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Archived News
12th April 2005
AU observers call for probe into poll results
Panic-buying as basic goods vanish from shops
Zimbabwe cancels tobacco auction
Mugabe: Zimbabwe will not ask for food aid
Handcuffed Telegraph men appear in court
Inky fingers point back at Mugabe
Zanu PF unleashes massive violence against MDC supporters
Mugabe 'conjures up' winning votes
US queries Zim voting results
Zanu PF threatens to seize companies
Foreign journalists complain over Zim media gag
Mugabe branded 'shameless' over attempt to gatecrash Pope's funeral
ZEC chief stuck
Zimbabwe youth leader arrested over riot radio
Endorsing poll ‘morally questionable’ SACC
Mugabe pushes to end isolation
Bitter Zanu PF candidate plunges suburb into darkness
Kidnapping in Mazowe
Zimbabwe to divert Z$5 trillion to buy emergency food
Zimbabwe's enabler
MDC rejects electoral commission's explanation
Reporters face jail in Zimbabwe
MDC youths in hospital
Empty shelves shock for Zimbabweans
Zimbabwe to launch new propaganda radio station
Zimbabwe opposition at crossroad
Britain's Prince Charles shakes hands with Mugabe
Zim opposition MP released
DA held in elections scandal
Mugabe tightens grip on the helm
Lupane MDC official's house burnt down
Tough on Togo, letting Zimbabwe slide
Chamisa claims torture
Bob’s your owner?
Zimbabwe’s HIV miracle worker
Thugs desert Mugabe forces
Zanu PF chairman to take over as Speaker
Mugabe promotes hard-liner
Death threats to Zimbabwe labour leaders irk Cosatu
No pics on journo's camera
Observing with a blindfold
The prince and I talked about girls from Ghana, claims Mugabe
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From The Daily News Online Edition, 5 April
AU observers call for probe into poll results
Harare - The head of the African Union Observer Team, Dr Kwadwo Afari- Gyan, says the allegations of electoral fraud in the just-ended elections in Zimbabwe should be investigated immediately. Speaking when the AU Observer team made its preliminary observations, Afari-Gyan said his team was also disturbed by the large number of people who were assisted to vote or those who were turned away. "The MDC has alleged that there are serious discrepencies in the official results released by the ZEC for several constituencies. It is hoped that both the ZEC and the ESC will promptly look into the allegations with a view to assuring Zimbabweans of the authenticity of the results of the elections, "Afari-Gyan said. MDC president Morgan Tsvangirai is on record urging his supporters "to defend their vote and their rights". By yesterday the MDC, which is compiling evidence on the alleged rigging of elections, had found irregularities in 76 out of 120 constituencies that they had analysed. In some instances, there are unaccounted for ballots of more than 15 000. As part of its evidence gathering, the MDC has obtained a copy of a video tape of the announcement of the number of people who had voted and a copy of election officials announcing the results. An official with the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission, which was running the elections, said that he needed to consult on the final figures. The head of the African Union Observer Team, Dr Kwadwo Afari- Gyan, said the allegations of rigging should be attended to immediately. "The MDC has alleged that there are serious discrepencies in the official results released by the ZEC for several constituencies. It is hoped that both the ZEC and the ESC will promptly look into the allegations with a view to assuring Zimbabweans of the authenticity of the results of the elections," Afari-Gyan said.
In a related development, more than 400 Movement for Democratic Change supporters staged a lunch-time demonstration in Harare on Monday to protest against the alleged rigging of the 31 March general elections, in which the ruling party registered a shock two-thirds majority in Parliament. The demonstration came after it emerged that the figures announced by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission on the number of people who voted and the total votes for the candidates did not tally. The demonstration lasted about half an hour and caught the police by surprise as they only caught up with the demonstrators after they dispersed. Although MDC officials said they were not aware of any arrests, sources said about 10 youths who were wearing MDC T-shirts were picked up and detained by law and order officers. "I am not aware of any members who were arrested but we will keep you updated," the MDC national youth chairman, Nelson Chamisa said. Speaking on condition of anonymity, another senior MDC official hinted that the demonstrations would continue for some time. "The protests could continue for some time. If the people feel aggrieved by the fraud conducted during the elections, they should be free to express their anger."
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From Zim Online (SA), 6 April
Panic-buying as basic goods vanish from shops
Harare Basic commodities have vanished from most shops in Zimbabwe while the few supermarkets still selling mealie-meal, milk, soap, sugar, cooking oil or other essential goods have hiked prices by up to 100 percent as the country plunges deeper into crisis days after a disputed election. Bread and fuel were still available but also showing signs of running short with for example, most garages in the southern Matabeleland region visited by ZimOnline reporters yesterday saying they had no or little stocks of diesel and petrol left. The state-funded Consumer Council of Zimbabwe (CCZ) told ZimOnline yesterday that panic-buying by consumers trying to stock up as much as was possible in case the country runs out completely of basic commodities was only helping worsen the situation. The council said it was still investigating the cause of the shortages but said preliminary inquiry showed that the staple mealie-meal was in short supply because most milling companies did not have maize. "Millers have run out of maize and this is exacerbating mealie-meal shortage. Cooking oil is in short supply because of a shortage of soya beans, a key ingredient in cooking oil production," a CCZ official said. The official, who did not give his name because the council does not allow employees to be quoted by name by the Press, added that a vicious black market was fast emerging with most of the goods out of stock in shops easily available on the black market at more than double what they cost in shops.
President Robert Mugabe, his grip on power firmer than before after his Zanu PF party won a landslide victory in last Thursday’s ballot, told the South African Broadcasting Corporation at the weekend that his government had the means to ensure no Zimbabwean starved. Social Welfare Minister Paul Mangwana yesterday also insisted Zimbabwe had enough food including basic commodities such as sugar, soap or cooking oil. Mangwana instead blamed shortages on panic-buying and on pro-opposition manufacturers whom he said were creating artificial shortages in a bid to incite people against the government. "Everything is available and the country has enough food." Mangwana said. He added: "This (shortage) is caused by panic buying and machinations of the opposition party. These manufacturers are opposition supporters and are causing the artificial shortages." In a snap survey in Harare, most of the city’s leading supermarket chains were not selling cooking oil, mealie-meal or popular laundry soap brand saying they had not received supplies from manufacturers. In the shops were some of the commodities were Available, prices had been hiked by between 50 and 100 percent.
Independent economic analyst John Robertson predicted the situation will get worse unless the government devalued the Zimbabwe dollar to help exporters who generate foreign currency needed to pay foreign suppliers of some of the essential commodities or ingredients required to manufacture them. He said: "Price increases will continue from now and this condition will make it difficult for exporters. Unfortunately, we need to devalue the dollar to help exporters whom we expect to bring in foreign currency." Some political analysts had expected last week’s controversial poll to help usher in a democratic solution to Zimbabwe’s crisis. But the poll appears to have worsened Zimbabwe’s isolation by key international players after the European Union, United States, Britain, Germany and Australia rejected the March 31 election as neither free nor fair.
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From Business Day (SA), 6 April
Zimbabwe cancels tobacco auction
Antony Sguazzin and Brian Latham
Harare - Zimbabwe’s tobacco-auction houses cancelled the season’s opening sales yesterday as farmers protested against a crippling drop in prices and the Zimbabwean dollar fell to a record low against the US dollar. Zimbabwe Tobacco Association CE Rodney Ambrose said yesterday about 150 disgruntled farmers forced the temporary shutdown of Tobacco Sales Floors, Zimbabwe’s biggest auction house. The official exchange rate for Zimbabwe’s dollar, which dropped 0,1% to 6086,78 to the US dollar at Monday’s biweekly auction at the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, was not high enough to cover costs for growers. Farmers were paid in local currency for tobacco priced in US dollars, Ambrose said. Tobacco prices fell to 22c/kg yesterday. "The bulk of the farmers were small-scale farmers who had specially made the trip in," Ambrose said in Harare. "They really can’t leave without making a sale. They can’t even cover their transport costs at this price." Tobacco Sales Floor sales and marketing manager Ian Logan said in Harare yesterday: "Farmers have rejected the prices.… The police have been called." The central bank sold $11m after the Zimbabwean dollar dropped, the bank said on its website yesterday. Bids were accepted in a range of 6086,74 to 6086,78, against 6082,04 to 6082,14 at the previous auction. Brazil and India may be offering similar quality tobacco for less, Ambrose said.
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From VOA News, 5 April
Mugabe: Zimbabwe will not ask for food aid
By Tendai Maphosa
Southern Africa is facing a drought induced food shortage. But Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe says that his government will not ask for assistance in feeding its people. President Mugabe has said Zimbabwe will accept assistance from those who want to give it, but his government is not going to ask for food aid. "We will have to import maize again, but we have the money to do so and there is no 'begging', as one newspaper said we are back to holding 'a begging bowl'," he said. Zimbabwe has in the past five years experienced food shortages during successive droughts. Last year it stopped donor agencies that were distributing food in the country from doing so, saying it had a bumper maize harvest. International aid agencies have also blamed the food crisis in Zimbabwe on Mr. Mugabe's sometimes violent land-reform program that was launched in 2000. The exercise saw white farmers losing their farms, ostensibly for the resettlement of landless blacks.
The president has admitted that some of his top officials abused the exercise and ended up with more than one farm and that some of them are not producing to capacity. A lack of capital for production materials on the part of black farmers also led to a drastic fall in production. Regional World Food Program spokesman Michael Huggins recently visited Zimbabwe. He said the agency is presently feeding more than one-million vulnerable Zimbabweans. Mr. Huggins said if Zimbabwe does have the means to feed its people the WFP would restrict itself to its targeted feeding program. "The ideal is always for the World Food Program and other U.N. agencies to work in places where we are needed, and clearly if we are not needed in Zimbabwe then there are more than enough emergencies in the world where we can go and deploy our assets," he said. Mr. Huggins said even if there is enough food there is the problem of peoples' ability to access it. He said because of successive bad harvests, some people have sold all their assets such as livestock to use the money to buy food. During his campaign for last week's parliamentary election, Mr. Mugabe assured Zimbabweans that no one would go hungry.
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From The Daily Telegraph (UK), 6 April
Handcuffed Telegraph men appear in court
Harare - Two journalists from The Sunday Telegraph who are being detained in Zimbabwe pleaded not guilty yesterday to violating immigration regulations and breaking draconian press laws. Toby Harnden, the chief foreign correspondent, and Julian Simmonds, a photographer, appeared in court in Norton 25 miles west of the capital Harare, where they were arrested last Thursday. They are accused of reporting on the weekend election without official accreditation and overstaying their visas. They were handcuffed together as they entered the court and sat impassively as charges were read out. Occasionally they passed notes to their lawyers. Albert Masama, the state prosecutor, said the men were clearly in Zimbabwe to provide news coverage of the elections, which pitted President Robert Mugabe's Zanu PF against the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). "The accused persons had no right to cover the elections because they had no accreditation and had no right to stay in the country beyond March 28," said Mr Masama. "They didn't leave the country on the expiry of their visas. They flew to Harare, where they met unknown members of the MDC."
