowner, after squatters who had occupied his farm stormed his house. The invaders said the farmers had attacked them. When police arrived, they ordered the whites to report to Chinhoyi police station, where they were arrested on charges of "public violence" and assault. They were still in custody last night. Six of the farmers' wives tried to visit them yesterday and found a mob of about 40 youths wearing Zanu PF T-shirts massed outside the police station.

One of the women was attacked and the gang then ran through the streets, assaulting other whites. Magdalina Hartmann, 72, was assaulted in a post office where she had gone to withdraw money from her savings account. She said: "I was standing in the queue and a man came up to me and said: 'You white bitch, I am going to hurt you.' "He said it three times and then hit me on my arm. I could not stop crying then or now. I don't know what I have done to make people hate me like this." Mrs Hartmann's doctor said that she had been "badly slapped around".

Dr Chris Lewis treated five victims. He said that all were shocked. One woman was "quite hysterical". Dr Lewis treated another woman in her late sixties who was assaulted as she waited at a supermarket check-out. Witnesses said she was jostled by four men, one of whom rammed her with a shopping trolley. Hendrik Spreeth, 45, needed 20 stitches for two 3in stab wounds. Dr Lewis said: "He was chased down the street by four men. He was kicked, beaten, punched and stabbed in the arm." Betty Smith, 80, a farmer, was in a shop on the main street when her son, John, 50, joined her. She said: "His shirt was torn to pieces and the blood was pouring down." "They beat the hell out of him with sticks. I came here in 1948 and I never imagined it could be like this." A woman in her forties was punched in the face as she left the police station. She had gone there to register her car and was hit through the window as she drove away.

One farmer said: "This was clearly orchestrated. The farmers were in jail and they knew that white people would come and visit them. They had the mob waiting." Philip Chiyangwa, the Zanu-PF MP for Chinhoyi and the local party leader, blamed farmers for the violence. He accused them of attacking squatters on their land. He said: "When these farmers go haywire, they start using their guns. There should not be any provocation from the farmers. These people must not provoke us." A Foreign Office spokesman said that Brian Donnelly, the newly appointed British high commissioner, had "registered his concern at various levels in the Zimbabwean government and was awaiting their response". But by late last night there had been none.

Johannesburg - An elderly white farmer has been murdered in Zimbabwe and more than 20 others arrested for assault after defending themselves from attack by so-called war veterans. Ralph Corbett, 76, a rancher farming near the town of Kwekwe, was trussed with wire and beaten about the head with an axe on Friday in what his family say was a politically motivated killing. He died in hospital yesterday. Mr Corbett is the ninth white farmer killed since President Robert Mugabe launched the land invasions nearly two years ago. The murdered farmer's land has been occupied by "war veterans" for a year.

His daughter, Cheryl Miller, said the attackers stole a gun but other valuables were not touched. "The war veterans are responsible for the lawlessness. They have made it clear they want whites out of the country and this is the way they are going about it," she said. In a separate incident, the Zimbabwean police said they will charge 23 white farmers with public violence and assault after detaining them for fighting with blacks. The farmers, from the Chinhoyi area about 60 miles from Harare, had gone to the assistance of one of their number after dozens of black squatters attacked his house. None of the squatters was arrested.

The state news agency, Ziana, alleged that about 60 white farmers were beating the squatters with sticks and stones in an attempt to drive them off the farm owned by Antony Barklay. But farmers' representatives claimed that the invaders barricaded Mr Barclay inside his home and he called for help. "A farm owner was besieged in his house and two farmers came to [his] assistance, and those farmers were stoned and assaulted," said Malcolm Vowles, spokesman for the Commercial Farmers' Union. The farmers say that when they called the police to say Mr Barklay's life was in danger they were told that a constable would be sent the 15 miles to the farm on a bicycle. They took this to mean the police would not help.

The farmers say that six of their wives were beaten at the Chinhoyi police station when they tried to visit. Yesterday, the police issued a warning on the farmers security radio network warning whites not to go into Chinhoyi after a mob attacked people on the streets and in a supermarket, injuring at least 10, most of them white. The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) says the upsurge in violence is part of a political strategy by Mr Mugabe to further intimidate his opponents.

On Monday, the police arrested the MDC's security chief and accused him of attempted murder. Tendai Nyamushanya was detained over an incident which the party describes as an assassination attempt on its leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, after his convoy was attacked during a campaign last month. Mr Nyamushanya's lawyer says his client drew his gun but did not shoot anyone and that so far as he knows no one has lodged a complaint. He says the detention is purely political. Another MDC security official was arrested yesterday when he tried to take breakfast to Mr Nyamushanya in jail. Earlier this week, South Africa's president, Thabo Mbeki, conceded in a BBC interview that his efforts to persuade Mr Mugabe to drag his nation from the brink of collapse had proved futile.

