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Archived News
6th August 2002
Theft of Passports Is Facile and Primitive Revenge
MDC rejects Kadoma mayoral results as fraudulent
How Zimbabwe is killing the region
Global "Save Zimbabwe" Campaign Launched
Charity warns of starvation in Zimbabwe
Mugabe off to Malaysia
Spoornet shunts food aid off the rails
Let them eat cake
DRC deal could be difficult to implement
Govt fights back on sanctions
Minister says Zimbabwe food aid must increase
U.S. Zimbabwe emergency food dispute settled
Zanu PF youths kidnap Manicaland opposition official
Mugabe's militias lift bar to aid
Mugabe has lost moral right to rule, say MPs
ZESN Preliminary Statement on Kadoma Mayoral By - Election 27 - 28 July 2002
Heads to roll in reshuffle
Food shortages complicate Zimbabwe dialogue: Minister
Britain's Amos says Zimbabwe dampens aid appeal
Journalists challenge Zimbabwe's media laws
Todd finally gets passport
Mugabe threatens to seize passports of opponents
File on Four
Zimbabwe continues to block gene-altered corn
Mugabe opponents face trial
Judge refuses to remove Nkala murder suspects from remand
Opposition youth chairperson Chamisa faces LOMA charge
Former White House official slams Mugabe for "perfect crime"
Police arrest MDC MP in hospital
Dulini-Ncube returned to hospital
For Zimbabwe's white farmers, time to move on
Over the top
Sick MDC man back in hospital
Zimbabwe police search Tsvangirai's home
Zim farmers count their losses
A nerve touched
SA, DRC strengthen ties
Shunned by West, Mugabe turns to Asia
JAG urges farmers to stay
The Rhodesian plan
Zimbabwe youth are mimicking American culture, minus the context
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From The Financial Times (UK), 30 July
Charity warns of starvation in Zimbabwe
Johannesburg - Save the Children, the UK-based international aid agency, on Monday warned of mass migration of starving people from Zimbabwe to neighbouring South Africa within the next three months. "Migration happens as an absolute last resort. But if we go on as now - without major intervention - people will begin to starve in late September and October. If we don't manage this with a significant increase in aid and [Zimbabwean] government and commercial participation, then we risk large scale population movement," said Brendan Paddy, a spokesman for Save the Children. "People at the end of the rope will break for the border with South Africa. Many Zimbabweans have economic and social links there." The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) estimates that about 6m Zimbabweans - half the country's population - face severe food shortages as a result of drought and a mismanaged economy. But the UN agency says people are not dying yet in Zimbabwe as a direct result of starvation.
Some of the worst hit areas are in the south-west of the country along the border with South Africa and Botswana. The border between South Africa and Zimbabwe is porous. A large Zimbabwean community - estimated by analysts to number more than 1m people - lives in South Africa. South African immigration officials acknowledge that stopping illegal immigrants from Zimbabwe crossing the border in search of work is near impossible. "Border jumpers" cross the Limpopo river at night to make their way through holes in a border fence that during the apartheid era was electrified with a lethal charge to discourage military insurgency. Immigration officials have yet to report a heavy influx of hungry migrants abandoning the land in the neighbouring country. But the South African government has made contingency plans in its northern Limpopo province for the arrival of refugees.
The regional food crisis affecting 14m people in Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Zambia, Malawi, Swaziland and Lesotho is expected to peak in October and subside in March. Save the Children estimates that the 6m facing hunger in Zimbabwe will grow to almost the entire population before the end of the year. President Robert Mugabe's government has no foreign currency with which to import maize supplies. In spite of appeals by the UN, it has discouraged private sector participation in food distribution by imposing price controls and maintaining a state monopoly on maize-marketing. "In Angola, people are starving to death now [as a result of the civil war]. But Zimbabwe is going to rise rapidly up the agenda. It's the worst hit country in Southern Africa," said Mr Paddy.
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From The Daily News, 30 July
Mugabe off to Malaysia
Barely ten days after returning from a visit to Cuba, President Mugabe is off again, this time to Malaysia, for six days. Mugabe, together with 71 of his top Zanu PF and government officials, who has been barred from travelling to Europe under the EU’s targeted sanctions imposed just before the controversial March presidential elections, is expected to meet his Malaysian counterpart and government officials. Mahathir Mohamad, Mugabe’s long-time ally, has announced his intentions to leave office unlike his counterpart, who chose to remain at the helm after going through a controversial election. It was not immediately clear what Mugabe’s itinerary would be but in Cuba he concentrated on visiting technological centres and scientific centres dealing with the HIV/Aids scourge.
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From The Daily News (SA), 29 July
Spoornet shunts food aid off the rails
Famine and starvation is crippling southern African countries north of the Limpopo and the situation is set to worsen as Spoornet - which supplies them with food - reduces the number of trains which transport grain. With the government's privatisation of parastatals, including Transnet whose subsidiaries include Spoornet, the number of trains is expected to be cut drastically to save the cost of maintaining the ageing fleet. World Food Programme (WFP) deputy executive director Jean-Jacques Graisse said: "We see this as a crisis of enormous proportions. The situation worsens with each day." The reports, based on recent WFP missions to Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe, warned that about 12,8 million people faced serious food shortages until the region's next main harvest in April 2003. Given the gravity of the findings by the assessment missions, UN agencies have called on donor governments worldwide for rapid donations to avert a humanitarian crisis. About 1,2 million metric tons of food aid are needed immediately to relieve the hungry. Over the next year, four million metric tons of food would have to be imported to meet the needs of the affected people.
However, National Milling Co-Operative chief executive Jannie de Villiers said Spoornet simply did not have the capacity to deal with a problem of this magnitude. De Villiers said Spoornet had already had a problem distributing grain throughout South Africa. "You order 40 locomotives and they bring only 10, resulting in a mill working only half a day," said de Villiers. He described the crisis as still in its infancy stage and warned that the crunch was still coming. Independent grain trader James Chryton, echoed De Villiers, saying Spoornet had been under pressure from Public Enterprise Minister Jeff Radebe to cut down the number of locomotives in a move to make Spoornet profitable. He said that making Spoornet profitable was part of the larger scheme of making the parastatal more attractive to potential investors and strategic partners. Mxolisi Mgojo, a mining magnate from Eyesizwe Mining Company, observed that the government was "reaping the fruits" of under-investing in its rolling stock in the past few years.
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From ZWNEWS, 31 July
Let them eat cake
By Michael Hartnack
Anyone can balance their books by the simple expedient of not paying their bills, as Zimbabwe Finance Minister Simba Makoni demonstrated last week when he presented a supplementary "mini-budget’’ to Parliament. Derisive laughter from the opposition Movement for Democratic Change greeted much of his 45-minute statement. Makoni's books "balance" by simply defaulting on service of US $1,1 billion in international debt, and financing day-to-day government by borrowing from captive local financial institutions at a quarter the rate of inflation. Pensioners and others who have their life savings invested are forced to lend to Robert Mugabe’s regime; and for every dollar they hand over they get only 40 cents back at the end of the year. Many elderly people would be unable to survive without remittances from relatives abroad.
Makoni blamed all Zimbabwe's economic troubles on drought and inflation - meticulously avoiding reference to the disruption of agriculture by state-sponsored militants, and the seizure of 5 000 commercial farms, the invasions of factories, tourist facilities and other business premises. He referred coyly to "our agrarian transformation" which, to be a success, now requires vast injections of inputs Z$8,5 billion. He allocated Z$17,1 billion to food relief for 7,8 million people. But this comes to US $310 million at the official rate of exchange, and is already pretty well offset by US $236 million in pledges Zimbabwe has already received from foreign donors. In other words, if drought were Zimbabwe’s only problem, there would be little to worry about. "Government is committed to striving to ensure that no citizen of Zimbabwe dies of starvation," Makoni announced. According to Catholic churchmen, 27 children have already died of malnutrition-related diseases at Binga, on the shores of Lake Kariba, where ruling Zanu PF militants prevent distribution of relief to suspected MDC voters' families. Angela Rippon of the British Red Cross last week reported that three children had died at their school desks. Makoni announced plans for supplementary feeding schemes for under-5s and for schoolchildren in the 5-9 age group, which, even if it happened, would do nothing for the millions withdrawn from school because their parents cannot afford the fees. Able-bodied adults will receive relief in "food for work" schemes and the elderly and infirm will get it free, Makoni added, to MDC shouts of "Zanu PF only!"
Makoni admitted that with the agricultural sector shrinking by 24,6 percent (against his October 2001 estimate of 6,9 percent), manufacturing by 11,9 percent (forecast 7 percent), mining by 4,9 percent (2,4 percent) and the hotel and distribution sector by 12 percent (8,6 percent), the economy would contract by an overall 11,1 percent this year. Agricultural exports will decline 13,6 percent. He said revenues were above target only because of runaway inflation, adding with masterly understatement, "We therefore do not celebrate." Extra funds were allocated to chronically inefficient parastatals, and to MDC shouts of "It was illegitimate," to running elections. In all, Makoni said he would finance Z$52 billion additional expenditure by re-allocating spending between ministries and by seeking Z$11,5 billion (U$209 million at the official exchange rate) from a revaluation of "non-essential" imports for customs duty purposes. This effective devaluation came just two days after Mugabe explicitly rejected any form of devaluation and savagely attacked the existence of parallel exchange rates.
In an inflation-fuelling step, Makoni said "non-essentials" would be valued at an exchange rate of Z$300 to U$1 instead of the official rate of Z$55. (The black market rate is now running at Z$500-$700 for one American dollar.) Imported goods, including spares of every sort, domestic appliances, and medicines, are likely to jump by 500 percent in price. In addition, the discretion customs officers will enjoy opens the door wider to corruption. On July 23, Mugabe declared at the opening of Parliament that devaluation was "dead." He explained that the Zimbabwe dollar would recover its 55-US $1 value by virtue a huge new outflow of exports, triggered by his "agrarian revolution." It all illustrated the determination of Zanu PF, from Mugabe downward, to proclaim utterly contradictory notions. However, the ruling party’s sheer insensitivity to reality could not be better illustrated than by a full-colour photograph that appeared on the front page of the state-controlled Herald, and again (enlarged) inside, on the very day Makoni made his statement about 7.8 million needing food relief. The 78-year-old Mugabe was shown feeding birthday cake by hand into the mouth of his 30-something wife, Grace, at a lavish reception at Harare's five-star Sheraton International Hotel. She was wearing an outfit that might have made supermodel Cindy Crawford jealous.
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From SABC News, 30 July
DRC deal could be difficult to implement
Despite official optimism that the latest peace agreement between the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Rwanda will lead to the end of the war in the DRC, some Africa analysts are warning that it is going to be difficult for all sides to carry through the deal. The presidents of the DRC and Rwanda signed the peace pact in Pretoria today. The deal aims to end the civil war in the DRC which has drawn in five neighbouring countries and left an estimated 2,5 million people dead. In terms of the deal, Rwandan Hutu rebels based in the east of the DRC are to be rounded up, disarmed and repatriated within 90 days. In return, Rwanda will withdraw some 20 000 of its troops currently stationed in the DRC to secure its borders from the rebels. South Africa and the United Nations will verify that the withdrawals do take place within 120 days from the signing of the treaty.