Beatrice Mtetwa, defending, said the men's passports showed that no expiry date had been recorded on their tourist visas and both believed they had been granted the 14 days they had applied for on entering Zimbabwe. "Unless you work at immigration it's gobbledegook," Mrs Mtetwa said. "There's nothing that appears like they were given seven days." She did not immediately address the more serious charge of violating media laws, which could bring a maximum sentence of two years in prison and a fine. But she said the men would deny that they were in Zimbabwe working as journalists. She described their trip as a tourist outing that took them to Victoria Falls, Matobo national park and the southern city of Bulawayo as well as a Zimbabwe-Angola football match. They "kept a travel diary and took pictures as is normal with tourists", she said. Prosecutors on Monday blocked a magistrate's order to grant bail to the men, arguing that they could abscond. Foreign journalists are effectively banned from working permanently in Zimbabwe and must seek temporary licences from a state commission for brief assignments. Zimbabwe has arrested or deported dozens of journalists and denied others entry under its media rules, which Mr Mugabe's government introduced three years ago.
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Comment from The Star (SA), 6 April
Inky fingers point back at Mugabe
Zimbabwean election rigging was predicted by just about every analyst
By Allister Sparks
If one is to accept, as our Southern African observer teams apparently do, that the result of the Zimbabwe election "reflected the will of the people of Zimbabwe", then one should also accept its corollary, writes Allister Sparks. Which is that the people of Zimbabwe enjoy economic collapse, unemployment and starvation and so turned out in record numbers to vote for more of the same. Either that or they are crazy and wilfully voted against their own interests. I do not accept either proposition. The election was rigged. This was not only predictable, it was predicted by just about every independent analyst in the business. In my last column I noted that the regime was permitting freer electioneering in the closing weeks of the campaign to make it easier for the "friendly" observer teams to declare the poll free and fair, but that plans were afoot to rig the election in less visible ways. That is exactly what happened.
The playing field was skewed from the beginning. The constitution enabled President Mugabe to handpick 30 MPs, which meant the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) needed 76 of the 120 contested seats to win a majority of one while the ruling Zanu PF needed only 71 for a two-thirds majority. Add to that the years of intimidation of opposition voters, no access for the opposition to the state-controlled media, the closure of the country's only independent daily newspaper, the shutting out of foreign observers and correspondents, the redrawing of constituency boundaries to eliminate several safe MDC seats and make others marginal, a hopelessly outdated voters roll which opened the way for nearly 2-million "ghost" votes to be cast, and you begin to get the picture. Ghost voters aside, more than 133 000 living voters were turned away from the polls because of the defective roll. But it was the count which proved decisive - something which was also widely predicted but which the friendly observer teams appear not to have observed.
With the pro-Mugabe police and troops appointed as the only electoral officers, opposition election agents around the country found themselves denied entry to the polling booths where the ballots were counted. In the urban constituencies, legally wise MDC candidates were able to challenge these illegal restrictions and gain access, but not in the rural polling stations. There the count took place with only the pro-government electoral officers and Zanu PF candidates and agents present, making the manipulation of figures easy. The MDC claims this took place on a massive scale, citing discrepancies between figures released before the count began of the total number of votes cast and the numbers for each party announced after the count. In Kariba constituency, for example, it was announced as the polls closed on Thursday night that 16 676 people had voted. But when the result was announced on Friday morning the electoral officers reported that Zanu PF has received 13 719 votes and the MDC 9 540 - a total of 24 142, or 7 466 more than the total given the night before. An MDC candidate in a Gweru constituency noted the anomaly that in a densely populated communal land area favourable to the opposition the polling stations reported an average of between 250 and 300 votes each, while polling stations in a much more sparsely populated part of the constituency more favourable to Zanu PF reported an average of 700 votes each.
More insidious still was a back-up system intended to impress the observer teams. Voters were required to dip their fingers in indelible ink to ensure they could not vote a second time. But the ink was not indelible. A little Vaseline or Jik and it could be washed off in minutes. But all this venality is now history. President Robert Mugabe remains in command with a stronger grip on power than ever. He has total control over the executive, the legislature, the judiciary, the police and the military - added to which he now has the power to rewrite the country's constitution to his liking. But what he does not have is a solution to Zimbabwe's deepening economic crisis. That cannot be resolved without international aid, and Mugabe is not going to get that as long as the Western powers perceive him to be stealing elections and violating human rights. So where does that leave Zimbabwe and its people? With more of what they have been suffering for the past five years.
Mugabe says he will use his two-thirds majority to change the constitution within the first four months. He says he will establish a senate, a second parliamentary chamber to "cater for those people who, because of their age, are no longer as energetic as they were, and for traditional chiefs". Faced with a deepening rift between a party Old Guard still clinging to office and younger members champing at the bit as they wait for the succession issue to be resolved, Mugabe may use the senate as a dumping ground for old cronies while introducing some new blood into his government. But which new blood? Is there any in that atrophied and pervasively corrupt party? If so, it is well hidden. I suspect this is the moment President Thabo Mbeki has been waiting for, hoping Mugabe will seize the opportunity to shape a constitution that will enable him to proclaim himself a purely ceremonial president and appoint a prime minister to head a government of national unity which would include the MDC. Mbeki's choice for such a prime minister would presumably be Emmerson Mnangagwa, whom he pointedly invited to the last ANC national congress in December 2002. That would be a satisfying culmination to all these years of "quiet diplomacy", and Mbeki would doubtless be rewarded with international acclamation.
But there are snags. Mugabe has already shouldered Mnangagwa aside, having appointed the more obscure Joyce Mujuru to the key vacancy of vice-president at his party congress last December. Now Mnangagwa has suffered the further setback of losing to the MDC in his home constituency of Kwekwe. It is the second time he has lost in successive elections, and this surely puts paid to his prospects of being named heir apparent. As for the government of national unity, Mugabe is unlikely to make a serious offer to the MDC - and the MDC would be unlikely to accept even if he did. It is too outraged at having been abused and cheated for so long by the Mugabe regime, and too sceptical of Zanu PF's ability to undo its disastrous economic policies. It is also mindful of the fate of Joshua Nkomo and his Zimbabwe African People's Union, which was swallowed up and lost its identity and credibility after merging with Mugabe's Zanu in 1987. Mugabe may make some gesture in the context of his constitutional changes as a token of gratitude to his southern neighbour for his long and patient support, but it is unlikely to mean much in real terms. More like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Which, the election observers would have us believe, is in accordance with the will of the doomed ship's passengers.
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From Zim Online (SA), 7 April
Zanu PF unleashes massive violence against MDC supporters
Harare - Retribution is quietly gathering pace days after Zimbabwe’s disputed election with several dozens of opposition supporting families denied food or beaten up and forced to flee their homes, Zim Online has established. In the town of Karoi in Mashonaland West province, ruling Zanu PF party militants have told all perceived supporters of the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party that they will intensify attacks against them once foreign election observers have left the country. At least 10 villagers from Kazangarare rural area in the province have sought refuge in Karoi after fleeing ruling Zanu PF militias on Monday, who were threatening them with unspecified punishment for supporting the MDC. "They (Zanu PF militants) said we should come here to Karoi where the MDC is supported," one of the villagers Innocent Tavoyi told ZimOnline. The villagers are staying at the Karoi home of Biggie Haurovi the MDC candidate in last Thursday’s poll. Haurovi lost Hurungwe East constituency, under which Karoi and Kazangarare falls, to Zanu PF’s Reuben Marumahoko. But the opposition candidate had more votes in Karoi town.
In Gwanda, in Matabeleland South province, 45 MDC supporters were beaten up and told they will no longer be allowed to buy maize from the state Grain Marketing Board, the only supplier of the staple food in the hunger stricken district. MDC officials in Matabeleland South said retribution against their supporters, which they said they feared could become more brutal in coming days, began last Saturday a day after the final results of the poll won by Zanu PF by 78 seats against the MDC’s 41. In Mutare city, in the east of the country, six MDC supporters are holed up at the opposition party’s provincial headquarters in the city after fleeing their homes in Makoni East, about 100 km north-west of Mutare. "They (Zanu PF militants) are threatening everyone known to have been campaigning for the MDC. The police are aware and insist we be beaten up first and then report later as there would be evidence," Tendai Gonese who was campaigning for the MDC in Makoni East said. Gonese and his MDC colleagues, Nixon Injisi, Langton Chifamba, Future Musindo, Thomas Handireki and Rosemary Chimombo said they will only go back to their homes if they are assured of protection from Zanu PF militants.
But MDC officials in Mutare and in other parts of the country where retribution is going on against opposition supporters said they had reported the attacks and denial of food to opposition supporters to the police but to no avail. MDC deputy spokesman in Matabeleland South, Petros Mukwena said: "Most of the people have suffered beatings …they have (also) taken advantage of their control of maize distribution to deny our supporters a right to buy the commodity. We have told the police about these activities many times in the past few days but they have not done anything about it." In Karoi, the MDC’s Haurovi said MDC supporters there were living in fear as Zanu PF militants freely roam the area terrorising suspected opposition supporters while the police had by yesterday not taken any action against the ruling party militants. Haurovi said: "I am surprised that the police are not arresting Zanu PF members involved in brutal attacks against MDC supporters, people are living in fear here." But Home Affairs Minister Kembo Mohadi and Zanu PF officials denied there was any campaign of retribution by ruling party militants against MDC supporters. "I am not aware of that. If the MDC has such problems, which I do not believe are happening, they have not reported to the police," Mohadi said.
In Mashonaland West province, under which Karoi falls, acting Zanu PF provincial chairman John Mafa said: "We have not sent anyone to go around beating up people and we as a party we have not received any reports of any of our supporters beating people for voting for the MDC." Human rights and pro-democracy groups warned of a vicious backlash against the opposition after Zimbabwe’s poll and urged observer missions to remain in the country a little longer after polling to help ensure there will be no victimisation of government opponents. It was not possible to immediately establish when the South African government, Southern African Development Community and Africa Union observer missions, all still in Zimbabwe, planned to leave the country. Meanwhile, MDC spokesman Paul Themba Nyathi said in a statement yesterday that deputy Transport Minister Andrew Langa last Sunday fired shots to scare MDC supporters as Zanu PF militants brutally attacked them at Avoca rural business centre in Insiza constituency in Matabeleland South province. "In Insiza, Andrew Langa, the "winning" candidate for Insiza fired at people at Avoca Business Centre last Sunday (3 April 2005). Langa arrived at Avoca business centre and ordered the youths he led to randomly beat up people at the centre. When people tried to defend themselves and forced the youths to retreat, Langa fired at the people, but no one was hit," Nyathi’s statement read in part. Several people were injured during the attack and were treated at Avoca Hospital while a man, Dumisani Mthunzi, who suffered serious injuries was transferred to Bulawayo Central Hospital where he is still receiving treatment, according to Nyathi. Nyathi said police at Filabusi police station in the area however allowed the Zanu PF youths to go scot-free and instead arrested some of the victims. More MDC supporters were also attacked in Shamva in Mashonaland Central province and in Harare’s Mufakose low-income suburb according to Nyathi. ZimOnline was not able to independently verify the incidents reported by Nyathi.