The cost of bread in Zimbabwe has more than doubled since January, after a seventh price hike in as many months, AFP reported on Tuesday, quoting a local consumer watchdog. The Consumer Council of Zimbabwe (CCZ) saidbread prices went up by 15 percent this week, but the domestic ZIANA news agency reported a hike of between 7.5 percent and 20 percent. A standard loaf of white bread now costs around 50 Zimbabwean dollars (US $0.90) up from 23 Zimbabwean dollars (US $0.42) in January this year.

The retail price of bread has been going up nearly every month since the beginning of the year by an average 15 percent. The consumer council has condemned the bread price hike, which bakers blame on rising cost of inputs - flour, sugar, yeast, labour and fuels. "Consumer Council (of Zimbabwe) strongly protests against unjustified monthly price hikes of basic commodities," said CCZ director Elizabeth Nerwande. A 30 percent hike in the price of bread sparked riots in the capital in October last year.

Prices of basic commodities, including fuels have doubled, in some cases tripled in the last 18 months as Zimbabwe goes through its worst ever economic crisis. "Consumers cannot finance the economic crisis forever," said Nerwande in a statement. Economists have said the southern African country is going through the "great depression" due to political instability. The current economic crisis is characterised by inflation at around 60 percent, unemployment hovering around similar rates and critical shortages of foreign currency.

As pressure continues to mount on President Mugabe because of the prevailing anarchy in the country, it has emerged that the Commonwealth intends to act strongly against him at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) to be held in Brisbane, Australia, in October. High level sources within the Commonwealth, a club of former British colonies, confided to The Standard last week that Mugabe had until October to "sort out the mess" in Zimbabwe or risk topping the meeting’s agenda. The sources said the Commonwealth had decided to use this strong approach because of the deepening crisis within Zimbabwe. State-sponsored terrorism has, over the last year, taken its toll on Zimbabwe and reduced the country to a state of lawlessness. Commonwealth countries are concerned that unless they confront Mugabe and take action against him, if necessary, the crisis in Zimbabwe could spill into neighbouring southern Africa countries with disastrous consequences for the region.

"Many southern African countries are suffering because of Mugabe’s policies. The message we are trying to get through to Mugabe is that "you are alienating yourself from the Commonwealth and we really want to help you." "We are not on a very productive path right now. Mugabe has totally rejected the United Nations initiative. He has rejected the Nigerian initiative and all this will have to be looked into at Brisbane. If he doesn’t sort out his mess, then it will be left for the leaders gathered in Brisbane to see what further action can be taken," said the source.

Diplomatic sources said the Commonwealth was now putting issues of governance high on its agenda and would take a tough stance against Zimbabwe if its record did not improve. Said the source who preferred anonymity: "Issues of governance are very much at the forefront of our work. We are the only international organisation that has set rules which our members are supposed to adhere to and we have the ability to get them to do so. We want to help Zimbabwe rebuild its democratic institutions. It is not only about having democratic elections but having democratic institutions. For example, in Fiji the army and the judiciary remained relatively stable when a coup took place last year. In Zimbabwe, these institutions have been politicised and compromised and this has to stop."

The government has been using the army and the police to ensure effective election campaigning which has included the harassment of opposition parliamentarians and their supporters. The judiciary, on the other hand, has been rocked by resignations following the ruling party’s onslaught on judges it sees as sympathetic to the opposition. The source reiterated that the Commonwealth was firmly behind a transparent, legal and orderly form of land reform. The club, he said, would not support Zanu PF’s haphazard and chaotic land reform whose purpose was political. "The land issue will remain important. There cannot be peace in Zimbabwe until the land issue is resolved, but it cannot be resolved through violence and electioneering. The process has to be sober. We have tried to engage Mugabe on the way forward on land reform but we are not getting any fruitful results. The problem is also that there are countries which are supporting him publicly and possibly giving him a false sense of security," said the source.

The Commonwealth joins a host of other international organisations and countries, among them the European Union and the United States, who have threatened to act strongly against Zimbabwe if Mugabe’s regime continues to sponsor anarchy. Mugabe and his cabinet ministers face personal sanctions from the European Union if an EU general council meeting in October resolves that he has not done enough to stop political violence and ensure the restoration of the rule of law. In June, the EU gave Mugabe a two-month deadline during which he was to end political violence and publicly commit himself to the holding of free and fair presidential elections next year.

