Messages From Zimbabwe

Forget the in fighting within the Mutambara formation, forget the Zanu PF power tussles and enter the Professor Battle.

Professor Mutambara and Professor Welshman Ncube have two different viewpoints on the constitutional issue yet they represent the same grouping. It has emerged.

Mutambara cut down the Kariba Draft that Professor Welshman Ncube partly authored as the main blueprint for the constitution making process.

“Zimbabwe needs a people driven constitution instead of the Kariba Draft,” said Professor Arthur Mutambara during the recently ended Investment Conference in Harare.

Professor Ncube in earlier media reports was quoted saying that the Kariba Draft is the basis of the constitution making process since it was agreed on September 25 last year.

“The position is that we agreed in the GPA that we will use the Kariba Draft as the starting point,” Ncube was quoted saying.

Mutambara is a Robotics professor while Ncube is a constitutional law expert and a professor of Law.

The two are President and Secretary General of the breakaway MDC formation. Both of them have no constituency to their name. Arthur Mutambara the president of the formation did not take part in the presidential elections while MDC’s Deputy President Thokozani Khupe beat Ncube in Bulawayo’s Mzilikazi constituency.

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The Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) has identified Zimbabwe as a dynamic area for a considerable number of investments and mergers.

The bank’s chief economist Sam Muradzikwa said a number of opportunities had been identified which now needed tightening to become bankable, The Herald reported on Thursday.

“We have good business proposals but very few of them are bankable, we can see that there are opportunities here but there is need for preparedness to accept and develop these,” he was quoted as saying.

He urged local banks to consider partnerships with regional financial institutions to beef up their portfolios. “Right now the economy needs short term financing and this is the role that as a bank that we shall work on,” said Muradzikwa.

Muradzikwa added that as a financial institution DBSA remains committed to participate in developing the economy. DBSA is currently running training programs in Zimbabwe.

“As part of the technical development that will serve as development aid for the country, we are training executives to be well equipped and knowledgeable of how best they can serve financial institutions,” Muradzikwa said.

Commenting on the recent developments within the banking sector, Bankers Association of Zimbabwe president John Mangudya said that investors were welcome to come and play their role in helping restore the financial sector.

“High expenses that include rentals, electricity, water and other are translating to or leading to high charges on accounts,” he said in response to charges that banks were charging higher fees for services.

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Hong Kong lawmakers criticised the government today for refusing to prosecute bodyguards for the family of Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe after they allegedly manhandled two journalists.

The remarks followed the government’s decision last month not to take legal action against security personnel accused of taking the journalists’ cameras outside the Hong Kong residence of Mugabe’s daughter.

The bodyguards were Zimbabwean police and intelligence officers responsible for the safety of Bona Mugabe, according to a Hong Kong legislative report. The younger Mugabe is a student at the City University of Hong Kong.

The two journalists were on an assignment for London’s Sunday Times to follow-up on reports the Zimbabwean president owned the luxury property.

The incident was the second this year involving a member of the Mugabe family in Hong Kong. In a separate alleged attack in January, Mugabe’s wife was granted immunity from prosecution after allegedly punching a British photographer near her luxury hotel.

Defending the government’s decision not to file assault changes against Bona Mugabe’s bodyguards, Hong Kong’s justice secretary insisted there was not enough evidence to prosecute the bodyguards and maintained the two acted out of concern for Mugabe’s safety.

“They felt that they could not take any possible chances with the safety of Miss Mugabe, and it was in that context that their actions needed to be viewed,” Wong Yan-lung told a special legislative hearing.

Lawmakers, however, argued the government’s decision was tantamount to giving bodyguards special privileges to assault others when protecting their clients.

“The decision gives rise to ambiguity that bodyguards could take action and injure ordinary citizens whenever they are carrying out security works,” said Democratic Party lawmaker Albert Ho.