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From The Daily Telegraph (UK), 7 April
Mugabe 'conjures up' winning votes
By David Blair
Zimbabwe's opposition yesterday claimed to have found proof of "massive electoral fraud" carried out by the regime of President Robert Mugabe. The Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) said that tens of thousands of votes appear to have been conjured from nowhere to guarantee victory for candidates from the ruling Zanu PF party in last week's parliamentary election. Mr Mugabe has, say his critics, stolen victory in every national election since the formation of the MDC almost six years ago. Intimidation and violence were once the regime's principal weapons against all opponents. But the opposition says that Mr Mugabe also tries to avoid international criticism by relying on more subtle ways of holding power. Critics believe that he increasingly relies on outright ballot-rigging and electoral fraud carried out by pliant officials. The MDC claims this was the dominant feature of the latest election. It points to glaring discrepancies between official voting figures issued after polls closed.
Seven hours after voting ended last Thursday, Lovemore Sekeramayi, an official from Zimbabwe's Election Commission, appeared before journalists and began reading out the total number of votes cast in each constituency. He did so for 72 seats, before stopping abruptly without any explanation. Later, Mr Justice George Chiweshe, the High Court judge who chairs the Election Commission, appeared on state television and announced the totals won by each candidate. But in 45 of the 120 seats, there were discrepancies between his figures and the turnout announced earlier. In Manyame constituency, Mr Sekeramayi said that 14,812 votes had been cast. Hours later, Mr Justice Chiweshe announced that Zanu PF had won the seat with 15,448 votes. The winner was Patrick Zhuwawo, Mr Mugabe's nephew. If the turnout figure was correct, Mr Zhuwawo became an MP with 104 per cent of the total vote. In Goromonzi constituency, Mr Sekeramayi announced a turnout of 15,611. Mr Justice Chiweshe then declared the Zanu PF candidate had won 16,782 votes. The victorious MP was Herbert Murerwa, the acting finance minister, who - if the turnout figure was correct - swept up 108 per cent of the total vote. In Marondera East constituency, Sydney Sekeramayi, the defence minister, won 19,912 votes against 10,066 for Iain Kay, a former commercial farmer standing for the MDC. But the turnout in this seat was announced as being only 25,193. Thus 4,742 votes seem to have appeared from nowhere.
In 11 seats, the discrepancies were larger than the majorities of the winning candidates from Zanu PF. Had the MDC won those 11 constituencies, it would have held enough seats in Parliament to prevent Mr Mugabe winning the two-thirds majority that allows him to amend the constitution. "This indicates massive electoral fraud by the ruling party," said Paul Themba Nyathi, the spokesman for the MDC. He called the discrepancies "serious and unaccountable" and said the figures had been submitted to the outside observers who covered the election. But the observer missions from South Africa and African regional organisations have already ruled the contest free and fair. Mr Nyathi, who lost his seat in parliament, said: "Regrettably, these observer missions have so far shown a chronic lack of interest in such compelling statistics and instead have maintained their respective positions that the elections reflected 'the will of the people'. This was clearly not the case. "The MDC and the people of Zimbabwe know full well who the real winners are. This election was stolen. The results are in no way an accurate reflection of the sovereign wishes of the people of Zimbabwe." But the MDC, which officially won 41 seats compared with 78 for Zanu PF, has no plans to challenge the election results in court. Three years ago, it filed a challenge to Mr Mugabe's victory in the presidential polls of 2002. But so far, the judges have declined even to hear the party's case.
From ZWNEWS: If you would like to see details of the first 30 constituencies identified as having serious polling discrepancies, please let us know. The details will be sent in an email approximately half the size of the average daily ZWNEWS.
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From News24(SA), 6 April
US queries Zim voting results
Cape Town - The United States Embassy in Zimbabwe has called on the Zimbabwean Election Commission to release the voting results of the individual polling stations as soon as possible. In a statement received in Cape Town on Thursday, the embassy said the US government, along with many other governments that observed the 2000 and 2002 elections in Zimbabwe, were not invited to bring in outside observers for the March 31 elections. However, the embassy in Harare sent 25 teams of diplomats accredited as election observers by the Electoral Supervisory Commission (ESC) around the country during the pre-election period and on election day. On election day, embassy teams observed more than 350 polling stations in 59 constituencies. The observers noted several patterns of irregularities that raised concerns about the freeness and fairness of the process. Of particular concern was a lack of transparency in the tabulation of vote counts. The US observers were excluded from observing counts in four polling stations. Where they were admitted, observers and officials, including party representatives and neutral domestic observers, were locked in the polling station and not permitted to communicate with anyone outside. At the same time, uniformed police were observed communicating the vote tallies via radio and telephone.
In several observed instances, the presiding officer confiscated the notes of party polling agents and independent observers before letting them depart the polling station. In apparent contravention of Zimbabwean election law, results were not publicly posted before being forwarded to regional centres and at many stations were never posted at all. Zanu PF agents and the police appeared to have improper roles in the supervision or conduct of the polling stations and in the operation of ZEC constituency tabulation centres. In several instances, embassy observers witnessed uniformed police participating in the vote compilation instead of ZEC officials at the constituency tabulation centres. Also, some polling stations were located in areas that would be intimidating to some voters, such as next to police stations or within 200m of a Zanu PF office. Some polling stations also appeared to be associated with the distribution of food. Finally, in many polling stations observed, the percentages of voters turned away were as high as 30 percent. Compounding concern over these irregularities was the silence of the Zimbabwe Election Commission on crucial issues. It had failed to release the voting results of any polling stations, to explain why its initial release of totals of ballots cast only included six of the country's ten provinces, and also not explained why it never released results for the remaining four provinces.
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From The Mail & Guardian (SA), 6 April
Zanu PF threatens to seize companies
Harare - President Robert Mugabe's ruling Zanu PF party has threatened to seize commercial companies it says are trying to provoke food riots in the wake of last week's parliamentary elections. "Some of the manufacturers could have unilaterally increased prices with the ulterior motive of inducing people to blame the government and trigger food riots," the head of the party's women's league, Nyasha Chikwinya, said in an article published on Wednesday in the state-owned daily newspaper, The Herald.Trade Minister Samuel Mumbengegwi issued a statement saying manufacturers and retailers who had raised prices of staples such as sugar, salt, soap and cooking oil by up to 25% since the March 31 poll "should revert to previous levels because the increases were not approved". "We have been understudying the running of the companies from the days of [1998] food riots and shortages. Enough is enough. This cannot go on any longer," said Chikwinya. In 2002, reacting to foreign pressure, the government stopped militants from invading companies after the seizure of 5 000 white-owned farms. Some of the invaded premises belonged to South African subsidiaries, protected by international investment agreements.
The government has been failing for months to set new maximum prices in the face of hyperinflation, which reached 620% last year before falling back to an official 127% in March - a figure many economists question. Despite the country's chronic economic problems, with 70% unemployment and 3,8-million of Zimbabwe's 11,6-million population now living abroad, Zanu PF claimed 78 parliamentary seats in last week's elections, compared to 41 for the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change. With Mugabe nominating a further 30 in the 150-seat parliament, he may now amend the constitution at will. Chikwinya said that under Zanu PF management of the seized companies, "we will produce good results and shame our detractors". Appealing for an end to panic buying and hoarding, Mumbengegwi said temporary absence of maize meal from stores was a result of temporary "logistical problems" and "millers were now bringing the situation under control." Mugabe (81), in power since the country won independence from Britain in 1980, alleges Zimbabwe's economic problems stem from British reprisals for his "fast track" redistribution of former white farms. But critics say he has undermined production and exports, using agitation for land reform as a smoke screen to intimidating opposition. On the eve of the elections, his government raised the national statutory minimum wage tenfold to Z$950,000 (about R128) a month, a move unions predicted would lead to increased unemployment and illicit use of child labour.
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From The Daily News Online Edition, 6 April
Foreign journalists complain over Zim media gag
Johannesburg - An international organization representing the interests of foreign correspondents, the Foreign Correspondent’s Association (FCA) has condemned Zimbabwe for allegedly failing to allow a free and open media coverage of last week’s parliamentary poll. "The FCA believes that free and open press coverage of elections is a vital part of the democratic process. Zimbabwe fell short of that ideal in these elections," FCA chairman Simon Robinson said in a statement. Zimbabwe denied several journalists, including reporters from the BBC, CBS, the Associated Press, Reuters and the Chicago Tribune, accreditation to cover the parliamentary poll. The FCA’s stance against the Zimbabwean government comes in the wake of arrests and detention of foreign correspondents in Harare. Two British journalists have been arrested for working inside Zimbabwe without accreditation while four others and several other foreign correspondents were denied accreditation to cover the controversial poll, won by President Mugabe’s Zanu PF party. Stephane Barbier and Fanuel Jongwe from Agence France Press were detained for more than an hour on the evening of March 31, after watching police arrest around 100 women who had gathered for a prayer meeting. At the same protest, a group of journalists including correspondents for the Economist, Associated Press and Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter were threatened with arrest for refusing to leave the area as police pushed protesters into their trucks.
On Friday Swedish journalists Carolina Jemsby and Fredrik Sperling were detained by immigration authorities after filming street scenes in Harare. They were threatened with prison and told that "people had expectations of you when you were given accreditation. You fell short..." Jemsby was forced to erase her film but was released and allowed to continue her work. Sperling was accused of earlier filming a farm belonging to a relative of President Mugabe. Sperling had not set foot on the farm but was accused of trespassing. He had his accreditation withdrawn, was forced to leave the country immediately and was declared a prohibited immigrant. The FCA expressed concern for Britain's Sunday Telegraph journalists Toby John Harnden, 37 and photographer Julian Paul Simmonds, 46. They were arrested and charged with violating media and immigration laws. "While the FCA recognises that the men did not hold accreditation to work in Zimbabwe and were there illegally, it is concerned that they will be made an example of under the draconian Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act," Robinson said.
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From ekklesia (UK), 7 April
Mugabe branded 'shameless' over attempt to gatecrash Pope's funeral
President Robert Mugabe has been branded 'shameless' after he flew from Zimbabwe unannounced to join world leaders attending Pope John Paul II’s funeral in Rome. The trip which defied a European Union travel ban was denounced by one of Mugabe’s fiercest human rights critics, Roman Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube of Bulawayo. "That man will use any opportunity to fly to Europe to promote himself. The man is shameless," said the archbishop. He also said Mugabe was exploiting the Vatican’s current preoccupation with funeral arrangements. The Archbishop recently called for a non-violent uprising against Mugabe. In response Mugabe accused the prelate of being "a half wit" and said he was praying for God to kill him. By going to Rome Mugabe, 81, who has been in power since 1980 independence, defied European Union travel sanctions imposed in 2002 after its observers were barred from disputed presidential elections, at which Mugabe claimed a further six-year term. His ruling Zanu PF party last week announced it had gained a two-thirds majority in parliamentary elections similarly marred by allegations of intimidation and massive rigging.