The Standard was on Thursday vindicated when the United States Senate passed the Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act 2001 which seeks to formalise sanctions against Zimbabwe and place travel restrictions on Mugabe, his cabinet ministers, his service chiefs and their families. Government spin doctors initially made concerted efforts to deny the story following reports that the Act had been approved by the US senate foreign relations committee. Government officials also confidently stated that the Bill would take considerable time to pass through both the Senate and the House of Representatives. However, having been fast tracked through the Senate, the Bill is now set for its final stage, debate and consideration in the House of Representatives, before American President George W Bush signs it into law. The Bush administration has already made clear, its desire to descend heavily on wayward Mugabe.

6 August

At 9:00 am on 6 August, farmers in the Chinoyi district received a distress call over the local radio network from a local farmer, who reported that his house was being attacked by a group of 40 Zanu PF thugs. The police were informed - their response was that they would send a constable on a bicycle the 24 kilometres from the police station to the farm. Realising the police were not going to react in anything like a timely fashion, 11 farmers travelled to assist the besieged farmer. En route, they lost radio contact with the farmer, and began to fear the worst. On arrival at the farm, they found the farmstead surrounded, and they forced their way way through the mob in an effort to reach the inhabitants. in the process several of the besieging crowd - and four or five farmers - were injured, one seriously enough to be hospitalised. The besieged farmer was eventually found barricaded inside the house, out of reach of his radio.

The police eventually arrived and requested that the eleven farmers report to Chinoyi police station to give statements. On arrival at the station, all the farmers were arrested. In addition, a 72-year old man who arrived later to bring blankets for those who had been arrested was also detained. No Zanu PF supporters were arrested.

7 August

A group of farmers and local residents arrived this morning at the police station in an effort to mediate. Amongst them was Mr Mark Shaw - previously a police officer in the Zimbabwe Republic Police. He too was arrested - his offence being talking to a lawyer on a mobile phone. A number of other people were also arrested, bring the total of those in detention in Chinoyi to 20.

On the evening of Sunday 6 August, a group of around 60 Zanu PF militants - provided with food and ferried in on government vehicles - gathered on a farm in Nyathi in northern Matabeleland. They camped overnight on the farm, and on Monday morning abducted 13 people from a nearby mine. They then laid an ambush for the game scouts employed on the farm, who were armed with shotguns. The ambush was sprung, and in the melee three of the mob, and some of the abductees from the mine who were being used a human shields, sustained minor birdshot injuries. The game scouts managed to escape, but the mob then went on the rampage in the farm compound, burning down three of the staff quarters, valued at Z$500 000. The incident was reported to the police, who initially reacted in a professional manner, but who have subsequently refused to become involved after pressure was applied by the governor of Matabeleland North, Obert Mpofu.

Contacted for comment, David Coltart MP, legal affairs spokesman for the opposition MDC, said, "We believe that these incidents are not coincidental. Think back to April last year, when David Stevens was murdered in the north of the country, and Martin Olds in Matabeleland. Think also of the extreme violence after the by-election in the Bikita West constituency. We believe all three of those past incidents were a reaction to Zanu PF realising just how much trouble they were in politically. Although they won the Bikita West by-election, we believe there was substantial electoral fraud in that election. Zanu PF knew the true ballot figures, and hence unleashed the violence even though they had 'won' the election. Similarly, the murders of Martin Olds and David Stevens were a reaction by Zanu PF to just how much support they realised they had lost." He added, "What is happening today in Chinoyi and yesterday in Nyathi is exactly the same kind of thing - Mugabe and Zanu PF are trying to beat the population into supporting them, and if that doesn't work - as it increasingly isn't - they are trying to provoke a reaction so they can declare a state of emergency. Zanu PF know the true figures for the Bindura by-election, and this is what they do in response. Why else should they react so violently in Mashonaland - their heartland - when their candidate in Bindura apparently won with such a majority?"

Cape Town - President Thabo Mbeki acknowledged for the first time on Monday that his efforts to avoid political, social and economic collapse in neighbouring Zimbabwe had failed. He told BBC television he was pinning his hopes on a new Commonwealth initiative to help the country. Mbeki said the total collapse of Zimbabwe was the greatest threat to South Africa and the region. "We sit across the border from Zimbabwe, and critical for South Africa must surely be that we don't have a situation that the IMF warned about at the beginning of this year: a meltdown in Zimbabwe."

Mbeki said he did not know why his efforts to persuade Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe to moderate his actions had not been effective. "What I know is that we can't afford the complete collapse of Zimbabwe on our borders, so we have got to try and do whatever we can." Mbeki has met Mugabe repeatedly over the past 18 months and has refused to condemn publicly his handling of illegal and often violent occupation of white-owned farms by self-styled veterans of the country's 1970s war against colonialism. He said he hoped a team of Commonwealth foreign ministers, which has been formed to look at the problems in Zimbabwe, would be able to mediate a solution to unrest in the country. "I am hoping that we will get something out of that particular process ... We have got to find a way of getting out of this crisis of Zimbabwe," he said.