Meanwhile, Hong Kong police are still investigating whether the two bodyguards had the proper permits to provide protection for Mugabe.

Local media had reported the two were on visitors visas, which wouldn’t allow them to work in Hong Kong.

The Department of Justice said it would stand by its decision not to press assault charges, but left open the door to prosecuting the two bodyguards on other crimes if there was enough evidence.

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Robert Mugabe tells his fellow African leaders in nations like South Africa that he represents the true spirit of anti-colonialism and therefore whatever he does to his own people must be better than what they endured under colonial rule. After stealing the last presidential election in a manner that President Ahmadinejad of Iran would appreciate, Mugabe allegedly agreed to a coalition government. At recent meeting called to discuss creating a new constitution, opposition leaders tried to speak when they were verbally, and then physically, assaulted by thugs carrying out the orders of Mugabe. Members of the Movement for Democratic Change attempted to speak when they were shouted down by Mugabe burst into revolutionary songs and then physically attacked the opposition.

Mugabe showed up two hours late in what was most probably a planned attempt to let Movement for Democratic Change leaders know who runs the country. He has refused every attempt to work in a cooperative manner with those who do not accept his unitary leadership view for Zimbabwe. Nothing will change until South Africa and other African nations begin to stand up for the people of Africa rather than for old comrades in the liberation movement.

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Robert Mugabe will delay new constitution in a bid to scuttle the country’s coalition government and avoid elections in which he may not be allowed to compete, two members of his party’s decision-making body said.

The president is concerned that if he cedes power he may face prosecution for violent crackdowns on opponents, the members of the body, the politburo of Mugabe’s Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front party, said. The officials declined to be identified because they aren’t authorized to speak to the press on this matter. The politburo, which has more than 40 members, sets policy for the party.

Robert Mugabe will insist on the Kariba Draft as the main reference document and if he doesn’t get his way, he will use Parliament where the majority of the opposition, the MDC is systematically reduced by trumped up charges and prosecutions and on guard is the Senate which is packed up by ZANU PF thugs ready to scuttle the process.

Negotiations that were due to start on July 10 between the Movement for Democratic Change party and ZANU PF were postponed, MDC lawmaker, Douglas Mwonzora, said.

An agreement between the rival parties for a coalition government hinges on the talks beginning today, according to Mwonzora.

The collapse of the agreement may reverse gains that include the stabilization of the economy after 10 years of recession and the curbing of an inflation rate that rose to nearly 500 billion percent in September, according to the International Monetary Fund. The inflation was triggered by a scarcity of foreign currency that caused shortages of everything from staple foods to gasoline.

“Any delay will cause a chain reaction of other delays that could scupper the whole power-sharing agreement,” Mwonzora said in an interview from the capital, Harare. “Then we’d be back at square one.”

Under the coalition agreement, which ended a decade-long political impasse in February, a new constitution must be agreed and elections held within two years of that. Mugabe’s victories in elections against the MDC party led by Morgan Tsvangirai in 2000, 2002, 2005 and last year were described as marred by violence and irregularities by the U.S. and European Union.

Tsvangirai got the most votes in presidential elections in March last year but didn’t win the 50 percent needed to avoid a second round. He boycotted the runoff in June because he said his supporters were being attacked by Mugabe’s backers and the police. Parliamentary elections also held in March 2008 were won by the MDC, costing ZANU PF its majority for the first time since it took power in 1980.

The coalition government was formed after talks organized by the Southern African Development Community, a group of 15 nations, and led by former South African President, Thabo Mbeki.

The office of South Africa’s President, Jacob Zuma, didn’t respond to e-mailed questions about the delay in talks.

“We are aware of the development,” Michele Montas, spokeswoman for United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, said. “The secretary-general has been encouraging democratic progress to be made in Zimbabwe, but that is a matter for the parties, that are now in one government, to discuss. It is not for us to have an opinion at this point.”