On Monday, Mugabe took the floor uninvited at a requiem mass for the Pope in Harare’s Catholic cathedral, attacking western powers for meddling in Zimbabwe’s internal affairs. "It is sad to note in today’s world there are people who want to dominate other people contrary to the late Pope’s teaching," he said. Mugabe who is Jesuit-educated, calls himself a Catholic, and described John Paul II as "a very virtuous man, a virtuous leader of the Catholic Church". During an apparently shameless interview with the South African Broadcasting Corporation to mark his Zanu PF party's recent victory, Mugabe said small nations such as Zimbabwe feared "the bullies of this world", and hoped that big nations would pay heed to the Pope's message of peace. The US embassy in Harare on Wednesday joined critics of last week’s elections, expressing concern at the role of police and ruling-party officials in polling and counting, the association of polling stations with food distribution and the "drastic discrepancies" between initial announcements of votes cast and the eventual combined votes announced for the rival candidates.
In 2002 Mugabe and approximately 100 of his closest political associates were also barred by the US and many Commonwealth nations from operating bank accounts on their soil or travelling there for private purposes. However, Archbishop Ncube noted that the Italian Government was obliged by its treaties with the Vatican to admit Mugabe for the Pope’s funeral. Senior church figures would be unable to communicate to him their concern at the human rights situation in Zimbabwe, the archbishop predicted. "The Secretary of State might be rather too busy right now to talk to him but when someone in the family has died you appreciate all the sympathy you can get from all people, even murders, crooks and thieves like Mugabe," he said. "In any case what will he (the Secretary of State) achieve? Mugabe is so stubborn and so conceited." His comments, defying draconian new laws that impose a five-year jail sentence for undermining the dignity or authority of the head of state, mark a new intensity in the war of words between the two men.
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From The Zimbabwe Independent, 8 April
ZEC chief stuck
Ray Matikinye
The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) yesterday failed to explain the discrepancies in figures that determined the outcome of the general election held last Thursday saying media and public concerns stemmed from updates issued by the commission rather than the actual voting figures at the end of the poll. ZEC chairman Justice George Chiweshe struggled to clarify issues raised by journalists at a press conference. He said the glaring discrepancies were made up by stakeholders in political circles who were using the media to try to discredit the poll and the ZEC itself. "I explained that the figures quoted in any update that the commission may give are not necessarily an accurate reflection of the facts on the ground and that the figures were given without prejudice and only for the purpose of giving an indication as to the turnout trends in various provinces and constituencies," Justice Chiweshe told a media briefing yesterday.
He said the updates were only given to show voting trends in the constituencies. But he could not explain how the initial update announcement for Beitbridge indicated 36 821 people had voted by 2pm when the final result showed 20 602 people had voted. He also failed to explain how the commission had gathered and compiled the initial updates. The final result showed that the Zanu PF candidate, Kembo Mohadi, had polled 14 305 against Muruma Siphuma of the MDC’s 6 297. The total shows a deficit of 16 219 votes unaccounted for. The commission released voting figures from 72 constituencies last Thursday evening but abruptly stopped doing so without explanation. There was no mention of the figures being "interim" at the time. Chiweshe said his commission would not publish votes cast at each polling station as this would not materially affect the final vote count. Asked whether the commission could release the interim figures — up to 2.30pm — for the remaining constituencies in Mashonaland Central, Masvingo, Matabeleland and Midlands, Justice Chiweshe said that would not change the result of the election. "That is neither here nor there. The correct position is that there is only one set of figures to be considered and only one process to be examined. These are the official figures by which the election result was determined. The question of inconsistencies does not arise," he said.
Chiweshe, who had earlier said none of the contesting parties had formally lodged complaints with the commission, admitted the opposition had lodged a complaint over the results on Wednesday. The MDC, which rejected the poll results last Saturday, is currently compiling data regarding the discrepancies with a view to lodging a complaint with the courts before the April 15 deadline. Although Chiweshe said the process was witnessed by local and international observers, monitors and agents of the contesting parties, he could not say for certain whether all polling agents were allowed to witness the counting —particularly at 13 polling stations located at chiefs’ homesteads and 12 other non-neutral locations. "The law allows agents to be present during the counting of votes," Chiweshe said. But the MP-elect for Bulawayo South, David Coltart, said he was locked out from a counting centre in his urban constituency. Asked whether the commission had rigged the elections, Chiweshe said the commission was an independent body whose members had been selected by both the ruling party and the opposition MDC. He denied that the commission was partisan. He said his commission was studying an African Union observer team report that initially gave the polls a clean bill of health but is now calling for investigations into alleged electoral fraud. Chiweshe said the AU had not retracted its verdict but was merely giving suggestions and guidelines to improve the conduct of elections in future.
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From Reuters, 8 April
Zimbabwe youth leader arrested over riot radio
Harare - Zimbabwe police arrested the main opposition's youth leader on Thursday, after his supporters ran amok over parliamentary elections they charged were rigged by President Robert Mugabe's ruling party, state radio said. It said Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) youth leader Nelson Chamisa handed himself to police in the company of his lawyer due to the incident earlier this week, which followed the opposition's crushing parliamentary defeat by the ruling Zanu PF party. Police and MDC officials were not immediately reachable for comment. On Tuesday police said they were on high alert countrywide after a small group of opposition protesters ran through central Harare the previous day, smashing a couple of shop windows and distributing fliers condemning the election results. But MDC spokesman Paul Themba Nyathi denied that the party was organising any protests, saying the disturbances might be the work of the ruling party. Zanu PF won the two-thirds parliamentary majority it needs to push through constitutional changes at will in the March 31 polls, which the MDC and Western governments say were rigged.
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From Business Day (SA), 8 April
Endorsing poll ‘morally questionable’ SACC
International Affairs Editor
The South African Council of Churches (SACC) and a group of civic organisations have said the thumbs-up given by government’s observer group to the Zimbabwe elections is "morally questionable". A combined statement said the group took exception to government’s pronouncement that due to the peaceful climate that prevailed during the voting, the elections were necessarily free and fair. Molefe Tsele, SACC general secretary, said yesterday that the statement by the South African government observers came across, "almost as if the perpetrator (of the violence ahead of the elections) was being congratulated and rewarded". The grouping, which also includes the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference, the Institute for Democracy of SA, and the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, sent a team of 15 to observe the election, but Tsele was barred from entering Zimbabwe. On current evidence the poll could not be found to be free and fair without qualification, it said. The public questioning of Pretoria’s assessment of the elections comes days after both the US embassy in Harare and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change raised the possibility of a manipulated count. This finding by the SACC puts it at odds with its counterpart in Zimbabwe, the Zimbabwe Council of Churches, which said earlier this week it found the poll free and fair. Christian churches are divided in Zimbabwe on their support for President Robert Mugabe.
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From Zim Online (SA), 8 April
Mugabe pushes to end isolation
Harare - President Robert Mugabe, who is in Rome for the Pope's funeral, is desperately trying to secure meetings with European leaders to try and push for an end to his regime's isolation. But there was no indication by last night that any of the world leaders attending would agree to meet Mugabe on the sidelines of Pope John Paul II's funeral at the Vatican. Mugabe's officials were trying to organise meetings with former leaders of mainly Eastern European countries who have since joined the European Union in a desperate bid to try and lobby them against the continued sanctions on him and his officials. The EU operates by consensus and Zimbabwe's foreign ministry sources said Mugabe hoped to break that consensus by getting other European Union countries not to agree to the continued sanctions against his government. "He hoped to woo a few EU countries that have recently joined the organisation (EU) by explaining to them that all the problems in Zimbabwe are all because of Britain's fault in not releasing money for land reform," said one source. "He wants to tell them that Blair has carried the same 'lying habits' that created the chaos in Iraq to Zimbabwe." Some of these former communist eastern European countries admitted into the EU were close supporters of Mugabe during the liberation struggle and provided arms and ammunition to Zanu PF guerillas. Mugabe has repeatedly accused Blair of being solely responsible for EU sanctions on Zimbabwe. He has accused the British Prime Minister of surreptitiously lobbying Zimbabwe's "friends" like Italy and France to impose sanctions.
But his campaign to win these "friends" might falter as it seemed likely that very few or none of the EU leaders would be willing to meet him. Shaking Mugabe's hand by an EU leader has previously attracted widespread disapproval in the European media. No single appointment had been confirmed at the time of going to Press yesterday though officials refused to disclose the exact countries they had approached. Still Mugabe would share the podium with his arch critics - Blair and American President George Bush, who are all attending the funeral. More than 150 presidents, prime ministers, queens, kings and other influential people are expected at the funeral. Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi refused to meet Mugabe during his last visit to Rome more than two years ago to attend a United Nations meeting. Mugabe had asked for a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the UN's World Food Programme conference, which he was allowed to attend because the sanctions are waived for UN meetings. The EU imposed travel sanctions on Mugabe, his wife and top cronies over his human rights abuses and violent seizure of white owned farmland for redistribution to landless blacks.
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From Zim Online (SA), 8 April
Bitter Zanu PF candidate plunges suburb into darkness
Bulawayo - A losing Zanu PF candidate has ordered the removal of an electricity transformer from Emganwini high density suburb in Bulawayo as punishment to the residents for failing to elect her into Parliament in last week’s polls. Sithembiso Nyoni who contested and lost the Bulawayo South constituency to the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)’s David Coltart, allegedly ordered the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA) to remove the transformer, plunging the suburb into darkness. Nyoni who had helped instal the transformer in a bid to curry favour with the residents ahead of the election as part of her "development drive" in the constituency, ordered the removal of the transformer on Sunday to "fix" the residents for failing to vote her into parliament. Nyoni polled a paltry 3 777 votes against Coltart's 12 120 votes in the election. Bulawayo, a bastion of the MDC, overwhelmingly voted for the opposition party in the disputed poll. Speaking to ZimOnline yesterday, Nyoni confirmed the latest turn of events, but denied that she had ordered ZESA to remove the transformer as punishment to the residents. She insisted that ZESA had removed the newly installed transformer for safe-keeping from thieves who had stolen it last Sunday. "It's true that ZESA employees took away the transformer from Emganwini for safe-keeping. I was advised that some thieves stole the transformer on Sunday night leaving the local residents in darkness. However, the transformer was recovered by ZESA and they are holding onto it for safe-keeping. However to assume that I had ordered or instructed ZESA to remove it after losing the election is just too naughty," said Nyoni. The police in Nkulumane said no reports of theft of the transformer had been reported to them.