Hussein Solomon, the head of the unit for African Studies at the University of Pretoria, has grave doubts that either side is fully in control of the militias that are fighting in the east of the DRC. "DRC President Joseph Kabila is not fully in control of the country, and I doubt that he controls the militias in the east. And, the Rwanda militias in the DRC have built their own power-bases, outside of the patronage of Rwandan president Paul Kagame, by extracting natural resources from the DRC," he explains. However, the Rwanda military authorities have reportedly indicated that they have a plan for the withdrawal of their troops from the DRC. Solomon also doubts that the deal has enough popular support. He points out that the peace deal has essentially been brokered between the governments of Rwanda and the DRC. Kabila is not an elected leader and the extent of his support among the Congolese is not known.
Earlier this year, the Inter Congolese Dialogue - where a broad spectrum of civil society organisations and political parties from the DRC tried to find a way to end the country's civil war collapsed for various reasons including demands that Kabila step down as president. Despite the end of the conflict with Rwanda - which has been one of the driving forces behind the war in the DRC - the DRC's internal political instability is likely to continue. Troops from Uganda, Zimbabwe, Angola and Namibia are also still in the DRC - either fighting in support of the government or one of the rebel groups. Military analysts also point out that South Africa and the UN will be hard-pressed to get troops deployed in the eastern DRC within the 120 days agreed to in the deal. In any event, the UN mission to the DRC is presently understaffed and it will have to recruit more troops. South Africa has indicated that it will provide additional troops to the UN if it is asked.
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From The Financial Gazette, 1 August
Govt fights back on sanctions
President Robert Mugabe’s government, stung by international sanctions against its members, will take harsh retaliatory measures against the pro-democracy nations and possibly withdraw passports of leaders of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), a Cabinet minister said yesterday. Home Affairs Minister John Nkomo said the government is actively working on a comprehensive response to sanctions which have been imposed by the West on ruling Zanu PF officials for their alleged support for lawlessness in the country. "We are actively considering a range of measures to take, which will include the withdrawal of passports and the introduction of exit and entry visas against our political opponents in the country who have campaigned for sanctions and we are practically working towards that end," he told the Financial Gazette. He said the passports of MDC leaders could be withdrawn, noting that a passport was only a privilege which could be taken away at any time. The United States, the 15-nation European Union (EU), Canada, New Zealand and Switzerland have banned Mugabe and most of his top officials from travelling to their territories and imposed a freeze on their overseas assets. The EU last week widened the sanctions by adding 52 more names to the initial list of 20 banned Zimbabweans while Britain sent home Zanu PF’s deputy secretary for the disabled Joshua Malinga, who had tried to fly from London to New York for a conference. Sweden last week also banned four senior Zanu PF legislators, including Deputy Parliamentary Speaker Edna Madzongwe, from travelling to the European country for a legislative meeting. Sweden told them that it was sending a clear message that "(ruling party) politics currently prevailing in Zimbabwe is bad and that if you are part of the politics you are set to be affected". Nkomo said in an interview: "In implementing these measures, we will take into cognisance the international law of reciprocity as well and we are busy exercising our minds in this regard." He said the planned measures will target people within Zimbabwe who have campaigned for sanctions to be slapped on the country’s political leadership and said the specific measures to be taken will be announced shortly.
The crackdown is likely to see critics of the government in the country being denied the right to move freely outside Zimbabwe through the seizure of their passports. The government accuses the MDC of leading the crusade for the imposition of sanctions on Zimbabwe, shunned by the rest of the world because of violence which marred the 2000 parliamentary elections and the disputed 2002 presidential ballot. Nkomo said it was crucial for the government to "deal with internal saboteurs" before it could even start responding to measures against foreign nations which are taking a tough line against Harare. He branded the EU sanctions as ineffectual and a vindictive act driven by racism to punish the government for its determination to seize white-owned farms to resettle blacks, a charge the EU has long rejected as baseless. The sanctions on Zimbabwe’s leadership have had a knock-on effect on Zimbabwe’s tottering economy because the country has been excluded from virtually all initiatives of the international community meant to ameliorate Africa’s under-development. The International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and most Western nations have also cut off all aid to Zimbabwe, accusing the besieged government of flouting its own laws and waging terror against its MDC foes and the independent media. Zimbabwe is in the midst of its worst hunger crisis, blamed on the government’s violent seizure of private commercial farms, and needs more than 500 000 tonnes of imported food aid to feed more than six million people - half its population. Ironically, most of the food aid is being donated by the US and the EU, which have refused to accept Mugabe’s March 2002 re-election and want a fresh ballot supervised by the international community.
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From The Times (UK), 1 August
Minister says Zimbabwe food aid must increase
Johannesburg/London - Britain will have to increase its emergency food aid to Zimbabwe to prevent widespread starvation, even at the risk of propping up the Mugabe regime, the Government admitted yesterday. Baroness Amos, the minister with responsibility for Africa, who was in Pretoria, said that Britain had promised £30 million a year in food and development aid, but that figure would have to rise significantly. Six million people are facing famine in the former British colony. The higher level of aid would be required for several years until the damage caused by President Mugabe’s seizure of about 3,000 white farms could be repaired, she said. Lady Amos sought to silence critics, who will accuse the Government of propping up Zimbabwe’s government, saying: "We cannot allow women and children to die." Britain had "a moral responsibility" to ensure that the people of Zimbabwe did not starve, she said. Nor could it refuse to increase assistance to Zimbabwe because of the danger that the ruling Zanu PF party would seek to ensure that food aid was distributed to government supporters, she said. Accepting that the British Government would face some critical questioning of its policies, she added: "It is essential that we work together to find a solution which puts the needs of the people of Zimbabwe first."
Britain has already donated £45 million to the United Nations World Food Programme’s international appeal for £338 million to avert famine across southern Africa. Zimbabwe will receive £14 million in emergency food relief, in addition to the £18 million donated in development aid. The Commons Public Accounts Select Committee criticised Britain’s spending on aid yesterday, saying that too little was reaching the poorest nations. More aid should be sent to poor countries whose governments were committed to reducing poverty rather than to middle-income states that could do more to support their poor, it said. In a report on the Department for International Development, the committee states that 22 per cent of direct aid went to countries with pockets of deprivation, but that were not poor. These included Russia, Guatemala, Bolivia, the Philippines and Sri Lanka. Greater attention should also be given to evidence of poor governance and its impact on aid, from other aid projects, local press reports or court proceedings, the committee said.
Agricultural production in Zimbabwe’s commercial farming sector is down 60 per cent from two years ago and even if Mr Mugabe’s land seizures were reversed it would take many years for food production to revert to normal, Lady Amos said. Some 62 per cent of white commercial farms in Zimbabwe have been served with so-called Section 8 Land Act notices, making it a criminal offence for their owners to farm the land. The World Food Programme estimates that 13 million people in Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Mozambique, Lesotho and Swaziland are threatened by food shortages. The organisation fears that Western countries have been procrastinating out of a conviction that the region’s food crisis is self-inflicted, Lady Amos said. Lady Amos told the Foreign Affairs Select Committee that she continued to hope for an unexpected and critical development that would save Zimbabwe, citing the example of Angola. In February the death of Jonas Savimbi, the rebel leader, in effect ended 40 years of conflict. She added: "As the months go on, if the situation does not change, I think the neighbouring governments may well have to review their strategy."
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From allafrica.com, 31 July
U.S. Zimbabwe emergency food dispute settled
Washington, DC - The United States and Zimbabwe have reached agreement on supplying emergency food to the famine-stricken southern African nation, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Africa Walter Kansteiner told allafrica.com Wednesday. "The government of Zimbabwe has accepted U.S. GM [genetically modified] maize with the proviso either that it come in milled or that, once it arrives in the country, it be milled." Zimbabwe had refused to accept thousands of tons of genetically altered corn, despite a famine emergency, arguing that if some of the unmilled kernels were sown instead of eaten, they would begin contaminating Zimbabwe's indigenous crop. The Zimbabwe government said that would threaten the country's exports to Europe, which prohibits bioengineered foods. Zimbabweans, as well as some international analysts, also fear that companies holding patents on genetically engineered seeds would seek to prohibit the traditional practice of saving a portion of the crop to plant the following season. Asked specifically if Zimbabwe would now be accepting U.S. corn, Kansteiner replied, "correct."
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From The Daily News, 31 July
Zanu PF youths kidnap Manicaland opposition official
Prosper Mutseyami, the MDC's vice-chairman in Manicaland, was on Monday allegedly kidnapped by a group of Zanu PF youths, who have reportedly assumed police duties in Chipinge North. The vigilantes reportedly handed him over to the CID in Chipinge, an MDC official said on Monday. Although the officer-in-charge at Chipinge Police Station denied knowledge of the incident, a member of the CID who identified himself as Runatsai, on the same day confirmed Mutseyami was being interrogated. "We have him under interrogation," Runatsai said. "Since I am not the one dealing with the case, I am not in a position to tell you why he has been detained. However, he has not been placed in police custody neither has he been formally charged so far. We are waiting for our superiors to interview him and we will take it from there." Pishai Muchauraya, the MDC's provincial spokesman, said: "Mutseyami was abducted by a group of the Zanu PF youth brigade from his home in Gaza at around 5am on Sunday. He was bundled up and taken to Chipinge Police Station CID section. The circumstances are confusing. If the police wanted to arrest him for a crime they suspect he committed, then they should make the arrest themselves, not Zanu PF thugs. Up to now we do not know what crime he committed and the police are not co-operating with us." Mutseyami has been in and out of police custody since the June 2000 parliamentary election in which Zanu PF lost 57 seats to the opposition MDC. Out of 14 constituencies in Manicaland, the MDC won seven, Zanu PF six, and Zanu Ndonga one.
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From The Times (UK), 1 August
Mugabe's militias lift bar to aid
Harare - Militiamen controlled by President Mugabe have lifted a two-month blockade on food earmarked for children in one of Zimbabwe’s poorest districts, but distribution has resumed on restricted terms. The Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace in Zimbabwe was forced to surrender control of its relief programme for 30,000 children in Zimbabwe’s remote Binga district to three local Catholic missions, Father Tom McQuinnel, the head of the Binga parish, said. The militia had accused the commission of supporting the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and demanded an overhaul of its operations. "In order to get food moving and help the children out, we had to agree to these demands," Father McQuinnel said. Distribution was allowed to resume last week. On May 25, about 30 war veterans had sealed off the gates of a warehouse in Binga where 115 tonnes of fortified maize porridge was stored. Police refused to act. The Batonka people of Binga are dependent on food aid. In the 2000 elections, they responded to two decades of neglect by Mr Mugabe’s party by voting for the MDC.