The EU supports Tsvangirai, Cristina Gallach, spokeswoman for Javier Solana, the EU foreign policy chief, said in an interview. Tsvangirai travelled to Brussels on June 18.

“We support the prime minister,” she said when asked about the delay to the talks. “We think a lot can be achieved if we are able to move along the lines of what he presented to the EU when he was here.”

Since the government’s formation the country’s economy has improved. Tendai Biti, the finance minister and a member of the MDC, last month forecast that Zimbabwe’s gross domestic product will expand by at least 4 percent this year. The IMF on July 2 said there is evidence of a “nascent economic recovery” and China has agreed to lend Zimbabwe $950 million.

The benchmark index of the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange has more than tripled since reopening on Feb. 19 with share prices set in U.S. dollars after a three-month closure, according to Renaissance Capital, a Moscow-based investment bank that focuses on emerging markets.

Mugabe, 85, has ruled the country since a civil war that ended white minority rule in 1980, and the MDC is demanding that a new constitution forbid him from running for president again. Mugabe has insisted that the country adopt a draft constitution drawn up last year and now rejected by the MDC that would allow him to serve two more terms.

Patrick Chinamasa, ZANU PF’s chief negotiator, and Olivia Muchena, a politburo member, didn’t answer calls to their mobile phones seeking comment. Joram Gumbo, ZANU PF’s chief whip, didn’t answer the phone. Three calls to the phone of George Charamba, Mugabe’s spokesman, were terminated after being answered.

Calls to Webster Shamu, ZANU PF’s communications minister, weren’t answered today, while calls to ZANU PF’s headquarters in Harare also went unanswered. Text messages to the five officials weren’t responded to.

“ZANU PF wanted the meeting delayed indefinitely, then they changed it to the end of July,” said Mwonzora, who’s the head of an interparty committee on a new constitution. “We have only agreed to delay things” until today.

Mugabe’s concerns about possible prosecution by the International Criminal Court or a new government stem from allegations that he instigated violence ahead of elections over the last decade that caused the death of hundreds of Tsvangirai’s supporters, the politburo officials said.

The president, a member of Zimbabwe’s Shona majority ethnic group, is also concerned about a crackdown on dissidents from the Ndebele people in the 1980s that resulted in the death of about 20,000 civilians, according to an estimate by the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, they said. The MDC has not offered Mugabe or his allies an amnesty.

Under his rule the country’s economy contracted by 40 percent between 2000 and 2007, according to the IMF.

In 2000, after Mugabe lost a referendum that would have boosted his powers, he initiated a land reform program that involved the often violent seizure of white-owned commercial farms for redistribution to black subsistence farmers.

That slashed income from the country’s biggest export, tobacco, and caused a famine in what had been sub-Saharan Africa’s second-biggest corn exporter as the company couldn’t finance sufficient imports to meet its needs.

About a quarter of the population, estimated by the UN at 12.9 million in 2003, has left the country, with most of them illegally crossing the border into South Africa.

The Zimbabwe dollar became virtually worthless because of inflation and was scrapped earlier this year in favor of the use of currencies such as the U.S. dollar and the South African rand.

While inflation and shortages of equipment and materials led to the closure of many of the country’s mines and businesses, Anglo American Plc, Rio Tinto Group, Old Mutual Plc, Barclays Plc and Impala Platinum Holdings Ltd. have assets in the country.

Zimbabwe has the world’s second-biggest reserves of platinum and chrome after South Africa.

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President Robert Mugabe has faced rare public questioning over his land-grab program during an investment conference – and his answer did not exactly reassure visiting foreign business people.

Mugabe yesterday told the conference, convened to raise finance to rebuild the Zimbabwean economy after the past 10 years of misrule, that “not necessarily” every white farm would be seized.

He also asserted, to much incredulity, that Zimbabwe had paid white farmers “compensation for developments and improvements”, adding that compensation should be paid by the British government.