Mbeki has been criticised at home and abroad for his so-called "quiet diplomacy" in the face of escalating civil unrest and a crumbling economy in Zimbabwe. More than 30 people, including five white farmers, have been killed in the occupation or seizure of more than 1 000 farms. White-owned businesses have been overrun and forced to make ad hoc payments to former workers laid off in a recession expected to accelerate this year to a seven percent decline in gross domestic product. Agricultural experts predict a serious food shortage in the country later this year.

Mbeki said sanctions against Mugabe, who is facing presidential elections next year, could hasten the collapse of the country. "Sure, time is running out. Which means we have got to act quickly and continue to say it is important to respond positively to these issues," he said. "There is a land problem in Zimbabwe, there is need for land redistribution, but it must be handled differently, without violence, without conflict, within the context of the law, bearing in mind the interests of all Zimbabweans, both black and white," Mbeki said.

Reacting to this, Democratic Alliance (DA) leader Tony Leon warned Mbeki against washing his hands of the entire matter and leaving it to others to resolve. In a statement, Leon said that it was regrettable, but typical, that Mbeki had chosen to announce that his quiet diplomacy towards Zimbabwe had failed to the foreign media. "He has repeatedly refused to make such an acknowledgement to the people of South Africa in Parliament," Leon said. Instead of criticising the opposition for pointing out that he was being used and abused by Mugabe, Mbeki should have listened to what the DA had to say. "However, it is not enough for the president to simply acknowledge his failure and, like Pontius Pilate, wash his hands of the entire matter and leave it to others to resolve."

Mbeki needed to be "proactive" in becoming part of the solution, and he should explain to the people of South Africa the steps he intended to take to rectify the situation. "Hopefully, President Mbeki has now realised that it was never a question of the justness of land reform - which was never in dispute - but, rather, the behaviour of a tyrant trying to cling to power," Leon said. Mbeki should now use his influence in regional and global institutions to lobby for the following:

• the deployment of independent election monitors from the African Union and elsewhere ensure free and fair presidential elections in Zimbabwe,
• organise to distribute food aid to the people of Zimbabwe through independent relief agencies, and
• the enforcing of diplomatic and political sanctions against Zanu PF leaders responsible for violence and intimidation, including freezing of their foreign assets and travel restrictions.

Leon said these measures were being considered by the European Union and were provided for by the US Zimbabwe Democracy and Recovery Act.

Harare - Zimbabwe stepped up its propaganda campaign over seizures of white-owned farms on Monday, saying that Australian Aborigines have enlisted the help of President Robert Mugabe in their quest for land rights. Aboriginal activists want Mr Mugabe to lobby for them at the Commonwealth summit in Brisbane in October, according to the government-controlled Herald newspaper. In a letter to Mr Mugabe, the leaders of Australia's Aborigines, who were not identified by the newspaper, claimed the Australian government had offered Mr Mugabe tight security at the summit in an attempt to muzzle him on land rights. The letter read: "They are scared your presence in Australia will excite Aborigines whose land was stolen from them by white settlers."

Its allegations came after reports at the weekend that Australian officials believed Mr Mugabe's security was at risk from human-rights protesters and gay activists. The human rights group Amnesty International said it was planning protests against Mr Mugabe's increasingly repressive policies at home and his outspoken criticism of homosexuals. Others among the 50 heads of government being targeted for protests include Kenya's President, Daniel arap Moi, Malaysia's Prime Minister, Mahathir Mohamad, a close friend and ally of Mr Mugabe, and Sri Lanka's leader, Chandrika Kumaratunga. The Australian-born gay activist Peter Tatchell has vowed to confront Mr Mugabe during the summit. Mr Tatchell was assaulted by Mr Mugabe's bodyguards in Brussels in February when attempting a symbolic citizen's arrest of the Zimbabwean President for human rights violations.

Johannesburg - Zimbabwean opposition party the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) has claimed that the crucial weekend by-election in the rural constituency of Bindura, convincingly won by the ruling Zanu PF, was not free and fair. Speaking to the Mail & Guardian in Johannesburg, MDC secretary general Welshman Ncube said voters in Bindura were enclosed in "concentration camp" like conditions. "The commercial farming areas of Bindura was a no-go area for us," he claimed. Ncube maintains that his party members were beaten up and the party could not campaign in the area. "And on the day of the polls, any of the residents who were likely to vote for the MDC were beaten up," he added.