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From the Daily Telegraph (UK), 1 August
Mugabe has lost moral right to rule, say MPs
London - President Robert Mugabe has lost the moral right to govern Zimbabwe and has destroyed the nation, MPs say today. The Commons foreign affairs select committee recommends tougher sanctions against Zimbabwe and stricter restrictions on overseas travel by the country's ruling elite. It criticises Mr Mugabe for his land seizure programme and accuses him of "rewarding his cronies with gifts of expropriated land". The MPs say the president has "deliberately and systematically flouted the rule of law" and abused the fundamental rights of his people. In a report published today they say the Government was right successfully to urge Zimbabwe's suspension from the Commonwealth and to refuse to accept the result of elections there in March. Britain had a "particular obligation" to help rebuild the nation, but as the former colonial power its actions "are viewed with suspicion and mistrust". The MPs urge Tony Blair to continue targeted sanctions against Harare's ruling elite and to increase aid to the people, working through international agencies and neighbouring countries.
"Since 1980 Robert Mugabe has deliberately and systematically flouted the rule of law in Zimbabwe," they say. "He has lost the moral right to govern his people. By abusing their fundamental rights and freedoms he has earned their contempt. One man can exalt a nation as Nelson Mandela did South Africa; one man can destroy a nation, as Mugabe has Zimbabwe." On land reform, the MPs argue for a programme which favours genuine farmers, internationally funded and monitored. "We condemn Robert Mugabe for his role in the violent seizure of farms and for rewarding his cronies with gifts of expropriated land," they say. The report says it is "vitally important" that Britain "continues to provide and increase aid to the people of Zimbabwe both bilaterally and through reputable international agencies, though not through the government of Zimbabwe". Other recommendations include increasing support for the BBC World Service in Zimbabwe and for other independent journalists and pressing for countries outside the European Union to impose similar sanctions to those of Europe. The report also calls on the Government to clarify how the EU travel ban applies to those travelling to international meetings.
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From ZESN, 31 July
ZESN Preliminary Statement on Kadoma Mayoral By - Election 27 - 28 July 2002
ZESN observed the Kadoma Mayoral Elections which were held on 27 and 28 July 2002. We had one accredited observer in 13 polling stations, 3 observers did not manage to turn up for accreditation. ZESN would like to express its concern and dissatisfaction with the conduct of the voting process, which in the organisation’s view compromised the fairness of the election. Of particular concern was the fact that the pre-election period was marked by significant incidents of violence and intimidation. This clearly resulted in voter apathy: the relatively low turnout - only 13 161 people managed to vote, out of 38 789 registered voters, or about 34% was in marked contrast to the recent Presidential election, when a very high turnout was recorded.
Although the boundaries of the municipal constituencies and Kadoma Central are not identical they are similar. For the 2000 parliamentary elections there were 22 polling station which were reduced to 13 during the presidential elections and slightly increased for the mayoral election. Despite the slight increase, the polling stations were still less than adequate for voters to be able to exercise their rights. Since we have complained about long queues in the past , one would have thought that for the mayoral election the authorities would have increased the polling station or made the number equal to the one during the 2000 parliamentary elections. Extremely long and slow-moving queues in the high density areas of Waverley, Mabanana, Kuredza and Mupamombe were observed. This could have been due to the reduction of polling stations. No justification was apparent for the extremely slow processing of votes. It is our view that this may have contributed to the relatively low voter turn out. The issue of low voter turn out should be of great concern to all the contesting political parties and civic society at large.
Large numbers of people were turned away from polling stations for various reasons: for example, at Munyaradzi primary School, by the end of Day 1 of voting, 124 people had been turned away. Equally worrying was that at the same polling station some people were allowed to vote on presentation of registration slips rather than identification cards. Reports also reached ZESN about a number of people not on the voters roll being allowed to vote, which is clearly against all regulations. We are still investigating and verifying allegations of ‘voters’ being bussed in from areas outside the constituency.Also, of particular concern is the fact that the voters’ roll was not made available to us and other stakeholders. Another anomaly was that there was an abnormally large number of "assisted votes" cast: this was observed both at Mabanana Primary School and at Munyaradzi Primary School. We strongly recommend that people who need assistance to vote should bring a trusted relative for the task. In conclusion, the significant number of irregularities and problematic features of the election clearly compromise and cast doubt on the freeness, fairness and transparency of the electoral process in Kadoma.
Dr R Matchaba Hove, National Chairperson
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From The Zimbabwe Independent, 2 August
Heads to roll in reshuffle
Speculation is mounting over the appointment of a new cabinet with reports suggesting President Robert Mugabe could announce a crisis management team in a week's time. Sources said Mugabe - who for the first time ever did not immediately appoint new ministers after his re-election in March - is expected to do so after the Heroes Day holiday. Information at hand indicates Mugabe is contemplating a "crisis cabinet" to resist growing international pressure and isolation. Unconfirmed reports about Mugabe's fire-fighting agenda have been swirling for sometime now. As usual, the president is expected to cling to the ruling Zanu PF old guard. Those widely seen as candidates for removal or reshuffle include Finance minister Simba Makoni and Industry and International Trade minister Herbert Murerwa who have recently been the targets of hardliners around the president. Mutoko North MP David Chapfika, who is chair of the parliamentary finance committee, has been lobbying for Makoni's post, ruling party sources said this week. Addressing the opening of parliament last week Mugabe, in a thinly-veiled attack on Makoni and Reserve Bank governor Leonard Tsumba, said those advocating devaluation were "saboteurs" and "enemies" of his government. The remarks, observers say, revealed Mugabe's deepening hostility towards reformers and dismissed idle talk about Makoni being a possible candidate for the Zanu PF leadership. Sources said Mugabe was coming under intense pressure from the ruling party's old guard and war veterans to transfer or even discharge loyalists such as Jonathan Moyo, Justice minister Patrick Chinamasa and Agriculture minister Joseph Made. Made is accused of bungling land reform, Moyo has alienated war veterans while Chinamasa has landed in a row with the courts. But insiders said although the three have evidently made mistakes, they were unlikely to go given their ability to reflect Mugabe's combative thinking.
Health minister Timothy Stamps is likely to be replaced by his deputy David Parirenyatwa while Defence minister Sydney Sekeramayi is said to be a possible candidate for a transfer. General Solomon Mujuru has been considered a candidate for the Defence ministry. Attorney-general Andrew Chigovera, who is an ex-officio member of cabinet and the recent subject of attacks in the government media, is also likely to go if his detractors succeed. Analyst Brian Raftopoulos said if a new cabinet is appointed it would be a fusion of old-guard followers and new blood. "I think it will be a combination of the old guard and younger ministers," he said. Sources said several provincial governors, especially the ageing Stephen Nkomo of Matabeleland South and ailing Peter Chanetsa of Mashonaland West could also be removed. It is generally accepted in government the two vice-presidents Simon Muzenda and Joseph Msika - will soon be retired although this may not happen just yet, given the political turbulence their succession would entail. The cabinet reshuffle is expected to give an indication of the direction which Mugabe wants to take in view of growing international hostility. Commentator Masipula Sithole said Mugabe was under pressure to fire Makoni. "There has been tremendous pressure from certain Zanu PF quarters for Makoni to go. They want to skin him alive together with Tsumba," he said. "The misguided hardliners are likely to dominate the new cabinet. It will be difficult to find credible new ministers because no one is enthusiastic to serve in a sinking ship." CBZ chief Gideon Gono, who was once tipped as a possible Finance minister, is understood to have turned the job down. But he could come in as Reserve Bank governor if Tsumba falls victim to Zanu PF's long knives. If the long-postponed reshuffle does materialise there will likely be a realignment of ministries. The current Ministry of Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement will be divided into two: the Ministry of Lands and Rural Resettlement, and the Ministry of Agriculture, a source said. The Ministry of Rural Resources and Water Development is also targeted for restructuring, sources said.
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From SABC News, 1 August
Food shortages complicate Zimbabwe dialogue: Minister
Food shortages in Zimbabwe are complicating efforts to get internal political dialogue off the ground, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, the Foreign Affairs Minister, said today. "Before we concentrate on the dialogue, we have to make sure that the people who dialogue have some food," she said in Pretoria. South Africa and Nigeria have been seeking to facilitate talks between the Zimbabwean government and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) since that country's controversial presidential election in March. Morgan Tsvangirai, the MDC leader, has challenged the outcome of the poll in court, causing the ruling Zanu PF to call off the dialogue in May. As the political stand-off continues, Zimbabwe is suffering from shortages of basic commodities including cooking oil, sugar, salt and the country's staple maize meal. An estimated 7,8 million Zimbabweans, including 5,4 million children, are faced with hunger. Dlamini-Zuma said the food crisis in Zimbabwe was now a priority. She commended the United States and the United Kingdom for their relief contributions. "(Meanwhile) the Zimbabweans must learn to live together, whatever political party they come from. It is the responsibility of all of them to make Zimbabwe work." Dlamini-Zuma rejected suggestions that the newly-launched African Union should act against Zimbabwe because its presidential poll was disputed. Major international bodies have also questioned the validity of the election, labelling the process "deeply flawed". Dlamini-Zuma said Zimbabweans in general had accepted the election result. Challenging the outcome of an election in court was an accepted procedure in any democracy. "The mere challenge (by the MDC) does not nullify the result," Dlamini-Zuma said.
The AU was, therefore, not applying double standards by barring Madagascar from the body while Zimbabwe was left untouched. The Organisation of African Unity (OAU), predecessor of the AU, last month announced that Madagascar was barred from taking up its seat in the AU that was launched on July 9. It resolved that the island state's election on December 16 last year that pitted Marc Ravalomanana against incumbent leader Didier Ratsiraka was not legally constituted. Ravalomanana was later found to have won the poll in a recount prompted by a court order. Ratsiraka has since fled the island. Germany, the United States, and France, the island country's former colonial power, last week began normalising relations with Ravalomanana's government. African leaders, nevertheless, resolved to stick to Madagascar's exclusion. The elections in Zimbabwe took place in accordance with that country's constitution, Dlamini-Zuma said today. Queried about other AU members that did not have democratically elected governments, she said the OAU's decision to exclude such countries were only taken in 1999. "That was the cut-off point. From 1999 onwards, people who are not constitutionally elected will not take their seats," the minister said. "There is no one who took a seat in the AU who was not constitutionally elected since 1999. There is no double standard."
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From Reuters AlertNet, 31 July
Britain's Amos says Zimbabwe dampens aid appeal
Pretoria - Britain's Junior Foreign Minister Baroness Valerie Amos said on Wednesday efforts to raise food aid for some 13 million starving people in southern Africa could be hurt by Zimbabwe's deepening political crisis. The United Nations' food aid agency World Food Programme (WFP) launched an appeal earlier this month for $507 million for an estimated one million tonnes of food aid required to deal with crippling food shortages in the region. Half of that amount is earmarked for Zimbabwe, the hardest hit of six affected countries in the area, with at least six million people at risk. Amos said donors were concerned that food distribution in Zimbabwe would be politicised by the government of President Robert Mugabe, who faces international censure for seizing white-owned farms for redistribution to poor blacks. "I think, frankly speaking, the WFP is having problems raising funds among the donor community, though not from Britain and the U.S., because of what's going on in Zimbabwe," she said. The WFP said it had raised a quarter of the required amount so far with the U.S. and Britain the biggest donors. But even then, the pace of donations was slow given the extent of the crisis which the WFP describes as the worst humanitarian crisis in the world presently.