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From SW Radio Africa, 7 April
Kidnapping in Mazowe
The son of the MDC candidate in Mazowe East, Shepherd Mushonga was kidnapped at Bedrock Business Centre and severely beaten up by Zanu PF youths in Mazowe. Wilson Mushonga and his colleagues were tracked down by 4 trucks packed with youths and war veterans. He was beaten up and left for dead in an adjacent verandah close to the family shop. He is currently hospitalised in Harare alongside his collegues. Earlier, we reported how scores of suspected MDC supporters have been injured with some admitted to hospital after Zanu PF candidates led their supporters in attacks on ordinary people, especially those believed to support the MDC. Homes have been burnt down while people flee their areas. Reprisals have been reported in Insiza, Gokwe, Shamva, Hurungwe and Mufakose. The Mazowe attacks are another example of the continuing reprisals country wide. Clarence Nhamo Mushava who was part of the group explains what happened. Meanwhile its alleged Transport Minister Christopher Mushowe, is leading a campaign to get his political rival and MDC candidate for Mutare West, Gabriel Chiwara dismissed from the National Railways. Chiwara, who lost to Mushowe in the rigged election, works as an artisan in the NRZ which falls under Mushowe's Ministry. The campaign is gaining momentum with other NRZ workers perceived to support the MDC being targeted. The party's Organising Secretary at the NRZ's Westgate compound for workers in Bulawayo is being asked to write a letter to the Area Security Manager and explain why MDC rallies where held inside the complex. Victor Moyo, the MDC's Bulawayo spokesman says the reprisals show that his party actually won the elections and that Zanu PF candidates are lashing back in disbelief.
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From Zim Online (SA), 8 April
Zimbabwe to divert Z$5 trillion to buy emergency food
Harare - Crisis-ridden Zimbabwe will divert Z$5 trillion or 18.2 percent of the total capital expenditure budget to buy emergency food to avert mass starvation in the country. Ruling Zanu PF party information secretary Nathan Shamuyarira yesterday told ZimOnline that poor rains had forced the ruling party and the government to re-look programmes to resuscitate Zimbabwe’s collapsing economy and divert funds earmarked for infrastructural development to buying food instead. Shamuyarira said: "As the president has said no one will starve, we have decided to divert the funds earmarked for capital expenditure to feed the nation. The drought has been a major setback to our turn-around strategies and we are in a predicament where we are forced to use resources for infrastructure development to ensure food security. We will make sure no one will starve" But critics say erratic rains notwithstanding, President Robert Mugabe’s chaotic and often violent seizure of farm land and irrigation equipment from white farmers for redistribution to landless blacks is to blame for the about 60 percent drop in farm production in the last three years. Most of the former white-owned commercial farms that were able to produce some food through irrigation were now lying fallow either because Mugabe’s cronies who took them are not interested in growing crops or because black peasants resettled on the farms do not have skills or financial resources to maintain production, critics say.
Most shops in Harare and other major centres were this week without the staple mealie-meal (ground from maize), sugar, cooking oil and soap while bread was showing signs of running short with reports that millers were running out of wheat. An estimated 4 million Zimbabweans or about a quarter of the country’s 12.5 million people face starvation. Fuel, in perennial shortage since 2000, was also getting scarcer with several garages in the country’s southern regions reporting that they had no stock or were selling the little diesel and petrol they had left. Harare-based economic analyst John Robertson said diverting money from the capital expenditure account would compromise quality of government service but would still not help much in getting food or basic commodities into the country as what was need was hard cash to pay foreign suppliers. Robertson said: "It will result in the delay in completing capital projects that means we will wait longer for the improvement of services in government…they must deal with the scarcity of foreign currency which has been caused by the collapse of the tobacco industry, shrinkage in beef and timber exports." Mugabe, in an interview with the South African Broadcasting Corporation soon after his Zanu PF party controversially won last Thursday’s parliamentary election, admitted Zimbabwe was facing food problems but said his government had the means to ensure the country was fed.
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Comment from The Washington Post, 4 April
Zimbabwe's enabler
South Africa falls short as monitor of democracy
By Sebastian Mallaby
Thursday's election in Zimbabwe was not merely stolen. It was stolen with the complicity - no, practically the encouragement - of Africa's most influential democrat. If you think too long about this democrat, moreover, you reach a bleak conclusion. For all the recent democratic strides in Africa, the continental leadership that was supposed to reinforce this progress is not up to the challenge. The bankrupt democrat in question is Thabo Mbeki, South Africa's president. For the past few years, he's been promising a pan-African Renaissance, a new era in which Africans would take charge of their own problems. Mbeki led the creation of the grandly titled New Partnership for Africa's Development, which commits members to the rule of law and other principles of good government; he's the driving force behind the peer-review mechanism that's supposed to police compliance with those pledges. The New Partnership's principles are quoted frequently by Africa sympathizers who advocate more foreign assistance, and they've boosted Mbeki's profile marvelously. Mbeki has become a fixture at the rich countries' annual Group of Eight summits. He has been treated by George Bush and Tony Blair as a player. He has felt emboldened to advance South Africa as a candidate for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.
But do Mbeki's New Partnership principles mean anything? In the run-up to Zimbabwe's election, when the regime's thugs were denying food to suspected opposition sympathizers, Mbeki actually undercut the international pressure for a fair contest. He expressed a serene confidence that the election would be free and fair. He allowed his labor minister, who was serving as the head of the South African observer mission in Zimbabwe, to dismiss the regime's critics as "a problem and a nuisance." He quarreled with the Bush administration's description of Zimbabwe as an outpost of repression. He did everything, in other words, to signal that mass fraud would be acceptable. And so Zimbabwe's thugs obliged him. Before the election, they arranged for ballot boxes made out of see-through plastic and a voter's roll stuffed with fictitious names. When polling day came, about a tenth of the voters were turned away from election stations for mysterious reasons. One constituency, in which 14,812 people voted according to election officials, was announced the next day to have awarded more than 15,000 votes to the president's nephew. In this way, the regime won a famous victory -- and with it the power to change whatever's left of Zimbabwe's constitution.
If South Africa, which could strangle its smaller neighbor's economy by switching off its electricity, had been tougher beforehand, this fraud might have been forestalled. If Mbeki had protested after the election, events also might have been different. Some brave Zimbabweans called for an African version of Ukraine's Orange Revolution. But as one opposition politician said wistfully, regional conditions provided no encouragement. Ukraine benefited from proximity to pro-democratic Europe. But Zimbabwe's democratic neighbor sent the opposite signal. After the election was stolen, the head of the South African observer mission heaped praise on the process, declaring that the outcome reflected "the free will of the people of Zimbabwe" and that "the political climate was conducive for elections to take place." Zimbabwe isn't the only place where Mbeki has been disappointing. On New Year's Day he visited Sudan and addressed that country's government. If ever there was an opportunity for some peer-to-peer truth-telling, surely this was it: Sudan's Arab leaders are engaged in the systematic killing of ethnic Africans in the western province of Darfur. But Mbeki spoke understandingly of "the challenges facing the government," and reserved his toughest comments for the easy scapegoat of imperialism. "When these eminent representatives of British colonialism were not in Sudan, they were in South Africa, and vice versa, doing terrible things wherever they went," he lectured.
Mbeki is undoubtedly an able man -- thoughtful in conversation, workaholic in habit, a wizard in the dark arts of backroom politics. But he is a tragic figure: He personifies the flaw that his own New Partnership is intended to inhibit. Open and accountable government is desirable because it exposes leaders to criticism, obliges them to listen and so reduces the risk of blatantly bad policy. But Mbeki, who leads a democratic government but one without electable opponents, is no more willing to accept criticism than to dish it out. He surrounds himself with yes men and spits viciously at critics. He lacks the humility to admit errors, even when the consequences are plain for all to see. Mbeki's error on Zimbabwe is almost as terrible as his earlier one on AIDS, when he opposed anti-retroviral treatment. Zimbabwe is the poster child for the emphasis on governance in the New Partnership for Africa's Development; it shows how bad government can take a promising society and ruin it. A country that was once a breadbasket for the region now depends on food aid; a country that once took in migrants now exports desperate people by the million. And yet Mbeki, the mastermind and guiding light of the New Partnership, will not speak out against this tragedy.
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From IRIN (UN), 8 April
MDC rejects electoral commission's explanation
Harare - The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) has denied rigging the 31 March legislative elections, but its attempt to explain discrepancies in vote tallies has been rejected by the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). MDC spokesman Paul Themba Nyathi told IRIN on Friday that the party would press ahead with its petition to the Electoral Court regarding inconsistencies between vote tallies televised at the close of polling and the final count of votes received by candidates. According to results announced by the ZEC, the ruling Zanu PF party took 78 of the 120 contested seats, the MDC garnered 41, and one seat was won by an independent candidate, former cabinet minister Jonathan Moyo. When the final vote tallies were announced there were increases or decreases of as much as 15,000 votes in about 30 constituencies. Addressing a media conference on Thursday, the ZEC chairman, retired Colonel George Chiweshe, said the commission believed the elections and poll count were conducted in a free and fair manner. He had called the press conference to respond to the MDC's ultimatum to explain the discrepancies, otherwise the party would take legal action. Chiweshe said the figures announced on television "were mere updates from various people on the ground, which we had not verified". Asked why the ZEC had earlier announced that 36,821 ballots had been cast at the close of polling in Beitbridge, which was later reduced to 20,602, Chiweshe said it was because they had not verified the information they had received from the ZEC officials on the ground. "We wanted to give an indication of the voting trends," he told journalists. However, the MDC was not appeased. "His attempt to explain the discrepancies was pathetic; nobody believed it because everyone knows what happened," Nyathi said. "We have to go to the Electoral Court and exhaust all legal means [of challenging the poll results]". The African Union observer team has already called on the ZEC to investigate the discrepancies.
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From The Guardian (UK), 9 April
Reporters face jail in Zimbabwe
Andrew Meldrum in Pretoria
Two British journalists arrested for working without accreditation in Zimbabwe are bracing for jail terms of up to two years if found guilty at a trial expected to conclude next week. Toby Harnden and Julian Simmonds, who were detained during last week's disputed parliamentary elections, appeared in court yesterday handcuffed together, dressed in prison garb of khaki shorts and shirts. The defence argues that the Sunday Telegraph journalists, who entered the country on tourist visas, were travelling through the country as tourists. Some experts say the two may be fined and deported immediately from Zimbabwe, but others warn that the authorities might seek to make an example of them. "The Mugabe government wants to make an example of them, to warn other foreign correspondents to stay out, and to frighten any Zimbabwe journalists who might be working without accreditation," said a legal expert in Harare. The journalists were arrested on March 31 at a polling station in the town of Norton, 25 miles west of Harare. In court yesterday state witnesses said one of the accused was taking photographs at a polling station during the elections. But under questioning from defence lawyer Beatrice Mtetwa the witnesses could not agree where Mr Simmonds was taking photos. Earlier state witness Max Makowe, an election observer, testified that when he asked Mr Simmonds for his accreditation the photographer admitted the pair were journalists and apologised for working without permits.