The false assertion came in answer to an unexpected question from Trevor Gifford, president of the predominantly white Commercial Farmers’ Union, who wanted to know who would compensate white farmers and why they were denied the right to own and farm land.

About 12,000 farms have been seized, most of them violently, since the land grab began, the CFU says. No one has received full compensation. By eliminating nearly all white commercial farming, Mugabe set off the collapse of one of the most prosperous African nations. Zimbabwe was classified last month as the most aid-dependent country in the world.

Mugabe’s last encounter with the CFU was in April 2000, soon after his “revolutionary land reform” began. Union officials pleaded with him to assert the rule of law after the first white farmer was murdered. The delegation of farmers was threatened with violence and the next day Mugabe declared on state radio that “white farmers are enemies of the state”.

Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara, head of the lesser faction of the Movement for Democratic Change, contradicted Mugabe yesterday. He told the would-be investors that Zimbabwe needed property rights and security of tenure to be restored.

He said Zimbabwe “can’t keep pushing the blame” for its failures on to former colonial powers.

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Failed asylum seekers are forced to live rough on the streets of Leeds – because their lives would be at risk if they were deported.

A total of 273 people – including mothers and children – were made destitute after the government refused their asylum pleas and withdrew their benefits.

But they are deemed ‘unreturnable’ as it is too dangerous for them to be sent back to their countries, according to a report launched in Leeds today.

They are left in a state of limbo with no money and nowhere to live, forcing some to sleep rough.

One in three have been without a home for more than a year, with many suffering from mental illness and malnutrition. Called Still Destitute, the annual report is the third commissioned by the York-based Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust into the plight of refused asylum seekers.

When their benefits are stopped they become reliant on charities and religious organisations in Leeds pushing them in turn to financial breaking point, it also found.

JRCT Trustee Peter Coltman said: “We must no longer ignore the shameful suffering of people, many of whom – the evidence clearly shows – simply can’t go home.

“That is why today we urge the Government to grant temporary leave to all those who, through no fault of their own, cannot return to their country.”

The 2009 report found there were 232 refused asylum seekers dealt with by Leeds, which is one of the UK‘s principle dispersal centres.

This was down from 2008′s figure but the real total could be higher according to the trust, as one agency which provided figures last year ran out of funds and was closed.

The report found two out of every three homeless asylum seekers came from just four countries – Iraq, Iran, Eritrea and Zimbabwe.

Zimbabwe, which currently has no diplomatic relationship with the UK, is the single biggest country of origin for refused asylum seekers and The Home Office has a policy of not deporting as it is impossible to guarantee their safety.

The trust is calling for an automatic continuation of support until the individual leaves the UK.

It also wants the government to recognise validity of religious, social and family connections for refugees in need of housing.

A Home Office spokesman said: “Where an individual, through no fault of their own, cannot return home we provide the support to prevent them becoming destitute. This report focuses on those who the courts have decided do not need our protection.”

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Bob Vaughan-Evans, a director of Zimbabwe‘s Commercial Farmers’ Union, has been axed to death at his home.

Mr Vaughan-Evans, who was in his late seventies, was killed on the eve of his wife Jean’s 80th birthday. The couple were attacked in their home in Gweru, Zimbabwe‘s third largest city, where Mr Vaughan-Evans represented the CFU in the Midlands Province.

The CFU president, Trevor Gifford, said Mr Vaughan-Evans, a renowned agriculturalist and conservationist, died from head wounds after he was attacked by an intruder.

He said he did not yet know Mrs Vaughan-Evans’s condition. “She is frail and in a wheelchair from a previous attack, also in their home,” he said.

Mr Gifford said the couple had been attacked three times in the last six months, once for about £15.

President Robert Mugabe began siezing thousands of white-owned farms in 2000 and now only a few hundred remain on small portions of their original land holdings.

“We still do not know details of what happened. Bob was a very important member of the CFU team,” said Mr Gifford.