In view of the "undemocratic" manner in which the election was conducted, Ncube said his party - led by Morgan Tsvangirai - had met with the African National Congress chair Mosioua Lekota, the Congress of South African Trade Unions’ executive as well the South African Communist Party last week to urge them to send election monitors three months prior to next year’s presidential elections. The Zimbabwean deputy high commissioner in South Africa, Danson Mudekunye, denied the reports of intimidation and the allegation that elections were not free and fair. He pointed out that European Union monitors were present during the elections: "If the MDC had won, then the election would have been free and fair."

The Bindura by-election was widely believed to be a test case for the political mood in the country ahead of presidential elections likely to be held around April, when 21-year incumbent Robert Mugabe will fight for yet another term. The Bindura seat fell vacant when MP and minister Border Gezi, a close aide of president Robert Mugabe, was killed in a car crash in April this year. Zanu-PF’s Elliot Manyika defeated MDC candidate Elliot Pfebve by polling 15 864 votes, 6 408 more than his rival. Pfebve had actually fared better in last year’s elections, when he had stood against Gezi. Prior to the election, reports had said that Pfebve and 16 of his supporters were arrested en route to a polling station. Mudekunye said Pfebve was taken to a police station and was warned and cautioned as he and his supporters were shouting slogans on the polling day within the 100m radius of a polling station -- which is unlawful.

On widely reported projections that Zimbabwe is heading for a food crisis, a senior foreign affairs official said that according to the World Food Programme’s projections, "It is a very likely possibility." A food shortage could have severe repercussions on South Africa, with the possibility of thousands of desperate Zimbabweans trying to enter South Africa. The foreign affairs official said his department is monitoring the situation. Mudekunye said the possibility of a food crisis had arisen as a result of a drought in the southern region, which has also affected Zambia and Malawi. He said the situation is under control at the moment, but added that there could be a shortage of cereal in February next year.

Harare - The chair of Zimbabwe's state-run oil company was arrested at the weekend in connection with a deal in which the cash-strapped firm was swindled of Z$218 million, police said on Monday. Nicholas Kitikiti, who is the chairman of the National Oil Company of Zimbabwe (NOCZIM) and the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Mines and Energy, was expected to appear in court on Monday. "Yes, he was arrested and is being investigated," said assistant police commissioner Wayne Bvudzijena. Kitikiti is reported to have approved a deal in which NOCZIM lost the funds to a private company Quenora Investments, which was supposed to have procured fuel on its behalf. Except for the past few weeks, Zimbabwe has experienced severe fuel shortages since December 1999, while the prices have tripled over the same period. The shortage has been attributed to corruption at NOCZIM and an acute shortage of foreign exchange for importing the petroleum products.

Harare - The Zimbabwean government has announced that it plans to make available R2bn for the newly resettled farmers in the next two months - a move the local business community fears could further fuel inflation in the country. Commerce, organised agriculture and industry have already protested after taking into account that the government is broke. "We suspect they merely want to print money to please the supporters they shoved into commercial farming areas," said Christopher Marara, an economist with a commercial bank. "Where are they going to get the cash. There is no international support and all the donor funds have virtually dried up."

Dr Joseph Made, the Minister of Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement, maintains, however, that the money was ready and will certainly be disbursed to the peasant farmers. David Hasluck, Commercial Farmers' Union (CFU) director, lambasted the move, asking Made at last week's congress of the CFU: "Where is the money coming from? If we can just print money, we do not need to produce and we can all be happy." The minister did not respond. Made said the new farmers needed support to enable government to achieve certain targets set for the agriculture sector for livestock and crop production for the season 2001/2002.

Made said: "Cereal production has generally declined over the last 10 years. The issue of cereal production is very, very important in terms of our food security and industrial growth. To this effect, I would like to indicate that we have set targets for the other sectors other than the commercial farming sector." With the R2bn to be available in the 2001/2002 farming season, the smallholder sector is expected to reach a target of 4.8 million tons of maize next year, he added.

But the figures were described by the spokesperson for commerce and industry as a wish list. In the past, the combined output of Zimbabwe's farmers never got anywhere near the tonnage set by the minister. The highest return since independence is around 2 million tons. This year, both the smallholder and commercial sectors produced a total maize crop of only 1.4 million tons, which is less than the domestic annual requirement of 2.1 million tons. The smaller crop was the result of lawlessness and erratic rainfall. The shortfall means Zimbabwe, once a breadbasket of southern Africa will be forced to import the staple, maize, in the face of non-existent currency reserves and dwindling international support.