Mrs Mtetwa argued that the two were travelling through Zimbabwe as tourists. "It is up to the state to prove that they were working as journalists," she told the Guardian. In court Mrs Mtetwa described their trip to Victoria Falls, Matobo national park and the southern city of Bulawayo as well as a Zimbabwe-Angola football match. They "kept a travel diary and took pictures as is normal with tourists". She said they were in Norton for a lunch break when they stopped at the polling station. Yesterday the state showed Mr Harnden's notebooks as evidence that he was preparing material for a story on Zimbabwe's elections. The state is taking a tough line against the two journalists, refusing them bail and holding them in Harare remand prison, which has a reputation for terrible conditions. The two journalists told reporters outside the court that they were in decent shape. "It's been uncomfortable, but we have not been treated badly," Mr Harnden said. Government officials say more than 200 journalists were accredited to cover the March 31 elections but many others had their applications rejected. Some entered the country as tourists and worked without licences.
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From SW Radio Africa, 8 April
MDC youths in hospital
Four MDC youth activists have been sent to hospital after they were allegedly brutalised by police in custody. The 4 were part of the group of activists arrested in connection with an MDC demonstration that took place in Harare early this week. Freelance journalist, Frank Chikowore saw the 4 who were released today and he says they looked badly beaten. The youths say they were assaulted with sjamboks and stones. One of the youths, Spencer Gwata, is having problems walking. His trousers are allegedly torn as a result of the severe beatings. The youths who had been in custody at Southerton Police Station say they were denied food, blankets and visitors. It is also reported that the police allegedly planted five grams of mbanje on the youths and forced them to pay fines of $25 000 each for being in possession of illegal substances. It's believed the police deliberately planted the mbanje to avoid the youths appearing in court, which would have exposed the abuse. In a related issue, the MDC National Youth Chairman and MP for Kuwadzana Nelson Chamisa is still in police custody. Chamisa who was arrested on allegations of inciting public violence when he addressed the youths has been transferred from Rhodesville police station to Matapi police station also in Harare.
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From Zim Online (SA), 9 April
Empty shelves shock for Zimbabweans
Harare - Thirty-two year old Takaruza Chibanda walks lazily along the shelves in one of the supermarkets in Mabvuku, a poor working class suburb in the east of Harare. Deep in thought, as if he is battling with balancing his immediate needs with the little cash at hand, Chibanda, a father of three, picks the barest essentials into his small shopping basket for his family. But most of the essential goods are not there anymore. The shop, which a few weeks ago was teeming with basic foodstuffs ahead of the parliamentary election, is virtually empty. This scene was not peculiar to the capital city alone. In most major cities and towns, there were reports of severe basic foodstuff shortages in supermarkers, barely a week after a disputed election. Maize-meal, Zimbabwe's staple food, cooking oil, flour and sugar virtually disappeared from the shopping shelves overnight, as Zimbabweans in panic mode after the shock election results, appeared to prepare for the worst. Chibanda, is the true embodiment of hopelessness in the face of mounting calamity. He says Zimbabweans cannot take it anymore.
But with President Robert Mugabe, firmly in control once again after a crushing victory over main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party, there is no immediate hope of an economic revival as the 81-year old Zimbabwean leader continues to be dogged by a crisis of legitimacy. The International Monetary Find (IMF) and World Bank have shunned Zimbabwe over Mugabe's human rights record and violent seizure of white-owned farmland. The European Union, Britain and the United States have since dismissed Mugabe's election victory as a fraud condemning Zimbabwe to more of the same crisis. For Zimbabweans, battered by a severe five year economic crisis, the overwhelming feeling masking their deep-seated anger over the food shortages, is one that the government does not care anymore since they won a fresh five-year term in office. "The government was simply waiting for people to vote before they set prices on the loose," said Chibanda.
In Glen Norah, another poor suburb of Harare, the shelves are also getting emptier. There is no wheat flour, nor is there any cooking oil here. Mary Muchenje, a vegetable vendor in Highfield and mother of five, says vegetables are not in short supply at the wholesale market in Mbare but they have just gone up. "I went to Mbare Musika this morning but I could only buy cucumbers, tomatoes and bananas. One cabbage which used to cost Z$8 000 is now selling at $14 000," she said with a resigned tone. With 75 percent of Zimbabwe's population out of employment and inflation above 120 percent, the highest in the world, last week's highly disputed election did not offer any hope of a quick respite. Analysts say the national economy is quietly sliding towards another round of erosion of real incomes and standards of living. They say what the economy needs is not tinkering with the symptoms but a total overhaul of the economic and political structure by re-engaging the international community. Anything short of restoring the rule of law and legitimacy of the political leadership will condemn Zimbabweans to a fresh five-year period of pain.
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From Zim Online (SA), 9 April
Zimbabwe to launch new propaganda radio station
Harare - The government of Zimbabwe will soon launch a new 24-hour propaganda shortwave radio station to counter negative coverage from independent radio stations broadcasting from outside the country. New Ziana's Electronic Services Business Unit boss, Happison Muchechetere, confirmed to Zim Online that the government will launch the station, to be called Radio 24-7, in the next three weeks to counter United Kingdom and United States-based radio stations targeting Zimbabweans. "On short wave, we will be accessible to people within Zimbabwe and those abroad where our signal will reach," said Muchechetere. SW Africa Radio and the United States-based Studio 7, are the only independent radio stations targeting Zimbabweans. There are no independent radio stations operating in Zimbabwe were the Harare authorities keep a tight leash on the media. Critics accuse the state-controlled Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) of churning out virulent propaganda against the government's perceived political opponents. The new radio station, is expected to take Zimbabwe's propaganda war to a new foreign arena against the two independent radio stations. There have already been attempts to clog SWAfrica Radio's network with the station complaining last month that the Zimbabwe government had jammed its transmission networks from London. Zimbabwe has always described the two stations as "pirate radio" aimed at creating divisions in the country.
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From The Chicago Tribune, 9 April
Zimbabwe opposition at crossroad
Some say compromise with the ruling party, others call for revolt
By Laurie Goering, Tribune foreign correspondent
Johannesburg - Following a second set of rigged elections, Zimbabweans seeking change in their devastated country now face a difficult choice, activists and analysts say: Organize a popular uprising, or give up the political battle, accept President Robert Mugabe as perpetual ruler and try to persuade him to begin focusing on helping people rather than clinging to political power. Recent elections, marred by widespread vote fraud, were "a clear demonstration you cannot remove a dictator from office at the ballot box," said John Makumbe, a Zimbabwean political science professor on sabbatical at Michigan State University. That means Zimbabweans, disappointed in the democratic process and fed up with repression and economic ruin brought on by the ruling party and with failures of leadership in the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, need to act on their own, Makumbe said. "The need is for the people to effectively lead themselves," he said. "In my view, there is no other solution but civil disobedience."
Zimbabwean Archbishop Pius Ncube, one of Mugabe's most outspoken critics, called for street demonstrations after the March 31 elections, which gave Mugabe's ruling party a two-thirds parliamentary majority, enough to change the country's constitution. Election observers, including US diplomats and Movement for Democratic Change poll watchers, said that the vote tallies recorded for ruling Zanu PF candidates in many districts surpassed the total number of votes cast. In Murehwa South District, for example, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission reported 8,579 votes cast at the close of polling and then said later that the ruling party received 19,200 votes in the district. Similar results were reported in at least 30 of 120 election districts. "The election was stolen," charged Paul Themba Nyathi, a spokesman for the Movement for Democratic Change. "The results are in no way an accurate reflection of the sovereign wishes of the people of Zimbabwe." But frustrated voters have shown little inclination to follow the archbishop's call to the streets. The problem, analysts said, is that Zimbabweans live in justifiable fear of police and military repression and no leader has stepped forward to guide them. "In Zimbabwe, you only need to fire one canister of tear gas and everybody's back home," Makumbe said. "People are getting used to poverty, misery, repression."
Lovemore Madhuku, a constitutional lawyer and key leader of the country's civil society movement for political change, agrees that bringing about organized civil disobedience will take time and grass-roots organizing. But "there is no other option," insisted the human-rights campaigner, who has been jailed repeatedly and was beaten and left for dead a year ago by government-allied thugs. "We have to renew this fight, otherwise people will lose hope," he said in a telephone interview from Harare. "The only question is, `Do we have sufficient commitment and leadership to do that?'" Political analysts say it is now clear such leadership will not come from the country's chief opposition party. The Movement for Democratic Change, long reluctant to lead street protests, has responded to the latest election by "wringing its fingers and doing nothing else," Makumbe said. But Madhuku and Archbishop Ncube, the country's strongest activists, cannot by themselves carry off a revolution, analysts warned. Since the 2000 elections, when voters for the first time showed signs of rejecting Mugabe's regime in favor of the Movement for Democratic Change, the president has tried to cling to power and boost his sagging popularity by seizing white-owned farms for redistribution to landless peasants and insisting the opposition is a front for whites trying to recover power in the country, which won its independence from Britain in 1980.
Much of Zimbabwe's best land, however, has ended up in the hands of Mugabe cronies, while Zimbabwe's agricultural production - once the envy of Southern Africa - has plunged, leading to a broader economic collapse. Today hyperinflation has made the country's currency virtually worthless, underpaid doctors have fled abroad, the economy has shrunk by half, at least 3 million unemployed Zimbabweans have gone to neighboring South Africa to find work and Zimbabwe can no longer feed itself, much less export food. Faced with that reality, "I think this is the time for all Zimbabweans to step back and look at the disaster the country is now - the economic implosion, the political repression - and say, `This thing cannot go on anymore,'" said Trevor Ncube, a Zimbabwean journalist and head of the Mail and Guardian newspaper in South Africa. The best way to stop it, he said, may simply be to reassure Mugabe that his grip on power is no longer threatened. "I think Zimbabwe is desperately yearning for peace and normalcy after years of turbulence and economic meltdown," Ncube said. With people still reluctant to take to the streets, a better way to bring about improvement in the country's day-to-day life may be simply to ease the 81-year-old president's fears and say, "Your people deserve better than this," Ncube said. Mugabe "is a man who fought a liberation war, who cared about his people but who has unfortunately been sidetracked in the search for political survival. That's made him resort to desperate measures and that has wreaked havoc on the country," Ncube said. But now "he's achieved all he wanted to do…Now should be the time to say, `What do I do with all these things I wanted? Do I want to leave a legacy of people starving, jobless, crippled by poverty?'" Whether Mugabe might respond to such overtures - or whether Zimbabweans would be willing to make them - remains unclear. What is certain is that while Zimbabwe's autocratic leader jetted off to the Pope John Paul II's funeral in Rome on Friday, his people stayed behind, waiting in long lines for staples such as cornmeal, cooking oil and gasoline.
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From Reuters, 9 April
Britain's Prince Charles shakes hands with Mugabe
London - Britain's Prince Charles, attending the Pope's funeral, shook hands on Friday with Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe -- a leader so shunned by the European Union that it has banned him from the region. "The Prince of Wales was caught by surprise and wasn't in a position to avoid shaking Mr Mugabe's hand," a spokeswoman for the prince said. The EU imposed travel sanctions on Zimbabwean government officials after accusations of vote rigging in Zimbabwe's parliamentary polls in 2000 and in Mugabe's re-election two years later. But Mugabe, a Roman Catholic, defied the ban to attend the funeral at the Vatican, which is not part of the EU. The handshake with Mugabe was the latest mishap to befall Prince Charles on the eve of his wedding. He had been due to marry his lifelong love Camilla Parker Bowles on Friday, but postponed the wedding to Saturday so he could attend the funeral of Pope John Paul II. Foreign Secretary Jack Straw was called to task last year for inadvertently shaking Mugabe's hand at the United Nations.