"The fear that we might not raise enough to meet our target keeps us awake every night," Luis Clemens, WFP spokesman in Johannesburg, told Reuters. Once a regional bread basket, Zimbabwe has been reduced to begging for food after the land seizures and drought combined to cut output of the staple maize crop by two thirds. Rains later this year are expected to boost harvests in Zimbabwe but analysts predict annual food shortages because the seizures have disrupted the country's farm system. The WFP, which is the world's biggest food agency, said it had expanded its appeal beyond traditional donors - to the Middle East, East Asia and Latin America. WFP Chief James Morris said earlier this month he had warned Mugabe not to use food distribution for political gain. Mugabe in turn had assured him, he said. Mugabe has been accused by the opposition of using food as a campaign tool during controversial polls he won in March and of channelling food aid to supporters of his ruling Zanu PF party. Amos is on a three day visit to South Africa. She is British Prime Minister's Tony Blair's personal representative to the Group of Eight (G8) Nations.
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From The Mail & Guardian (SA), 1 August
Journalists challenge Zimbabwe's media laws
Harare - A small group of independent journalists in Zimbabwe said on Wednesday they have filed a lawsuit challenging a harsh new media law in the Supreme Court. The Independent Journalists Association said the regulations of the media law breached constitutional rights of free expression and association, said the group's representative, Abel Mutsakani. No date has been set for the court hearing but it parallels similar action by foreign correspondents who are also challenging the constitutionality of the law. Critics say the media law is part of a strategy by longtime President Robert Mugabe to crack down on any form of dissent in the country. Also on Wednesday, the Catholic Church in Zimbabwe told the independent Daily News that ruling party militants had lifted a two-month ban on food distribution in the northwestern district of Binga. Catholic church representative Father Tom McQuillen said three churches were now being permitted to distribute food in the area, considered an opposition stronghold. Aid groups and opposition officials have accused the government of refusing to give food aid to opposition supporters and steering it to ruling party strongholds. The church had reported that 27 children died of malnutrition-related illnesses after the forced closure of a warehouse run by the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, funded by Britain's Department of Overseas Development. For more than two years, Zimbabwe has been suffering from political unrest largely blamed on the ruling party. The nation's economy has spiralled into chaos and is on the brink of a disastrous hunger crisis that threatens nearly half the country's 12,5-million people.
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From The Financial Gazette, 1 August
Todd finally gets passport
Registrar-General Tobaiwa Mudede this week finally issued human rights activist Judith Todd a passport following a High Court order directing him to do so within 14 days. The order was made two weeks ago by High Court Judge Justice Benjamin Paradza. "I actually got the passport on Tuesday this week and it is valid for one year," Todd told the Financial Gazette yesterday. "The Registrar-General has complied with the High Court order, although he has appealed to the Supreme Court. Until that ruling, he has been made to treat me as a Zimbabwean citizen," she said. Mudede had stripped Todd of her Zimbabwean citizenship on the grounds that she took no steps to renounce a possible claim to a New Zealand passport. Justice Paradza however granted Mudede permission to appeal against his ruling in the Supreme Court. If the higher court rules in favour of Todd, the ruling could have major implications for millions of Zimbabweans of foreign descent. In another citizenship case in March this year, former Rhodesian premier Ian Smith was denied a new Zimbabwean passport until he renounced his British citizenship. Smith was however yesterday not available at his Harare home or Shurugwi farm to comment on whether he had been issued with a new passport.
The government last year introduced tough new citizenship laws which stripped thousands of white Zimbabweans of British origin the right to vote in the March presidential poll, saying they had not properly renounced their British citizenship. The amended Citizenship of Zimbabwe Act, which bans dual citizenship, could affect more than two million Zimbabweans with Malawian and Mozambican parentage. Mudede has demanded that Zimbabweans suspected of having a claim to a second citizenship must produce proof from the foreign country that they do not secretly hold its passport. Todd was born in Zimbabwe, but her father, former Rhodesian premier Sir Garfield Todd, 93, was born in New Zealand. Sir Garfield was not allowed to vote in the March election because he was told that he had ceased to be a Zimbabwean citizen. In May this year High Court Judge Justice Sandra Mungwira, ruling in Todd’s citizenship case, declared Mudede’s actions as illegal and refused him the right to appeal against that ruling. But Mudede claimed Justice Mungwira should not have heard the case because her husband might have a secret claim by descent to Malawian nationality and approached Justice Paradza for permission to take the matter to the Supreme Court.
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From The Times (UK), 2 August
Mugabe threatens to seize passports of opponents
Harare - President Mugabe is threatening to withdraw the passports of Zimbabwe’s political opposition leaders and introduce visa restrictions in retaliation for economic and travel sanctions imposed on his regime by the West. In an interview with the independent Financial Gazette, John Nkomo, the Home Affairs Minister, said that "people within Zimbabwe who have campaigned for sanctions" could lose their passports, while foreigners would be subjected to visa restrictions. Passports were "a privilege which could be taken away at any time". The Government needed first to "deal with internal saboteurs" before considering action against Western governments which imposed sanctions, the minister said. The restrictions on the movements of Mr Mugabe’s opponents were among "a range of measures" being considered. The Government has already adopted citizenship laws enabling it to deny Zimbabwean passports to anyone suspected of having a potential claim to another nationality. Aimed at disenfranchising 40,000 white people of British descent, the measures may also affect more than a million black people with links to other African nations. The laws have been successfully challenged in the High Court, but the Government plans to appeal in the Supreme Court.
Mr Nkomo named only the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), but observers said that the country’s large and vociferous pro-democracy movement of trade union, church and civil rights organisations were vulnerable. The Government blames its opponents at home for sanctions imposed after international observers said that elections returning Mr Mugabe to power had been rigged. The United States and the European Union banned senior Zimbabwe officials from visiting their countries and made their assets liable to confiscation. Canada, New Zealand and Switzerland followed suit. However, the regime appears to have been most stung by the EU’s addition last month of 52 names, including Mr Mugabe’s wife, Grace, 38, to its original list of 20. Since then, a wheelchair-bound junior Zanu PF party member has been sent home after he arrived at Gatwick airport en route to a conference for the disabled in New York, and this week Sweden said it had refused visas for four senior women Zanu PF MPs. Mr Mugabe’s penchant for international travel has been seriously cramped and his wife’s shopping trips strictly curtailed, but this week he flew to Malaysia, where he was welcomed by Mahathir Mohamad, the Prime Minister, only six days after returning from a trip to Cuba.
Welshman Ncube, the MDC’s secretary-general, said that the Government’s planned restrictions were "illegal and unconstitutional". "Every Zimbabwean has a constitutional right to freedom of movement, which means freedom to enter and exit Zimbabwe. The courts have repeatedly held a passport to be a right and not a privilege." Lovemore Madhuku, chairman of the National Constitutional Association, which is campaigning for a new democratic constitution, said that the Government could carry out its restrictions on people’s movements only if it defied the constitution. The MDC’s 56 MPs in the 120-seat Parliament constituted a blocking vote to the two-thirds majority needed to amend the constitution. Last week Mr Mugabe said that the Government would obey court rulings only if the Government considered them "objective". In December last year one of Mr Mugabe’s brothers-in-law, who is the head of the state-owned power utility, sent technicians to cut off the domestic power supply to Morgan Tsvangirai, the MDC leader, after he had urged South Africa to stop supplying power to Zimbabwe.
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BBC Radio 4, 30 July
File on Four
"There are true and genuine friends, like China, like Libya, like the Arab world, who will help us, and they will help us at our request. The rest of you can please keep your money, keep your aid, and keep yourselves out of Zimbabwe, and we will manage thank you." This was the response of Didymus Mutasa, Zanu PF’s foreign affairs spokesman, in an interview with Grant Ferrett, the BBC correspondent who recently travelled to Zimbabwe. The trip was the subject of a recent BBC Radio 4 broadcast in which Ferrett reported on the scale of political manipulation of food aid, and the ethical dilemma faced by aid agencies and charities operating in Zimbabwe.
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From The Washington Post, 3 August
Zimbabwe continues to block gene-altered corn
The Zimbabwean government, the U.S. Agency for International Development and the United Nations World Food Program plan to continue negotiating through the weekend over how to get a shipment of gene-modified food to the African nation's hungry populace, sources in Africa and the United States said yesterday. About half of Zimbabwe's 13 million citizens are on the brink of famine because of a prolonged drought and bureaucratic mismanagement of food supplies. Earlier this week, a ship containing 17,500 metric tons of corn donated by USAID docked at Durban, South Africa, for distribution to Zimbabwe by the United Nations. But President Robert Mugabe has said he is reluctant to accept the corn unless it is milled. Otherwise, he has said, farmers may plant some genetically engineered kernels, contaminating the nation's fields and making Zimbabwean corn ineligible for export in future years to Europe, which restricts such varieties. It is uncertain who would pay to mill the corn. Negotiations are focusing on how to ensure that cornmeal gets to areas most in need if the Zimbabwean government does the milling. Aid organizations have been distributing food through nongovernmental organizations there because of evidence that the government has been diverting food from areas of poor political support. Sources said aid agencies want to be assured that the corn, once milled, will not be diverted.
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From CNN, 2 August
Mugabe opponents face trial
Harare - Zimbabwe set a November trial date for the main opposition leader and two senior party colleagues on charges of plotting to assassinate President Robert Mugabe. The main opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, president of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), Welshman Ncube, the party's secretary general and Renson Gasela, secretary for agriculture, deny they plotted to kill Mugabe. The Harare magistrate Dominic Muzawazi said: "The trial date as advised by the State will be on November 11, 2002 at the High Court." The case is based on a secretly filmed meeting between Tsvangirai and a Canadian security company employed by the Zimbabwe government. The defendants say the video tape was doctored to misrepresent a conversation led by the Canadian advisers. Defence lawyer Eric Matinenga told the magistrate state lawyers had failed to consult the defence in setting the date, and said the state had failed to honour an undertaking it made in May to consult defence lawyers on a trial date. "This is a sensitive, complicated, important matter which to all intent and purpose is political (yet) the state did nothing to liase with the defence regarding the trial date which was dictated to the defence," Matinenga said. State lawyer Stephen Musona said the prosecution had no legal obligation to do so, while Matinenga told the court that the defence would have to look at various aspects to see what could be done. Tsvangirai's lawyer Innocent Chagonda said: "Last week Zimbabwe police questioned Tsvangirai over allegations that he tried to organise the unconstitutional overthrow of Mugabe while addressing a rally in May." Chagonda said Tsvangirai was not formally charged, and described the allegations as political victimisation.