Zimbabwe's domestic debt rose sharply by R13bn in less than 12 months to R30bn because of increased state spending arising from the ruling party's bid to garner political support and the continued lack of foreign donations, economists said on Wednesday. The figures were confirmed in the latest central bank report showing that the size of the debt has been rising since June last year from R17bn and was likely to worsen as the political temperature rises before the watershed Presidential election set for next year. Further, the beleaguered government has kept on pressing the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe to advance money to its ministries.

Made told angry commercial farmers: "It is my hope that soon after this congress we will be receiving your proposals as to what your projected production will be for the commercial farming sector. "It will also be important for this proposal to include the resources that you anticipate to utilise in order to achieve your production proposals, that is the budget, inclusive of foreign currency requirements as well as the support you will need from the ministry." In response, the farmers said while the availability of resources were an important part of organised agriculture, the government must act on lawlessness and remove price controls. Hasluck said the controls on maize and wheat marketing imposed by the government last month would discourage production.

The offices of the Norwegian Directorate of Development in Zimbabwe is reported to be under surveillance by the country's authorities, according to The Financial Gazette. The reason is supposedly President Robert Mugabe's fear that the nation's political opposition will be given foreign assistance. According to the newspaper, the homes of some of the personnel of the embassies and foreign aid missions to Zimbabwe are also under surveillance. Norway's Charge d'affaires, Tom Eriksen at the embassy in Harare has sent a report on the matter to the Department of Foreign Affairs in Oslo, Dagsavisen writes. President Robert Mugabe and his ruling Zanu PF party, in May pushed through a bill in Parliament, making it illegal to support Zimbabwe's biggest opposition party, MDC. Embassies and aid missions which break this ban risk being expelled from the country, The Financial Gazette writes. Norway's Charge d'affaires deny that any Norwegian development aid is given to political parties.

Mutare - Three senior officials at the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) are said to have been asked to step down amid reports that $1,4 billion in proceeds from jewellery sales may have disappeared. The jewellery was manufactured by Aurex (Pvt) Limited, a subsidiary company of the RBZ, sources in Harare said this week. The Aurex jewellery consignment was sold to an undisclosed foreign country - most likely the United States of America - but proceeds from the sale never found their way into either Aurex or RBZ coffers, the sources confided.

The matter is understood to have been investigated by the anti-corruption unit of the National Economic Consultative Forum (NECF), a quasi-government, multi-sector body set up about three years ago to help spearhead the country’s economic revival. The NECF, according to our sources, recommended that the three senior RBZ officials step down for their respective roles in the transaction. It was not immediately clear what roles they played. The three officials, who were all said to be out attending workshops and could not be reached for the past five days, are reportedly resisting measures to remove them.

Other officials at the RBZ, Aurex and NECF were not forthcoming when contacted for comment, amid suggestions within financial and political circles that the matter was being kept firmly under the carpet to protect the image of the central bank. Aurex, which has undergone a restructuring exercise and announced a new board of directors on Thursday, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Reszim Investments (Pvt) Limited, which in turn is wholly-controlled by the RBZ. The company, based at Ruwa outside the capital, manufactures jewellery for export to the US, which earns it an average of $55 million (US$1 million) a month in foreign currency earnings.

Both John Dhliwayo, the managing director of Aurex, and Ignatious Mabasa, the RBZ spokesman, said they were unaware of the matter. Nonetheless, the pair suggested this newspaper submit questions in writing. At NECF, the chairman of the anti-corruption unit, businessman and politician Phillip Chiyangwa, denied the quasi-governmental body had investigated such an issue. "I’m hearing this for the first time from you," said Chiyangwa, referring further questions to Nhlanhla Masuku, the NECF’s chief spokesman. Masuku did not return messages left at his office. "There have been all sorts of rumours going around about that, but there is no substance to it," Lovemore Chihota, the chairman of Aurex, said on Thursday. He then suggested the newspaper visit him for a face-to-face interview over the allegations.

In advertisements flighted in issues of yesterday’s newspapers, Aurex said it had appointed new directors as part of a restructuring programme that would culminate in the marketing of machine-made and hand-made jewel products to Europe, the Middle East and the Americas. "Currently, Aurex is producing and selling jewellery to the American market only," the company said in the advertisement. "The exports are earning the country an average of US$1 million a month in foreign currency." At the official exchange rate, that is $55 million a month, or $660 million a year.

Government’s fast-track land resettlement programme will only achieve its full productive potential in 15 years, a World Bank-sponsored study on land reform says. The study sought to examine the impact of re-allocating five million hectares of commercial farmland to the peasantry. The report acknowledged that the land reform programme was economically viable if carried out in a manner that allowed resettled farmers to make the investment necessary to achieve productive potential. The analysis shows that the viability of the land reform exercise depends on support from government during the first five years of resettlement. The report said: "Results seem to be equally promising in terms of production and employment, assuming that the farmers throughout these periods would belong to the high-performance group."