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From News24 (SA), 9 April
Zim opposition MP released
Harare - An opposition MP arrested on charges of masterminding mass protests earlier this week urging Zimbabweans to reject the outcome of elections won by President Robert Mugabe's party, was released on bail on Saturday. Nelson Chamisa, the newly-elected opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) member of parliament for the Harare township of Kuwadzana, was detained since Thursday for allegedly inciting public violence. Magistrate Lorraine Wakatama granted him Z$1.5m (US$242) bail and with stringent conditions. Charges against Chamisa are that he told about 200 supporters who gathered at the opposition party's headquarters in central Harare on Monday to "go into the streets and do whatever you can" after they asked what the MDC was doing about the elections they said were rigged. After the address, scores of youths took to the streets of Harare alleging "massive fraud" in the March 1 parliamentary elections, prompting the police to go on high alert. The police said groups of MDC supporters stoned shops, assaulted passers-by and distributed flyers saying "the MDC has rejected the election results". The flyers allegedly urged the opposition party's "members, supporters and all Zimbabweans to pressurise the regime into reversing this electoral fraud," the police said.
Some 18 suspects were arrested separately from Monday to Thursday. They were released on Z$300 000 bail each on Friday by a Harare magistrate. The MDC denied links to the demonstrations, saying the youths could be "concerned Zimbabweans sympathising with the MDC or Zanu PF thugs wearing MDC T-shirts to tarnish the image of our party". Mugabe's Zanu PF won 78 of the 120 contested seats in the March 31 elections against 41 seats for the MDC, which dismissed the polls as "massive fraud". Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai cited among other irregularities the administration of the elections by a body alleged to be partisan, the use of food by the ruling party to win over voters and inflated voter figures. He said his party would consult its members on the course to take following the "flawed" elections, which were however endorsed as free and fair by observer missions from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region and the African Union.
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From The Zimbabwe Standard, 10 April
DA held in elections scandal
Ballot boxes found at home
By Savious Kwinika
Police last Thursday arrested Zaka District Administrator, Nyashadzashe Zindove, after he was allegedly found with seven ballot boxes and ballot papers at his home, The Standard can reveal. Zindove was by yesterday still being held by the police's Law and Order section at Masvingo Central Police Station. He is expected to appear in court tomorrow. Also last week, Norah T Chisi, a teacher at Bvudzi Primary School, who was a presiding officer in Zaka West during the 31 March general elections, was arrested after she allegedly "lost" a ballot box in unclear circumstances. Sources told The Standard that Chisi was on her way to Zaka district command centre at Jerera when she allegedly lost the box. Chisi was presiding officer at Jichidza Council Clinic in Zaka West constituency. Assistant police commissioner, Wayne Bvudzijena, confirmed that police had arrested two people in connection with election irregularities in Masvingo. "The accused persons will appear in court soon once the police have completed their investigations. Currently the Zaka DA is in police custody and the police are busy investigating the circumstances surrounding the ballot papers and the ballot boxes," Bvudzijena said.
Asked to explain how those ballot boxes ended up in a government owned house, Bvudzijena said the issue was "too complicated". "But from the reports I got, it appears that those ballot papers in the ballot boxes found at his (DA) residence were not used for voting. They were leftovers from the ballot papers used in the elections and they were not counted. Nevertheless, we are weighing what kind of a charge we are going to lay against him (Zindove). Right now I can't reveal much because it is a security issue," Bvudzijena said. Acting Zanu PF Masvingo Provincial Chairman, Isaiah Shumba, said the latest findings would not change the election results. "If the Zaka DA is arrested then it is a legal issue. However, as the ruling party, we are not going to accept any election re-run simply because of one incident in Zaka. After all, it's not yet clear how these ballot papers got into this man's house," Shumba said. The Masvingo provincial chief election officer, Obert Mujuru, refused to comment on the discovery of the ballot boxes.
Opposition MDC spokesperson, Paul Themba-Nyathi, said discovery of ballot boxes hidden by a government official was a clear indication that elections were rigged by the ruling Zanu PF party. He said he was dismayed by the Southern African Development Community (SADC), African Union (AU) and other observer missions, which endorsed the elections despite "overwhelming evidence of rigging". "We said this again and again that these elections were clearly stolen. The fraud was comprehensive and deep-rooted, and requires police to investigate. The observers here betrayed the aspirations of the people of Zimbabwe. "If police had applied their investigative skills professionally and diligently, they could have unearthed lots of discrepancies. The police should also investigate the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission Chairman, Justice George Chiweshe," said Themba-Nyathi.
ZEC during a press conference last week explained the figures that determined the outcome of the general elections arguing that the discrepancies were made up by stakeholders in political circles who were using the media to try to discredit the poll. Chiweshe said: "I explained that the figures quoted in any update that the Commission may give are not necessarily an accurate reflection of the facts on the ground and that the figures were given without prejudice and only for the purpose of giving an indication as to the turnout trends in various provinces and constituencies… The correct position is that there is only one set of figures to be considered and only one process to be examined. These are the official figures by which the election result was determined. The question of inconsistencies does not arise." But Themba-Nyathi said: "Justice Chiweshe said nothing at a press conference that made sense in justifying the discrepancies."
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From The Sunday Argus (SA), 10 April
Mugabe tightens grip on the helm
With a two-thirds majority, Zimbabwe's president is now free to overhaul the parliamentary system to suit his own ends, write Basildon Peta and Peter Fabricius.
Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe stands all-powerful at home after his ruling Zanu PF party's landslide election victory last weekend, which gave him the power to amend the constitution at will. But he appears to remain as powerless as before to break out of international isolation and salvage the country's ruined economy. On Friday Mugabe slipped through European Union sanctions to attend the funeral of Pope John Paul II in Rome where he apparently intended to collar EU leaders to urge them to end Zimbabwe's economic isolation. None was prepared to meet him, according to reports, and his only satisfaction was to embarrass Prince Charles by shaking his hand before the prince realised what he was doing. This short-lived victory will do nothing to overcome the shortages of basic commodities, including fuel, which Mugabe had somehow overcome for the elections - reportedly with SA help - but which returned this week with a vengeance.
Hungry Zimbabweans are now looking to their president for help but Mugabe's post-election pre-occupation seems to be with consolidating power rather than feeding his people. By hook or by crook, Zanu PF crushed the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), winning 78 of the 120 contested seats to the MDC's 41. Mugabe's sacked spindoctor Jonathan Moyo won the remaining seat as an independent. The MDC shed 16 seats from its high point in the 2000 elections and is now agonising over its role in Zimbabwean politics. This week it decided in effect on a two-pronged strategy of parliamentary and extra-parliamentary politics. But the prospects of MDC supporters joining the sort of popular uprising against Mugabe which Bulawayo Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube had called for before the poll, seem remote. Mugabe has threatened to meet such a mass uprising with the full force of the brutal security forces he commands. With 78 seats won last week plus the 30 seats he appoints himself, Mugabe now also commands a two-thirds majority in the 150-seat parliament and therefore the power to change the constitution.
Many Zimbabweans are looking for him to use this power to relieve their plight - perhaps by handing power to a successor who could lead the country out of isolation and back to prosperity. This is also the hope of many regional leaders who think it might be easier to restore international confidence in Zimbabwe with a new face at the helm. SA government sources say President Thabo Mbeki will continue to pursue his so-far unproductive quiet diplomacy by urging Mugabe to scrap the 30 appointed seats in parliament as well as the draconian media and security legislation which helped tilt the political playing field against the MDC. He is also expected to call on Mugabe to revamp the controversial outdated voters roll which the MDC accused Zanu PF of using to stuff hundreds of thousands of ballots. But both Zimbabweans and regional leaders seem likely to be disappointed. The only changes to the constitution which Mugabe has mentioned so far seem designed to consolidate his power.
Sources in the ruling Zanu PF who attended its first post-election politburo meeting this week said the party was completely ruling out the option of Mugabe retiring soon. They said the politburo had not yet decided the full extent of constitutional changes. But Mugabe already announced last week that he hoped to re-introduce an upper chamber of parliament, the senate, which was abolished in 1987. Analysts believe the senate will largely be used as a sinecure for members of the old guard whom Mugabe wishes to sideline. Most prominent is Emmerson Mnangangwa who was once touted as Mugabe's likely successor. He is now heading for political oblivion after Mugabe suspected him of plotting against his newly-pointed vice president - and possible successor - Joyce Mujuru. Mugabe also said in an interview with the SABC last weekend that he intended to change the constitution to hold parliamentary and presidential elections simultaneously. Zanu PF insiders say the purpose would be to extend Mugabe's present term - due to expire in 2008 - until the next parliamentary elections in 2010 - when Mugabe will be 86. It is likely Mugabe will at the same time amend the constitution to allow himself to stand down without calling elections, and instead anoint his own successor - the manipulable Mujuru. This would be a standby arrangement in case he falls ill before 2010.
It seems Zanu PF has no clear programme to resuscitate the economy after winning an election on a platform that contained no remedies for the country's ills but was instead directed against British prime minister Tony Blair and his supposed plans to re-colonise Zimbabwe. A new cabinet to be appointed next week will probably return the old guard who have proved more reliable than the so called young turks who tried to challenge Mugabe over Mujuru's appointment. South Africa might as well brace for an influx of new immigrants - both legal and illegal - in search of greener pastures.
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From The Zimbabwe Standard, 10 April
Lupane MDC official's house burnt down
By Savious Kwinika
Bulawayo - Suspected Zanu PF supporters last weekend allegedly torched and razed to the ground a thatched house belonging to Richmond Zitha, an MDC campaign manager for the newly elected Lupane MP, Njabuliso Mguni, in post election retribution, The Standard has learnt. Mguni said household property, including two bicycles, a wardrobe, school uniforms, clothes, birth certificates, 21 bags of cement and $2.1 million in cash were destroyed during the arson attack. The arson came a few days after Zanu PF activists in the area threatened to "deal" with all suspected opposition MDC supporters. Police in Jotsholo confirmed the incident and said investigations into the arson were still in progress. "Investigations are still in progress so we can not point fingers at anyone," said one police officer. Mguni said the arson, which he believes was carried out by suspected war veterans and Zanu PF supporters was in retaliation for not voting for the losing Zanu PF candidate, Martin Khumalo, in the 31 March parliamentary elections. He said the war veterans had allegedly moved around the constituency harassing people they suspected of voting for the MDC in last month's elections. "War veterans called a meeting last week at Dongamuzi Village in Lupane, where they read out a list of MDC campaign comm ittee members and threatened to deal with them. Richmond Zitha's name was among them. The next day Zitha's house was burnt down, destroying most of his property, except for a few items which they managed to salvage," Mguni said. Mguni also said Zitha, a retired social worker, is seen as a threat, by the war veterans because he is a very influential politician. "He is a very vocal and influential man, and the war veterans are scared of him, as he also played a huge part in me garnering 119 votes in Dongamuzi (a ward that is considered a Zanu-PF stronghold) against Zanu PF' s 194 during the 31 March poll," Mguni said.