Tsvangirai is legally challenging Mugabe's victory in a presidential poll in March, which the MDC and Western countries have condemned as fraudulent. Mugabe has denied the allegations and accuses the West of trying to impose Tsvangirai as leader of the southern African state. The opposition says Mugabe has mismanaged the country since assuming power, leading to a political and economic crisis currently showing itself in acute food shortages, while the government blames the food shortages solely on drought. Critics also point to Mugabe's controversial drive to seize white-owned commercial farms for redistribution to landless blacks and his sanctioning of white farm invasions since February 2000 by militants loyal to the government. On Friday the official Herald newspaper reported that the High Court in Zimbabwe's second city of Bulawayo had indicted an MDC legislator and two other men on charges of murdering two Zanu PF members last year. Formed in 1999, the MDC emerged as the strongest challenge to Mugabe's ruling Zanu PF party when it won nearly half the contested seats at parliamentary elections held in June 2000. The opposition says it would have won had it not been for a violent campaign it blamed on ruling party supporters.
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From The Daily News, 2 August
Judge refuses to remove Nkala murder suspects from remand
Bulawayo - Justice George Chiweshe yesterday threw out an application to stop the indictment for trial of the MP Fletcher Dulini Ncube (Lobengula-Magwegwe) and two other suspects in the Cain Nkala murder case. The application in the Bulawayo High Court sought the removal of the three from remand because the State had failed to link them to the murder. The defence alleged "political intervention" in the State’s bid to indict them. Chiweshe said in a ruling delivered on his behalf by Justice Misheck Cheda: "The application is designed to frustrate the course of justice and therefore cannot be successful." Immediately after the ruling, Mercy Moya-Matshanga of the Attorney General’s Office (AG) rushed to the magistrate’s court to seek warrants of arrests for the three.
Initially, the police through the State media, had alleged that the accused possessed forged passports and R1 million (Z$6 million). The reports alleged Nkala’s wife had been struck on the head with the butt of an AK rifle. Now, according to court documents, the State has a piece of the shovel allegedly used to dig the grave where Nkala was buried. Advocate Chris Andersen, the defence counsel, instructed by Nicholas Mathonsi and Josphat Tshuma, both of Web, Low and Barry, argued that the AG was obliged to fully disclose to the court the evidence and grounds upon which the three were to be indicted. "In the absence of a credible explanation for such conduct from the law officers it is difficult to avoid the conclusion of intervention for political reasons," said Andersen.
Moya-Matshanga argued the AG’s Office had the constitutional right to indict the three. She said the application to stop the indictment was an attempt to defeat the course of justice. Simon Spooner, who was implicated in the murder charge, has been absolved of all charges. Last week Justice Lawrence Kamocha issued a provisional order stopping the indictment of the three. The State is relying on statements from three other suspects, Khethani Sibanda, Sazini Mpofu and Remember Moyo. According to the statements Dulini Ncube and Masera held a meeting at which it was decided to avenge the kidnapping of Patrick Nabanyama, an MDC activist. Nabanyama was kidnapped in the run-up to the June 2000 parliamentary. He has not been seen and is presumed dead. The statements allege that Sibanda, Mpofu and Masera and three other people identified as Matshobana, Mageza and Prince Ndlovu kidnapped Nkala from his home and later murdered him. Sibanda and Moyo later told the High Court they were tortured into making confessions implicating the MDC members.
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From The Daily News, 2 August
Opposition youth chairperson Chamisa faces LOMA charge
Nelson Chamisa, the Movement for Democratic Change national youth chairperson, is due to appear before the Harare Magistrates' Court on charges under the repealed Law and Order (Maintenance) Act (LOMA). The LOMA, designed by the Southern Rhodesia colonial regime in 1960 to thwart African agitation for independence, was early this year replaced by the Public Order and Security Act (POSA). The LOMA was used by the present government after independence in 1980 to stifle opposition political activity. Chamisa, represented by Innocent Chagonda of Atherstone and Cook, is due to appear in court on 20 August on charges arising from public statements made at a campaign meeting early last year. According to a copy of the summons, Chamisa, 24, violated section 30 (1) of the Law and Order Maintenance Act, Chapter 11:07 by making a statement threatening or encouraging violence. The State is accusing Chamisa of inciting public violence when he addressed a campaign rally in Harare's Rugare suburb. Chamisa was arrested after making the statements. Chamisa's lawyer subsequently challenged the constitutionality of the sections under which his client was being charged. The matter was then referred to the Supreme Court after the magistrates' court established that the matter was constitutional and it had no jurisdiction to deal with it. The Supreme Court threw out the case after it established that the law under which Chamisa was initially charged had been repealed and replaced by the POSA.
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From Washington File (US State Department), 2 August
Former White House official slams Mugabe for "perfect crime"
Washington - Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe and his ruling Zanu PF party have "committed the perfect crime," robbing citizens of their political rights while at the same time turning the "breadbasket of Southern Africa" into an economic wreck facing famine, says former White House official John Prendergast. Prendergast, a program officer with the International Crisis Committee (ICG), a non-governmental (NGO) human rights organization, served as a special adviser on African conflicts to the State Department and was a director of African Affairs at the National Security Council (NSC) in the 1990's during President Clinton's Administration. He has written six books on Africa, including a study of Sudan: God, Oil & Country: Changing the Logic of War in Sudan, published recently by ICG. He participated in a "Forum on Zimbabwe: Post Election Crisis," sponsored by the Africa Society of the National Summit on Africa in cooperation with Howard University's Ralph Bunche International Affairs Center. National Summit President Leonard Robinson said the July 30 discussion was timely, in part, because of the rapid decline of grain production in Zimbabwe - "Once characterized as the breadbasket of Southern Africa." Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Walter Kansteiner III also spoke on the panel stressing that U.S. policy toward Zimbabwe is based on a set of principles that have remained consistent. He said, "Those principles are: democracy, human rights, civil liberties and economic freedoms. That's what drives our interests and policies towards Zimbabwe.
"That said, the regime now headed by Mugabe in fact is not living up to those principles," Kansteiner told the panel. "They are not committed to free and fair elections, as we saw [in the recent presidential election]. They clearly don't abide by a notion of human rights that we find acceptable. And they are not terribly concerned about civil liberties. So, we've got a strained relationship with the government right now." Kansteiner stressed that "doesn't mean we have no relationship. In fact,....we have some 50,000 metric tons of food that have gone in to help the people of Zimbabwe from the people of the United States. So, there is a practical dialogue on a number of these issues, particularly the humanitarian and food issues, but we do have large problems in our relationship with the government." Prendergast spoke derisively of Mugabe and Zanu PF, noting both should be congratulated for a series of "perfect crimes;" the first of which was the stealing of the last presidential election held earlier this year. After using state power to intimidate the political opposition and the nation's judiciary, "the ruling party remains the ruling party and the President remains the president for another six years," he asserted. "The second of the perfect crimes," said the human rights activist, is "the theft of most of Zimbabwe's most valuable assets. For example, land. If there was a genuine effort to redistribute by the government since independence then one could consider current actions in a much more understanding light," he said. "Instead, the regime only made land an issue when it needed an issue to campaign on and it is now grabbing up many of the choice properties and doling out these estates to Zanu PF leaders."
Continuing, Prendergast said, "the third and perhaps most elegant of these perfect crimes is the theft of Congo's (DRC) minerals. Rather than contributing to efforts to resolve Congo's wars, Zimbabwe exacerbated them by supporting the Rwandan Hutu militias in their continued effort to destabilize Rwanda; thus keeping the war on a slow burn and justifying Zimbabwe's continued intervention in Congo, which is a brilliant cover-up of the huge mining interests of Zimbabwe's generals and politicians." "The fourth of the perfect crimes," added the former White House official, is "turning a profit on [Zimbabwe's] economic collapse and famine. One of the crucial requirements to stabilize the economy now would be to allow the foreign exchange rate to float rather than keeping it fixed at an artificial and absurdly low level" as is currently done. "They won't do that because key Zanu officials are making lots of money in the currency market, effectively trading on human suffering."
Prendergast, who traveled to Zimbabwe and observed its controversial presidential elections earlier this year, said, "the fifth of the perfect [Mugabe Zanu PF] crimes was the destruction of Zimbabwe's independent voices. The government has systematically punished supporters of the [political] opposition through rape, murder, torture and intimidation. It's gone after members of the media and NGOs who try to speak out on issues of concern. It has broken the back of some of the key mass organizations in Zimbabwe." The former official said, "there are many other crimes that have been perpetrated in Zimbabwe over the last few years, perhaps not as perfect as the ones I've just mentioned, but all with one common denominator - that is they [Mugabe and Zanu PF] got away with it. There have been hardly any consequences." On the other hand, Prendergast said the consequences for the people of Zimbabwe have been severe. "There is no compensation for the victims - for the hundreds of thousands of black farmers, workers and laborers made homeless" by the regime's expropriation of land. The economy has been devastated by the regime's intervention into the market and "has now produced some of the highest unemployment rates on the continent." At the same time, the nation now faces a famine that "has produced rates of deprivation and hunger that are unrivaled, at this point, throughout southern Africa in the midst of its own drought." He concluded: "Things are bleak for the people of Zimbabwe but it is not hopeless."
Rebutting Prendergast, Zimbabwean Ambassador Simbi Mubako said many of his nation's problems were a legacy of colonialism, which the Mugabe regime had worked hard to overcome. For example in education, "before independence Zimbabwe had only one university with 1,000 students. Now we have 10 universities" with many thousands of students. "This is an achievement of the last 22 years," he emphasized. The regime's land reform scheme - characterized as a disastrous "fast-track" grab of property outside the legal process by Malik Chaka, a staff consultant to the Subcommittee on Africa in the U.S. House of Representatives who also participated in the discussion, was fair because it was land that earlier colonialist regimes wrested without compensation from the original African owners, Mubako indicated. As for Zimbabwe being the breadbasket of southern Africa, Mubako termed it an exaggeration and said the recent reduction in grain production was due to drought affecting the region and not to the Mugabe regime's agricultural policies. He said, "We had another severe drought I remember in my lifetime in 1947 and this was the first time we received food aid from the United States. That was colonial time and white farmers were in full control at that time." Other serious droughts followed about every ten years starting in 1962, he said, and "again we had to ask for food aid from abroad. It is not true that we had sufficient [grain] for ourselves."
Commenting on the presidential elections, Mubako said, "from the point of view of the Zimbabwean government and from the point of view of Africans, the majority of the people who observed the elections" agreed that "they were not perfect but they were certainly not stolen. I would be the first one to admit there were some flaws but I would also add that those flaws were no greater than the flaws of the elections you had in Florida." (Mubako referred to the disputed vote count in Florida after the U.S. presidential election of November 2000.) Pointing out that an election is not necessarily "stolen on the day of the vote," Malik Chaka stressed that the Mugabe regime's intimidation of the political opposition and "its use of terror" predated actual balloting by more than a year. While there was political violence on both sides, the Congressional aide said, "most blood is on Zanu PF's hands - they had the state power on their side. "The country is going down fast," Chaka concluded.