According to Roger van den Brink, the World Bank resident representative in Zimbabwe, the report is the first in a series, and only looks at the effects of land reform on the beneficiaries. In subsequent reports an economic model will be developed to capture the effects of land reform on key economic variables such as production and employment in the entire agricultural sector, as well as other sectors of the economy. The study comes at a time when hordes of war veterans and ruling party supporters have intensified their commercial farm invasions. In some cases they have burnt crops such as tobacco, wheat and export grass. Critics blame government for a skewed resettlement programme where people are being dumped on farms without proper infrastructure.

"Government administration costs include all types of costs necessary to smooth the process of resettlement," the report said. The researchers estimated that the administration costs include both costs specific to the resettlement (US$200 per farmer in the first year) and farmer support costs of US$50 a year. It said the infrastructure costs covered electricity, water, sanitation, farm road construction, building schools, clinics and animal health facilities. Economists and agricultural experts have pointed out that none of the inputs or support network vital to the success of the scheme have been put in place and the World Bank-sponsored study therefore remains academic.

President's 'war veterans' to get more than one vote - and weapons training

Harare - Plans by Zimbabwe's President Mugabe to rig next year's presidential election have been exposed, just as his beleaguered nation begins gearing up for the crunch ballot which he is expected to lose. His plot hinges on the multiple registration of ruling-party supporters in different constituencies to allow them to vote several times; the second part of the strategy involves relocating more than 500,000 unemployed urban dwellers to commercial farms now being confiscated from whites without compensation.

Mr Mugabe, 77, who has been in power since independence from Britain was achieved in 1980, announced that he would run for another six-year term next April, despite his government's massive unpopularity. The business and financial newspaper the Financial Gazette described his rigging plans last Thursday. Mr Mugabe aims to outflank the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) by moving the hundreds of thousands of unemployed and other desperate urban dwellers into farming areas under the controversial fast-track land resettlement exercise.

The relocation of registered voters from urban to rural areas - in exchange for their pledged votes - will bolster the ruling Zanu-PF party's rural support. Mr Mugabe's party traditionally enjoys support in rural areas. The relocated people will get slices of land from the farms the Zimbabwe government has been seizing from whites. They will then be expected to transfer their votes to a rural constituency where they have been resettled. The plan was tailor-made to fit Zanu's overall presidential election strategy. A pilot phase proved successful in the recent parliamentary by-election in Bindura constituency, where 4,000 mainly Zanu supporters and "war veterans" were moved from surrounding towns registered as voters in the constituency. Zanu won the by-election by 5,000 votes.

Government officials admitted that Mr Mugabe was not leaving anything to chance and would do all he could to ensure he won the presidential election. He has vowed never to let the MDC, which he calls a British puppet, rule Zimbabwe. The president is known to have contracted an Israeli company to supply $20m-worth of riot vehicles and water cannons for the police force, which he has often used to intimidate opposition supporters. The Home Affairs permanent secretary, Mike Matshiya, assured the Israeli arms firm, Beit Alfa Trailer Company, that the Zimbabwe government would strain every nerve to raise the foreign currency needed to purchase the equipment. Zimbabwe is in the midst of a desperate hard-currency shortage. Fuel supplies are exhausted and the price of basic goods is rocketing.

The opposition complains that it is immoral of Mr Mugabe to spend large sums of money on arms purchases at a time when the country cannot feed itself. The Finance Minister, Simba Makoni, has said that Zimbabwe has no money to import food. Information about plans to equip the police coincided with reports that groups of "war veterans" - Mr Mugabe's shock troops in his brutal campaign against white farmers - are undergoing training in gun-handling at the police's Morris Depot in Harare. Sources at the depot say veterans from all over Zimbabwe are undergoing training in batches of 50, in preparation for their deployment in the election campaign.

Stephen Madzimure, a 27-year-old supporter of Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change, is still sporting a black eye and nursing a swollen left arm, two weeks after being attacked by ruling Zanu PF party supporters. "I'm one of the lucky ones because I still have all my limbs,'' says Madzimure. ``Some of my colleagues in the party were almost beaten to death. You are attacked after rallies or followed to your homes which is what happened to me.'' Madzimure is among hundreds of victims of the latest wave of state-inspired violence in the run-up to a key by-election in his home town, Bindura, 80 kms northeast of Harare.