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Comment from The New York Times, 10 April
Tough on Togo, letting Zimbabwe slide
By Michael Wines
Even the heads of state who were its members called the old Organization for African Unity a dictators' club, one reason why it was replaced three years ago by a new African Union that was modeled, in name and purpose, on Europe's own union. The old O.A.U. fulminated about colonialism and liberation, but was often silent on human rights and the consent of the governed. The new group, bowing to a democratic breeze blowing from Mali to Mauritius, stood for the premise that the rule of law is in, and despotism out. Take it from Nigeria's president, Olusegun Obasanjo, a thoroughgoing democrat. "Anybody who comes to power unconstitutionally," he said at the union's first meeting in 2002, "cannot sit with us." So when Robert G. Mugabe attends the next meeting of the African Union, will he have to stand?
Democratic Africa has lately stifled a coup in Togo, sent peacekeepers to Burundi and Darfur and ended civil war in the Ivory Coast, achievements that would have been unthinkable only a decade ago. Yet it is curiously dumbstruck when dealing with Mr. Mugabe's draconian rule in Zimbabwe. The latest example is Zimbabwe's March 31 parliamentary elections, in which Mr. Mugabe's ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front Party thrashed its democratic opponents using electoral tactics that were less Queensbury Rules than those of professional wrestling. Starving voters were told to support the Mugabe party or lose access to food. Village leaders warned that opposition supporters could lose their homes. In 30 races surveyed by the opposition, roughly 180,000 votes appeared after the polls had closed and the official turnout had been reported. Nonpartisan election monitors and Western nations called the election grievously flawed. Not so the African Union: Zimbabwe's election was free and fair, it said. Far from declaring "This will not stand!," the group commended Zimbabwe's government for "making efforts towards creating an even playing field."
Why do African leaders who no longer tolerate a Togo coup blanch at denouncing Mr. Mugabe's strongman tactics? The question seems almost nonsensical, given that Zimbabwe's political and social implosion has flooded its neighbors with unwanted refugees and made the nation a potential vector for regional instability. The answer, however, is deceptively complex. It begins with the overriding fact that Zimbabwe, once southern Africa's crown jewel, is not a backwater state like Togo. And that Mr. Mugabe, who, at 81, is the surviving patriarch of Africa's liberation struggle, cannot be criticized or made to submit as easily as some anonymous colonel behind a military putsch. Political forces are at work behind the scenes as well. Mr. Mugabe's brand of race-baiting demagoguery plays well in parts of Africa's vast underclass, and to challenge him is to risk being branded a pawn of white colonialists. Foremost, perhaps, African leaders fear that the defeat of a serious ruler like Mr. Mugabe may help spread the notion that any entrenched leadership can be unseated by a committed opposition. In Africa, where most democracies are effectively one-party affairs, such a notion can be dangerous.
Maybe that helps explain why South Africa endorsed the Zimbabwe vote even more warmly than did the African Union, and why its president, Thabo Mbeki, has emerged as Mr. Mugabe's most powerful ally. Coincidentally, perhaps, Mr. Mugabe's opposition, the Movement for Democratic Change, enjoys strong support from South Africa's labor movement and from its Communist Party. Both groups are part of Mr. Mbeki's ruling African National Congress, but are widely expected to split from it before the 2009 national election. As Africa's most prominent politician, Mr. Mbeki provides his fellow leaders with cover to avoid addressing the Mugabe problem. A handful of democracies, including Nigeria, have been more outspoken in criticizing aspects of Mr. Mugabe's rule. But none have the gravitas of South Africa, itself the democratic victor in a liberation struggle not unlike the one that led to Mr. Mugabe's dictatorship. If this sounds like a recipe for stalemate, there is an alternative, voiced in Harare last month by a political activist who demanded anonymity because he was afraid that his employers would be punished for his views. The African Union can put down a coup in Togo, he said, because its charter explicitly permits intervention in a member nation's affairs in the case of a coup. But the charter is silent on whether the bloodless theft of political power by, say, stealing an election, is a coup in all but name. "What could change that is if Zimbabwean groups themselves make the call to the A.U.," he said. "You could make quite a strong argument that rigging and manipulating elections is a kind of constitutional coup." Which is precisely why Zimbabwe is such a thorny problem - and, viewed another way, an opportunity. The prospect that ordinary Zimbabweans might press for change is distinctly democratic in spirit. And it would offer a clear test of whether the continent's new commitment to democratic rule is more than just rhetorical.
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From The Daily Mirror, 11 April
Chamisa claims torture
Daily Mirror reporter
Lawyers representing Member of Parliament-elect for Kuwadzana, Nelson Chamisa, have claimed that their client was tortured while in police custody. The MDC’s national youth chairman was arrested last Thursday for allegedly inciting public violence following demonstrations in Harare by suspected opposition party supporters. Chamisa appeared in court on Saturday and was released on $1,5 million bail. The legislator’s lawyers - Atherstone and Cook - who are assisting Alec Muchadehama of Mbizo, Muchadehama and Makoni, have since written a letter of complaint to police officers, named only as Dowa and Ngena and the Officer-in-Charge, Rhodesville Police Station. The letter was copied to Police Commissioner Augustine Chihuri. Read part of the letter to Ngena, dated April 8 2005: "What particularly concerns us at this stage is our apprehension that you may not be in total control of this case as the Officer-in-Charge. The following events are of serious concern to us and to our client: Between 1900 hrs and 1945 hrs on 7 April 2005, the Officer-in-Charge at Rhodesville Police Station denied the writer access to his client, despite our production of valid practicing certificate. She also refused to make Nelson Chamisa available for supper, which meal the writer had bought for his client." The officer who denied the lawyer access to Chamisa to deliver supper is identified in the letter as Assistant Inspector Gotora.
The complaint lodged went on: "Chamisa was taken from Rhodesville Police Station very late at night (between 22:00 hrs and 00:00 hrs) on April 7 2005 for reasons still unknown to his lawyers and we believe, without your knowledge as the investigating officer. Our client was in the process of the shuttle, tortured by a member(s) of the ZRP. Of all the inmates at Rhodesville Police Station on the night of 7 April 2005, it was only Nelson Chamisa who was nicodemously transferred to the notorious Matapi Police Station." The lawyers said Chamisa should have been released from police custody soon after a warned and cautioned statement was recorded from him or sent to court. "We are contemplating civil proceedings against all members of the force directly or indirectly linked to the torture of our client," added the lawyers. A letter to another investigating officer, Dowa, read: "We understand that very late at night on the 7th of April 2005 you caused Nelson Chamisa to be removed from Rhodesville Police Station and be taken to Matapi Police Station, apparently for no justifiable reason. We further understand that when you reached the Coca-Cola factory area (Corner Seke Road and Cripps Road) you started intimidating and or torturing our client. We are still taking detailed instructions from our client about the exact nature of the intimidation and torture that he suffered at the hands of the ZRP. It is our intention to sue you in your personal capacity in civil proceedings for damages suffered by our client from intimidation and torture…"
However, chief police spokesperson Wayne Bvudzijena said he had not received Chamisa’s letter of complaint. "We have not received the letter," he said. Yesterday, Muchadehama, who had filed an urgent chamber application at the High Court late on Friday seeking the immediate release of Chamisa from police custody, told The Daily Mirror that his client was force-marched from the Graniteside industrial area in hand and leg irons to Matapi Police Station. "From Rhodesville Police Station they drove him towards Chitungwiza, dropped him near Coca-Cola factory area from where they force-marched him while in hand and leg irons to Matapi Police Station. He was ordered to move towards Matapi alongside the police vehicle," Muchadehama said. Muchadehama said the Harare magistrates’ court ordered Chamisa to report twice a week to CID Law and Order on Saturday and Sunday every week and not to interfere with witnesses.
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From The Mail & Guardian (SA), 10 April
Bob’s your owner?
Kevin Bloom
It happened well under the radar, but if you looked hard enough in January you would've found news that Zimbabweans living in South Africa were about to get a choice of two locally distributed newspapers. In February the first of these was launched by Wilf Mbanga, founder of Zimbabwe's famously silenced Daily News. The Zimbabwean, as Mbanga's new tabloid weekly is known, is now published in the United Kingdom with a Southern African edition produced in Johannesburg (the initial print run was 120,000 copies). Prior to launch, Mbanga issued a press statement that made his intentions clear: the paper would give voice to the "fears and frustrations" of exiled Zimbabweans. "A news blackout is dangerous for any society," Mbanga said. "The forthcoming general election scheduled for March adds urgency. We will ensure that our coverage is accurate, fair and balanced. We will be accountable to our readers. We will endeavour to give all viewpoints, and everyone - including the government of Zimbabwe - will have the right of reply. In short, we will do everything the government newspapers in Zimbabwe are not allowed to do."
Which was a significant comment, given that the other paper about to go after Zimbabweans in South Africa is The Herald, Zimbabwe's top-selling government daily. On a trip to Johannesburg to secure printing and distribution contracts with a "major South African group", The Herald editor Pikirayi Deketeke was equally adamant about his own intentions. "This is not a propaganda mission, it's a business mission," he said. Deketeke estimates that there are 3-million Zimbabweans living in South Africa. The number is way above the estimate of The Zimbabwean, which argues that there are more than 2-million Zimbabweans "living outside Zimbabwe in Southern Africa". Irrespective of whether the difference can be ascribed to the difficulty of accounting for "illegals", Deketeke is confident that he can reach a local circulation of 30,000 (one percent of his guess). The business model, he says, will be driven by copy sales. The newspaper won't be taking South African advertising in the short-term. Unlike The Zimbabwean, which will carry editorial specifically designed for the Zimbabwean diaspora, The Herald will be a full reprint of the edition produced in Harare. But still Deketeke denies that the goal is to push the Robert Mugabe and Zanu-PF line in South Africa.
"It is not my job to change perceptions. It is not the role of The Herald to change the South African reader's views of Zimbabwe. We are coming here as we believe there is a big market of Zimbabweans, as well as a big market of South African readers, who want a different view on what is happening in Zimbabwe." As for what constitutes this "different view", Deketeke makes no apologies. "I have been a journalist for 19 years in Zimbabwe. To a large extent I agree with Mugabe's views on certain positions. I am exercising my editorial right to express this agreement." Of course it could be said, with government paying the bills, it's the editor's job to agree. "That's a misconception," says Deketeke. "Government- or state-owned newspapers in Africa differ from country to country. South Africa isn't familiar with this form of ownership. From a technical perspective, we are not government-owned. Government only owns 51% of Zimbabwe Newspapers (1980) Ltd., through a trust, and th |