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From News24 (SA), 3 August
Police arrest MDC MP in hospital
Harare - Lawyers were trying to secure the release of a 62-year-old top opposition official on Saturday who was arrested in hospital in the western city of Bulawayo, less than 24 hours after he had one of his eyes surgically removed. Plainclothes security police collected Fletcher Dulini-Ncube, the treasurer of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change and local Bulawayo MP, from his bed in the private Mater Dei hospital where he was recuperating from his operation, said lawyer Nicholas Mathonsi. He said the police had insisted Dulini-Ncube be kept in police custody over the weekend so they could bring him to the Bulawayo magistrate's court on Monday where he is due to be indicted for trial for the alleged murder last year of a senior figure in President Robert Mugabe's militia of guerrilla war veterans. "He is in extreme danger," said Mathonsi. "I have given letters to the police from his doctors who say that if he is detained in any other conditions the chances are his eye will become septic and will affect the brain. We are trying to get police to understand they can look after him in hospital, and that we can get the magistrate to indict him in his hospital bed, but they are being unreasonable."
Dulini-Ncube suffers from severe diabetes. His eye condition was caused when he was arrested in November last year and held in filthy cells for nearly two months while police refused to allow him full access to diabetes drugs. Dulini-Ncube was one of dozens of MDC officials and supporters detained in a police crackdown against the pro-democracy party in Bulawayo over the killing of war veteran Cain Nkala. He and many others were held illegally for weeks and he was only released in late December on high court orders. "He has been reporting twice a week to the police since he was released," said Mathonsi. "It's not as if he is about to run away." Two other junior MDC party workers have been jail for nine months, without being brought to trial or any evidence produced to indicate they may have been involved in Nkala's murder. Prison authorities last month defied both high court and supreme court orders for their release. They are still in custody after police authorities had them indicted for trial, a move which effectively cancelled the orders for their release and meant lawyers had to apply afresh for release orders, Mathonsi said.
Observers say the arbitrary arrests, illegal detentions and denial of detainees' rights over the Cain Nkala murder is one of the more blatant cases of police partiality and persecution of the MDC. "Dulini Ncube never really recovered from the extreme diabetic condition he suffered while he was custody," Mathonsi said. Anxiety over state attempts to arrest him again had worsened his condition, and he spent two weeks in hospital last month. "The doctors decided a few days ago the only way forward was to remove the eye," he said. International human rights bodies and Western diplomats have repeatedly denounced Zimbabwe's police as an arm of the ruling Zanu PF party, with a long record of persecution of the MDC, while no action has been taken against hundreds of ruling party suspects in cases of murder and violence. Mugabe's regime has been isolated by most of the world as a result of his campaign of lawlessness he launched against the MDC in early February 2000, immediately after a referendum that month made it clear the opposition party was easily capable of defeating him in elections.
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From ZWNEWS, 4 August
Dulini-Ncube returned to hospital
Police late yesterday returned Fletcher Dulini-Ncube to his hospital bed, having detained the Bulawayo MP all day in custody. Dulini-Ncube had been taken by members of the Law and Order Section from the Mater Dei hospital early on Saturday, where he was recovering from a surgical operation to remove one of his eyes on Friday. A doctor’s report, detailing Dulini-Ncube’ s medical condition, and the severe danger to him of secondary infection if he was kept out of hospital, was given to the police at 11 am, but the police nevertheless kept him in custody all day. Dulini-Ncube is understood to have been in extreme pain during his time in custody. An application for bail will be pursued by his lawyers on Monday. The state accuses Dulini-Ncube of being implicated in the murder of Cain Nkala, a Matabeleland war veterans’ leader, in November 2001.
An application for indictments against Dulini-Ncube, Sony Masera, and Army Zulu to be quashed was thrown out by High Court Judge Chiweshe on Thursday. Lawyers for the three had argued that the prosecution had no evidence linking the three with the murder apart from confessions by two other accused, which they later retracted in court, saying their confessions had been extracted under torture. Another of those arrested at the time of Nkala ’s death, Simon Spooner, was also visited by Law and Order Section police yesterday. It is understood that the police questioned him in connection with the whereabouts of Army Zulu. The charges against Spooner were formally dropped two weeks ago. Dulini-Ncube and Spooner were among 14 MDC members who spent several weeks in illegal detention after Nkala’s body was found. Two of the accused, Khetani Sibanda and Sazini Mpofu, remain in prison, despite an order from Chief Justice Chidyausiku for their release.
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From The New York Times, 4 August
For Zimbabwe's white farmers, time to move on
Banket, Zimbabwe - This is the season for winter wheat, the time when lush, green seedlings usually blanket the earth. But these days, the roaring tractors have been silenced and many fertile farms are idle. Here in this hungry land, where the United Nations says six million people - half the population - are threatened by famine, the government of President Robert Mugabe has ordered thousands of the country's most productive farmers to stop farming. The white commercial farmers, who are among the largest producers of wheat and cornmeal, help feed the nation and fuel the economy. But they have been condemned as racists and enemies of the state because they have refused to turn over their land to the government - land that was seized from blacks during the days of British colonial rule. And now, officials say, the day of reckoning is finally at hand. By Aug. 8, the government has announced, most of the nation's white farmers must leave their farms for good. As the deadline approaches, many farmers are packing their bags. The threatened expulsion of 2,900 white farmers has shaken a country already reeling from drought, a collapsing economy and the political violence condoned by an increasingly authoritarian government. Some say officials are punishing the farmers for financing the opposition in the presidential election last March, an election that most Western officials believe was rigged to ensure Mr. Mugabe's victory. Others say that Mr. Mugabe, 78, who came to power in the 1980 election that ended white rule, is desperate to secure a place in African history as the revolutionary who returned the land to his impoverished people.
Officials of the World Bank and Western governments agree land should be redistributed in Zimbabwe, where the legacy of colonialism has left a tiny white minority with more than half the fertile soil. Whites make up only 1 percent of the population. But farmers and foreign donors have balked at participating in this program, which has been dogged by violence and cronyism ever since it was revived two years ago in what is widely viewed as a tactic to bolster Mr. Mugabe's waning popularity. Prominent politicians loyal to Mr. Mugabe now control scores of fertile farms while many poor blacks are stranded on arid stretches without adequate water or sanitation. The government, which claims to have acquired more than 5,000 properties, actually has title deeds to fewer than 100, recent statistics show. As government-backed militants have swept across the country, invading the farms in the past few years, several white farmers and dozens of black farm workers have been killed while thousands of other black laborers have been evicted and left homeless. The government has refused to pay white farmers for their properties, saying it will not pay for land stolen by British settlers. Britain has agreed to finance a well-run land redistribution program, but not the one that is currently in place. So farmers who are forced off their properties receive nothing right now for the land they have lost. The United States and the European Union, which have already imposed sanctions on top officials, have criticized Zimbabwe's treatment of its farmers, and diplomats here are quietly pressuring officials to reconsider their stance. It is still unclear how the government will actually deal with whites who defy the deadline. Some officials have threatened to crack down, while others have promised to be lenient with farmers who agree to give up some of their land. But recently officials arrested 16 white farmers for continuing to farm past June 24 - the date when most farmers were ordered to stop working - leaving little doubt that some hard-liners are willing to force citizens to endure even greater hardships as they struggle to redraw the colonial map.
Meanwhile, the exodus of whites from Zimbabwe's farms is quickening. In July, Adrian Wilkinson was loading his belongings into his Isuzu pickup truck, trying to beat the government deadline. In normal years, he grows about 740 acres of winter wheat. This year, he will produce no wheat at all. Militants threatened him when he tried to plant. A few weeks ago, they barricaded him and his wife inside their farmhouse, pounding on the doors and singing for blood. So the Wilkinsons have decided to give up their 3,000-acre farm, where they grew tobacco, soybeans and corn, and the red brick farmhouse where they raised their children and savored the best years of their lives. "On Monday, I took out my stove and my dishwasher," said Mr. Wilkinson, 50, who plans to live off his savings in a smaller house in town, where whites feel more secure. "Today, I'm going to take out this washing machine and the tumble dryer." He staggered under the weight of the washing machine and then wandered wistfully through his emptying house, choosing what would stay and what would go. He chose the two white highchairs, where his grandchildren used to squirm and wiggle, and his wife's satiny red slippers. A swivel chair. Two toasters. Ten blue-tinted wine glasses and a matching pitcher. Mr. Wilkinson did not weep when he locked the door and turned his back on his red roses and tiger lilies. But under the surface, desperation simmers. He swallows what he calls "happy pills" to get through the day without drowning in rage or sorrow. At night, he takes sleeping pills. He has consulted a counselor to cope with the anger that boils up inside, particularly when he thinks about the government's refusal to pay him for his property. He had dreamed of retiring, but not like this. "Am I angry?" he asked. He clenched his steering wheel as he drove past the palm trees, the metal gate and his empty fields. He has lived at this farm all his life. "I'm not against black advancement, but this is my life; it's my home," he said finally. "I'm losing everything." Over the past two years, as the farm invasions spread, about 15 percent of the country's white farmers have left their properties, according to the Commercial Farmers Union, which represents about 3,500 white farmers.
By May, about 30 percent of commercial farms had stopped producing altogether because of threats from government-backed militants, the union said. The combination of land seizures and this year's severe drought has been disastrous. In 1999, agriculture accounted for 20 percent of Zimbabwe's domestic product, the World Bank says. A year later, the figure had dropped to 11 percent, and experts say it has continued to decline. The production of corn - the country's staple food - plunged by nearly 70 percent this year, the United Nations says. It predicts that the production of winter wheat, which is harvested in October, will be down by as much as 40 percent. With the situation so dire, white farmers are increasingly questioning whether they have a future in Zimbabwe. At the Banket country club, where dozens of farmers met recently to consider their options, union leaders pleaded with members to stay put. "We've been harassed and terrorized for political gain, but we are still all Zimbabweans here," said Ian Barrett, who represents the farmers who produce cooking oil. "We're still here! We're still strong!" But everyone agrees that holding on is difficult. In the town of Chiredzi, where 16 farmers were arrested for continuing to farm, most of the men have vowed to defy the deadline. They are hiring extra guards and bracing themselves for the worst. Officials have warned that farmers who defy the deadline will be arrested, tried and sentenced to two years in jail or a $363 fine.