For President Robert Mugabe, Bindura, the seat of a top Cabinet minister Border Gezi who died in a car crash in April, was one Zanu PF just couldn't lose. The party literally went on the warpath - maiming opponents, beating others senseless, drafting in supporters to the rolls. The bloodshed paid off. Electoral officers announced July 30 that the Zanu PF candidate Elliot Manyika had defeated the MDC's Elliot Manyika by 15 864 votes to 9 4564, a substantial increase in the government's majority. The success of ZANU-PF's month-long brutal political campaign in Bindura has aroused fears of even worse violence in another landmark by-election, at Chikomba, 140 kms south of Harare, in September. Chikomba was the seat of the architect of ZANU-PF's reign of terror, Chenjerai Hunzvi, the self-styled Hitler who was the leader of veterans of the war which led to independence in 1980. He died of suspected AIDS June 4.

For Zanu PF, Bindura provided a vital endorsement of violence as a strategy for survival, which Mugabe adopted after the massive rejection in February last year of a constitution which sought to widen his powers and provide for the seizure of white-owned farms without compensation. Many fear that violence will now escalate in every poll - from local to presidential elections. Thousands of farms have been invaded by Zanu PF supporters, at least 50 people, including political opponents, white farmers and their employees have been killed, and national elections in June last year, which Zanu PF won narrowly, were wracked by violence. The economy teeters on the brink of collapse, food shortages loom, and streams of Zimbabweans, black and white, have left the country.

Outside Zanu PF, however, many see Bindura - and perhaps Chikomba - as a one-off where the ruling party was able to focus its terror machine on one district. That will be less easy to do in presidential elections which must be held by April next year. "All we need to do is to ensure that the presidential election is relatively free, which is difficult to do with by-elections,'' commented MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, whose motorcade was stoned and came under fire when he campaigned in Bindura. Emmanuel Magade, law lecturer at the University of Zimbabwe, said the result did not tell "us much about the future.'' ``They won in their stronghold and they did not change their campaign tactics,'' he added.

Few, however, are safe from political violence. Philip Marufu from Mount Darwin, 156kms north-east of Harare, recently told a court how he was abducted by Zanu PF supporters before the June elections, and held for a day in a storage tank with his 12-year-old son. The perpetrators, said Marufu, later brought their girlfriends to the closed tank and forced him and his son to listen to noisy sexual intercourse. Bindura magistrate Reyi Gweshero Tito had his house surrounded by Zanu PF youths after he convicted 17 party supporters of waging a campaign of violence in Mashonaland West. The youths sang revolutionary songs and forced the magistrate's wife to accept the post of treasurer of the youth wing. Among those sentenced by Tito was a brother of Chief Chiweshe, a local leader involved in the violence. The chief tried to stop people attending an MDC supporter's funeral, and ordered the destruction of granaries before he was beaten up by members of the MDC. Minister of Education, Sports and Culture Samuel Mumbengegwi and Foreign Affairs minister Stan Mudenge reportedly told principals and student leaders during a recent visit to the Masvingo province that they could be killed for supporting opposition parties. On July 30, some 100 army recruits rampaged through a nightclub and two bars in Masvingo, charging patrons with supporting the MDC, ransacking a till, and vandalising the premises.

Harare - Zimbabwe's main civic groups called on President Robert Mugabe on Saturday to end a violent campaign by his supporters ahead of presidential elections next year or risk more trouble. At the end of a one-day conference on "Crisis in Zimbabwe'' some 500 delegates from development agencies, professional associations, church and human rights groups, labor and student unions urged Mugabe to set a program that would guarantee a free and fair poll. They demanded the establishment of an independent electoral commission, a new voters' register at least three months before the presidential election, a political code of conduct for the elections and media freedoms.

"The political climate must improve significantly if we are to have a free and fair election, and this means the government must bring to an end the political violence that its supporters are perpetrating on the opposition,'' they said in one resolution. "If the president and the government refuse to act on these fair demands, we reserve our democratic right to engage in civic action, including civil disobedience,'' they added. The conference said it supported land reforms in Zimbabwe, but insisted it was opposed to Mugabe's controversial seizures of white-owned farms that have been accompanied by a wave of violence. "We fully accept the need to end inequities in land ownership, but land reforms must be properly planned and executed,'' the conference resolved.

Brian Raftopoulos, an associate professor at the University of Zimbabwe's Institute of Development Studies, said in a report that Mugabe appeared bent on using violence to destroy the opposition. "The future of Zimbabwe is balanced on a knife-edge, as an aging and increasingly unpopular nationalist leader struggles to secure his political future,'' he said. "The test of a political transition is upon us as a nation, and the failure to deal with this challenge could lead to a heightened civil conflict within the next year,'' he said.