Alain Faydherbe, 37, has decided that no matter what happens on Aug. 8, he will move to Mozambique, where officials are inviting white farmers to work that country's undeveloped land. Militants, known as war veterans because many fought against white rule, have invaded his farm and beaten his workers. "I've got three little kids," Mr. Faydherbe said. "Every time they hear a vehicle they ask if it's the war vets. They're afraid to sleep in their own rooms." John Nkomo, the home affairs minister, denied that officials have been mistreating the white farmers. He attributed the violence to a handful of criminals. He said the deadline was necessary to deal with farmers who have refused to turn over underused sections of their farms. "We have to deal with this land matter once and for all," Mr. Nkomo said. "As far as we are concerned, we are correcting an injustice." In the impoverished village of Chikhovo, where hundreds of hungry people waited hours to receive cornmeal from the charity World Vision, many seemed doubtful. They agreed that officials should right the historical wrongs that left blacks stranded on crowded, rocky soil. But Lloyd Tafirenyasha, who scrapes by on one bowl of porridge a day, said he could not understand how farmers could be evicted while millions of Zimbabweans were going hungry. "We wake up in the morning with no food," said Mr. Tafirenyasha, 18. "We need help. Those who are good in agriculture, they should continue. Those white farmers, they must stay for now."
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Comment from The Zimbabwe Standard, 4 August
Over the top
Being last on the list
Increasingly disturbed leaders in a troubled central African country are said to be preparing to hit back against sanctions imposed by unperturbed leaders of various western nations. Of particular concern is a list published by the central bank of a small muddy patch in the Irish Sea which names bad people from the troubled central African nation alongside bad people from elsewhere in the world. Meanwhile, the disinformation minister in the troubled central African nation is said to be particularly angered by the fact that his name, most of his colleagues and the young wife of the most equal of all comrades appear alongside the notorious Gossamer bin Liner on the list. Mr Bin Liner is a notorious Muslim with a price on his head. He also orchestrated the blowing up of several important buildings in North America by having aeroplanes fly into them at high speed. Mr Bin Liner's name appeared on the list, together with dozens of other less notorious Muslims, several months ahead of the leaders of the troubled central African nation, a fact that has led to some rivalry and discontent among the elite Pariah Nations' Club. The list also contains names from a strange sounding Asian country, an extremely vexed sort-of-country rich in oil and diamonds in West Africa and more notorious Muslims than most of us thought existed.
Still, the leaders of the troubled central African country are angered by the fact that their names appear at the bottom of the list, well beneath the notorious Muslims, the secretive, strange sounding Asians and the crude West Africans with all the diamonds. "It's a known fact that we should be at the top of the list," said one disturbed leader from the troubled central African country. "It's one thing to fly aeroplanes into buildings, but we'll achieve much the same result without fireballs and red mist." Meanwhile, another troubled leader vowed that the troubled central African country would respond to the sanctions in kind. "If we can't go there and shop in Harrods and Bloomingdale's, then they'd better watch out," he warned. "Right now we're devising our own plan to stop them coming here to do their shopping at MaiFattie's tuck shop-and if that doesn't send a firm message, nothing will." At this point a worried aid to the mouth-frothing leader pointed out that due to the shortage of food, MaiFattie was now known as MaiThinnie. "In that case we'll boot out all the imperialist running dog foreigners who're already here, then see what happens," said the troubled leader, while his audience wiped themselves down. "Unless they're fraternal revolutionary doctors sent over here by Comrade Fido," he added quickly.
The list caused further consternation when the first of the troubled central African nation's leaders was sent back from the muddy patch in the Irish Sea recently. After a vicious interrogation that included terrifying questions like: "Is this your name?" and "Do you know that you're not supposed to be here?" the victim was placed on an aeroplane and flown home without once being forced to crash into an important building. Leaders of the troubled central African nation pointed out that the treatment of their colleague amounted to torture and vowed to report the matter to the Pariah Nations' Club - just as soon as the Pariah Nations' Club decided where to situate themselves and who would pay the rent. Meanwhile, insiders pointed out that even inoffensive and little visited countries close to the Arctic Circle had refused access to leaders from the troubled central African nation, proving that countries famous primarily for being boring were at last sitting up and taking notice of the curious behaviour displayed by the troubled central African nation's self-appointed leaders.
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From News24 (SA), 4 August
Sick MDC man back in hospital
Harare - Senior opposition official Fletcher Dulini-Ncube (62) was recovering in hospital on Sunday after being arrested on Saturday, less than 24 hours after having one of his eyes surgically removed, lawyers said. Dulini-Ncube was taken from his bed in the private Mater Dei hospital by security police in the western city of Bulawayo on Saturday, and was only returned at 18:30 after being given a medical specialist's certificate saying that his condition was "life threatening", said lawyer Nicholas Mathonsi. Police had insisted that Dulini-Ncube, a member of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change's national executive and local MP, spend the weekend in police custody, despite his operation on Friday, so that he could be taken to court on Monday for indictment on allegations of murder. "He was in a very bad condition when I last saw him (shortly before returning to hospital)," Mathonsi said. "The wound in his eye had not been dressed and it was bleeding a little. He was in extreme pain."
Mathonsi said when he left the MP in hospital on Saturday, he was guarded by three policemen. He spent all day Saturday in the office of the officer commanding the notorious law and order section of the police in Bulawayo central police station. "He requires careful treatment under strictly sterile conditions for some time," said Eddie Cross, the MDC's secretary for economic affairs. "The threat is that if he is not treated with the utmost care, he will lose the other eye." Dulini-Ncube was among scores of MDC officials arrested in Bulawayo in November when President Robert Mugabe's ruling Zanu PF party accused the opposition party of killing a local official of the lawless militia of so-called guerrilla war veterans. A victim of chronic diabetes, Dulini-Ncube was denied access to his drugs and also refused the specialised diet needed for his condition. As a result, doctors said, he began to go blind in one eye which also began to turn septic. He was released after two months, for most of which he was detained illegally, but did not recover fully.
Police wanted Dulini-Ncube to be removed from his hospital bed again on Monday so he could appear in court for his indictment for trial, Mathonsi said, but he was trying to persuade police to have the magistrate travel to hospital to conduct the hearing at the MP's bedside. Throughout the affair over war veteran Cain Nkala's killing, courts have accused police of arresting MDC officials with little or no reason and holding them without evidence. Police have detained "suspects" for weeks beyond the statutory 48 hours they are allowed to without bringing them to court and then defying court orders for their release. Last month, senior prison officers said they would not obey court orders until they had been sanctioned by their superiors. They have been charged with contempt of court. Last week Mugabe declared that his regime would heed the courts only if his ruling party considered judges' orders were "objective". The 78-year-old ruler has dragged the country into economic and social chaos since February 2000 when he launched a campaign of bloody repression to avert imminent defeat in parliamentary elections by the popular MDC.
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From SABC News, 4 August
Zimbabwe police search Tsvangirai's home
Zimbabwe police today searched the home of Morgan Tsvangirai, the president of the country's main opposition party, looking for weapons, subversive documents and illegal immigrants, the leader said. Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), said around a dozen police officers, some armed and some in plain clothes, searched his northern Harare home for about an hour early in the afternoon. Tsvangirai is due to stand trial in November on allegations that he plotted to assassinate President Robert Mugabe. Tsvangirai described the police visit as "the usual political harassment". Late last month police questioned Tsvangirai on allegations that he had threatened Mugabe.
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From The Star (SA), 4 August
Zim farmers count their losses
Harare - Zimbabwe's white farmers have lost an estimated 14,5-billion Zimbabwe dollars' (R260-million) worth of property through seizure or looting in a two-year campaign of often violent farm seizures, a farmers' group said at the weekend. Quoting economists, Justice for Agriculture (JAG), which is a splinter group of the mainly white Commercial Farmers' Union (CFU) said that "14,5 billion Zimbabwe dollars' worth of moveable assets have been illegally impounded or looted since February 2000." The figure was included in a statement released on Saturday. The seizure of the properties by ruling party supporters has been in support of a government land reform programme that has targeted as much as 95 percent of white-owned land for redistribution to landless blacks. JAG says it intends to sue the ruling Zanu PF after it has completed working out the total losses sustained by both farmers and farm workers. "This could be one of the biggest law suits in Zimbabwe or externally under applicable laws," the JAG statement added. An estimated 2 900 white farmers will have to vacate their properties by midnight this Thursday as a government deadline for farm takeovers runs out, according to the CFU.
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From ZWNEWS, 5 August
A nerve touched
By Michael Hartnack
In less than a week, five prominent supporters of Robert Mugabe have fallen foul of the European Union's travel sanctions. The net has now been cast over both doves, such as Finance Minister Simba Makoni, and hawks who have headed the ruling Zanu PF party campaign of farm seizures and contempt for law. But the EU has yet to join the USA in banning businessmen suspected of fronting for Mugabe. Mugabe and his regime are clearly stung. His office reacted with fury to a news item in the independently-owned Sunday Standard noting that Grace Mugabe's name appeared with that of Al-Qaida leader Osama Bin Laden in the Bank of England's schedule of persons prohibited from UK financial dealings. A barely-coherent statement denounced "the criminal placement of the First Lady in the same league as Bin Laden,'' and described the report as "extreme terror journalism." The Standard report was strictly factual, and therefore not an offence under the draconian new press law, the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act. Standard assistant editor Brian Latham said police had not (yet) swooped. Home Affairs Minister John Nkomo threatened to retaliate to the EU list by withdrawing passports from leaders of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.
First to feel the force of bans and boycotts was Joshua Malinga, 55, a former Zanu PF mayor of Bulawayo and a wheelchair-bound polio victim who was turned back at London's Gatwick Airport en route to a conference for the disabled in New York. MDC MP for Bulawayo South David Coltart said that while he regretted on personal grounds the action against Malinga, members of Mugabe's politburo had to accept personal responsibility for the tyranny of the past two years and make a firm decision to dissociate themselves. Sweden confirmed last week it had barred three ministers and deputy parliamentary speaker Edna Madzongwe from attending a women's conference. Madzongwe is a fervent Zanu PF supporter. Among the ministers was Shuvai Mahofa, a prominent figure in farm seizures, factional unrest in her home province of Masvingo, and in formation of "green bomber" youth militias.
Some other notable personalities among the 72 now black-listed by the EU:
Retired army commander General Solomon Mujuru and his wife Joyce (known until 1986 as Rex and "Let Us Spill Blood" Nhongo). After one of their daughters died of malaria, they sent the rest of their six children to be educated in Britain. It is unclear where they are at present. Mujuru, like parliamentary speaker Emmerson Mnangagwa (also on the list), was heavily implicated in the genocidal suppression of Matabeleland unrest in the 1980s. Mnangagwa at that time headed the feared Central Intelligence Organisation. Mnangagwa and Mujuru are seen by many commentators as rivals - and the only potential Mugabe successors who could be trusted to defend his human rights record, since theirs' is even worse. Mujuru is believed to be a pragmatist businessmen can "work with,'' and a backer of Makoni.
The only white in Mugabe's cabinet, British-born health minister Timothy Stamps, 65, who has publicly defended the seizures of white-owned farms. Besides being a medical doctor, he owns a farm outside Harare. Stamps gave a black power salute in Parliament while being sworn in for the 2000 new session. He slated publicity given to the abduction and torture of journalists. He joined the capital's city council as medical officer in 1970 after immigrating from Wales, and later went into private practice. Resoundingly defeated as an independent candidate in a by-election, he joined Zanu PF and was nominated to Parliament by Mugabe.
Mugabe's sister Sabina who has been heavily involved in the seizure of white-owned commercial farms in the Norton area west of Harare, but her millionaire businessman son, Leo, is not on the list.
Witness Mangwende, who as a former agriculture minister was the architect of the Land Acquisition Act. One of his first priorities was to allocate himself 2 000 hectare Bath Estates at Hwedza, 120 km south east of Harare, bought with British funds for 18 peasant families. Mangwende's successor, Joseph Made, was already on the list. He spurned early warnings in May 2001 of impending famine and bears massive responsibility for the current food crisis.
The list also includes a large clutch of security force commanders, all implicated in Zimbabwe's shadowy business deals in the Democratic Republic of Congo. They also said before the March elections that they would refuse to recognise a win by MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
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From News24 (SA), 4 August
SA, DRC strengthen ties
Johannesburg - The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has expressed an interest in the South African arms industry's equipment and has agreed that the South African Defence Force can train DRC soldiers. "Military cooperation between the DRC and South Africa is still in its infancy, but may be expanded soon," Lieutenant General Liwanga Mata Nyamynyobo, chief of the DRC Defence Force, said in Pretoria at the weekend. Nyamunyobo and a delegation of senior staff officers are in South Africa on a courtesy visit by invitation of defence force chief, General Siphiwe Nyanda. Experts see the visit as a breakthrough as far as trust between the two countries' armies goes, as the DRC was not even interested in military ties with South Africa two months ago. South Africa was suspected of supporting Rwanda, which had about 12 000 soldiers fighting the war in the DRC. Nyamunyobo says his government will send a military attaché to South Africa to strengthen military ties soon. South Africa recently sent an attaché to Kinshasa.
Commenting on the peace agreement between his country and Rwanda, signed recently in Pretoria, Nyamunyobo says it is too soon to tell whether peace has eventually come to the region. The agreement stipulates that Rwanda will withdraw its troops from the DRC, while a UN peace keeping force will disarm the Interhamwe and other rebel forces that were involved in the genocide in Rwanda. South Africa is expected to send 1 500 soldiers to strengthen the UN forces. Nyamunyobo believes the three months set aside for the process is "logistically attainable". Approximately 2 000 of the rebel leaders are already being detained at a base in Kamina in the south east of the country. "These people are available to the peace keeping force, but they are no longer the DRC's responsibility." Nyamunyobo says the withdrawal of Namibia, Angola and Zimbabwe the DRC's biggest ally in the war - is progressing smoothly. Less than 3 000 Zimbabwean soldiers are left in the country, while the Namibian and Angolan forces have already withdrawn. He believes the remaining Zimbabwean forces will leave once Rwanda has withdrawn its soldiers.
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From CNN, 5 August
Shunned by West, Mugabe turns to Asia
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, facing sanctions from Western nations, said on Monday he would push for stronger business ties with Asian states such as Malaysia. "The British say I should not come to Britain. I should not go to Germany, to Europe as a whole," Mugabe told reporters. "What do I want Europe for?" he asked. "For me, coming to Malaysia is like coming home," the 78-year-old leader said. "You get revived not only in terms of energy, but also in terms of ideas." Mugabe, who was among several African leaders in Malaysia for an informal meeting of developing nations over the weekend, had earlier launched Zimbabwe's first Asia-based trade centre. "This is a tangible demonstration that we mean business," he said in a speech describing veteran Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad as a "true leader" of the developing world.
Mahathir has recently travelled widely from his Southeast Asian home, visiting Washington and the Vatican, while also playing host to a parade of leaders, including Iranian President Mohammad Khatami and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. Political commentator Chandra Muzaffar said Mugabe's visit, which highlighted Mahathir's wide range of political partners, gibed with the Malaysian leader's self-styled role as champion of poor countries and the group of developing nations in the southern hemisphere loosely referred to as the South. "In a sense, these things are not contradictory. They are all part of the man's world view," he said of Mahathir, whose mainly Muslim country is set to chair the Organisation of Islamic Conference next year. "Among the elites of the South, Mahathir has influence but then again one has to distinguish these elites from their people," Chandra added.
Mugabe's government has proposed retaliation, including actions against his main opposition party, for sanctions Western countries have imposed on him and his officials since he won a controversial election in March. Harare is studying a comprehensive response to a travel ban and asset freezes on Zimbabwe's ruling elite by the European Union, the United States, Canada, New Zealand and Australia. Many Western powers say the election was rigged and are backing demands by the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) for a fresh poll in the southern African country. Mugabe, in power since the former Rhodesia gained independence from Britain in 1980, says he won fairly and dismisses calls for a new poll as attempts to usurp power for MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai. EU sanctions initially targeted 20 leaders from Mugabe's ruling Zanu PF party, but were then extended to 52 others. The Commonwealth group of mostly former British colonies also suspended Zimbabwe for its conduct of the poll.
At a luncheon speech later, he defended his government's right to take possession of white farmers' land. Zimbabwe plunged into turmoil more than two years ago when self-styled war veterans invaded white-owned farms to help government redistribution of territory to landless blacks. Aid agencies say six million Zimbabweans, or nearly half the population, need emergency food aid due to drought and disruption of farming operations caused by the government's land policies. Mugabe said redistribution was expected to be completed by the end of this month. "People have planted crops, a lot of people planted wheat this season and there's very good crop of wheat by irrigation. Come October, we expect better rains this year," he said.
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From ZWNEWS, 6 August
JAG urges farmers to stay
With just days to go before the Zimbabwe regime's August 8 deadline for 2 900 commercial farmers to leave their properties, Justice for Agriculture, a new ginger group lobbying to save the industry from total collapse, has invited diplomats, journalists and civic society representatives to a meeting in Harare on Tuesday, hoping for suggestions on finding a way out of the crisis, and to drum up support. The group's chairman, David Connolly, will address the invitation-only meeting. Other speakers include economist John Robertson, an expert on the devastation caused by the stepped up seizure of farms and other property by militants of the ruling Zanu PF party, and Tony Reeler of the Amani Trust, which focuses on the tragic consequences in terms of human rights. Justice for Agriculture, a breakaway group from the Commercial Farmers' Union, estimates that since the land invasions began in February 2000 some Zimbabwe $14.5 billion of moveable assets have been illegally impounded or seized.
The group plans to sue Zanu PF once it has worked out the exact losses sustained by farmers and employees. "If the arms of government are allowed to go ahead with evicting 1.5 million people resident on farms after August 8, it will be abundantly clear to every hungry Zimbabwean exactly whose interests are being served," the group said in a mission statement. The group is urging farmers, wherever possible, to ignore the deadline and "remain in their homes and on the land, amongst their own people who are now so much more dependent on them during this time of crisis." Another prime aim, it said, is "to re-instill hope that there will be a tomorrow for Zimbabwe's commercial agriculture and an equal opportunity for any and all Zimbabweans who want to farm in Zimbabwe."
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Comment from The Christian Science Monitor, 6 August
The Rhodesian plan
Grant Newsham
Tokyo - Three times during the 1990s, the world stood by while heart-rending - and preventable - African tragedies unfolded in Liberia, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone. President Robert Mugabe's ongoing assault on human rights and democracy in Zimbabwe offers the latest test of whether the world community, and the West in particular, will act aggressively to avert tragedy. Mr. Mugabe's behaviour does not surprise people familiar with his record. In 1982, less than two years after being elected as newly independent Zimbabwe's first prime minister, Mugabe unleashed his North Korean-trained 5th Brigade against "dissidents" in the province of Matabeleland. Conservative estimates reckon 15,000 Matabele were murdered. Mugabe has subsequently intimidated the opposition, stolen elections, and squandered his country's vast natural wealth. He is destroying the economy and creating a famine.
On human rights abuses in black Africa, one simply hasn't seen the same manifestations of protest and pressure by Western governments and private organizations directed against tyrants on other continents - or even like those used against South Africa's apartheid regime. The European Union has enacted sanctions against Mugabe, but they're too narrow and too late. Ironically, the template for dealing with him is the one used to bring about regime changes in Rhodesia (as Zimbabwe was called before independence), and later, in South Africa. In both cases, wide-ranging economic and financial sanctions were crucial. Sanctions don't work quickly, but they are more or less effective, depending on the degree the regime is willing to use repression to survive. The broader the sanctions, the better.
A plan based on the Rhodesia model would include the following:
Financial sanctions: Because the basic source of power in any tyrannical regime is access to finances, an effective sanctions campaign against Mugabe must target his money. Impose strict controls on financial transactions involving Zimbabwe. The countries dominating the global banking system are quite capable of financially isolating a country and tracking fund movements. Even if multilateral cooperation is difficult, the US Treasury's controls against designated countries are an effective device, and the US can bring along many of its allies in an effort against Mugabe. Compared with elusive drug dealers and terrorists whose finances are now targeted, going after a clearly identified target is a far simpler task.
Hold financial institutions accountable: Targeted regimes will strenuously seek to evade sanctions by using proxies and front operations to move funds. Thus, it is essential to require financial institutions and other intermediaries such as lawyers and accountants to vet the source of funds they accept. A concerted intelligence effort to track down Mugabe's money is essential. In addition to an impressive global ability to monitor telecom and computer network systems, most competent foreign intelligence services are capable of penetrating the ruler's inner circle to uncover details of his finances and evasion methods. Aggressively seize assets when violations, or suspect money, are detected.
Trade sanctions: Extremely strict trade sanctions are vital. A certain amount of "leakage" will occur, but the economy will slowly atrophy. Rhodesia is a prime example of how effective these can be. A Rhodesian involved in evading the oil embargo commented once, "In 1965, Rhodesia was 20 years ahead of South Africa economically, but by 1975 we were 20 years behind." Five years later the country yielded to majority rule.
International ostracism: Combine financial and trade sanctions with a scheme to shut the Mugabe regime out of international society. Expel Zimbabwe from the UN and other international organizations, and institute a near-complete travel ban on the country's nationals, and on everyone connected with the ruling elite. Victims of this sort of social exclusion naturally play down its importance, but it is surprisingly wearing over time.
No 'targeted sanctions': Accept that the average Zimbabwean will suffer from the sanctions. Targeted or so-called "smart" sanctions don't work. As long as the ruling elite has access to resources, they will use them for themselves.
A positive component: Give moral support to the people. Supply funding and other assistance - covertly if necessary - to the opposition. Lay out a clear concept of what the sanctions are to accomplish. Win the public relations game both domestically and internationally, and put Mugabe in the position of defending corruption and repression. Despite his crudely racist appeals to Zimbabwean nationalism, a majority still voted against him in the March election. Show the opposition that it has the world's support. Eastern European dissidents noted how helpful this was psychologically, as did Nelson Mandela in South Africa. Encourage |