Zimbabwe‘s crime statistics are seldom disclosed, but there has been a surge of armed and violent robberies, particularly since Zimbabwe abandoned its worthless currency in January and now uses US dollars or South African Rands.

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A Zimbabwean asylum seeker from Barnsley, who got embroiled in a £1 million fraud against banks after he was given leave to stay in the UK, has been jailed for four years.

Dumisani Nyamyaro, aged 32, of Cypress Road, Kendray, is the fifth man to be jailed for his part in the massive scam which involved the theft of high-value cheques from banks including HBOS.

Timothy Capstick, prosecuting, told Leeds Crown Court the case involved the interception of cheque books, cards and other bank documents – many of which went missing from the bank’s post room in Leeds. Over a 20-month period stolen cheques were deposited into bank accounts by the fraudsters who then took the cash out.

Mr Capstick said: “The face value of the cheques was well over £1m although not all the money was successfully withdrawn.”

Nyamyaro, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud, was caught during Operation Illmington, which saw 30 houses raided across the country. He was seen by police with two other conspirators at a bank in Manchester where a cheque for £136,000 was paid into one account. When his home in Kendray was searched, police found a stolen cheque jammed in a paper shredder.

Jailing Nyamyaro, who had a previous conviction for deception involving stolen credit cards, Judge Kerry McGill said: “This was by anyone’s standards a large scale and sophisticated conspiracy. This was not shoplifting to get food to survive, this was crime by an organised group.”

Detective Chief Superintendent Howard Crowther, Head of West Yorkshire Police’s Crime Division, said: “The sentencing of Nyamyaro now sees five men behind bars for a total of 18 years under Operation Illmington, proving the commitment of the police and the criminal justice system to bring fraudsters to justice.”

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Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai on Sunday dismissed claims he was assigned by President Robert Mugabe to undertake his recent international tour in order to canvass for international aid or to negotiate for the removal of any sanctions on Zimbabwe.

Tsvangirai said he had instead undertaken the eight nation trip to redefine Zimbabwe’s foreign policy, following a decade of isolation caused by Mugabe’s policies of confrontation.

“I did not go to look for money but to build relations which were lost in the last 10 years,” said Tsvangirai of his tour of the United States, the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Norway the United Kingdom and France.

“You can’t just go and say, ‘Give me money’ without first building friendships.”

Tsvangirai was addressing hundreds of his  party supporters who braved the chilly weather to attend the MDC party’s 10th anniversary celebrations held at Rudhaka Stadium in Marondera on Sunday afternoon.

Tsvangirai said he found it disconcerting that the state media was reporting that he had been sent Mugabe to beg for money in Europe.

“We wanted to redefine the foreign policy of this country, and we achieved that successfully,” he said. “I was not sent by Mugabe.”

He drew thunderous applause when he said: “I, as the Prime Minister, have to make sure that what we decide as cabinet is implemented.”

Tsvangirai said the message from the Western countries whose money the government required to run government business was very clear.

The Western leaders were not interested in rhetoric but want to see real change on the ground before they can commit themselves to giving the country any financial assistance, he said.

“The leaders of the countries I visited told me that they are not interested in what we say but what we do,” the MDC leader said. “It’s up to us to make reforms and get help.”

According to the Ministry of Finance, Zimbabwe requires a total US$ 8,5 billion to fund crucial reforms.

Western donors, key to the revival of the battered economy, have demanded substantial democratic change before they can provide aid to Zimbabwe.

During his trip to Europe and the United States, Tsvangirai managed to raise up to US$500 million but the bulk of the money will be channelled through non-governmental organisations.

Tsvangirai said since there was a unity government between his party, the MDC faction led by Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara and President Mugabe’s Zanu-PF, it was important for the leaders to speak with one voice.

“There is confusion but we should speak with one voice,” he said. “We cannot have discord; we have to communicate a uniform message.”

He admitted, without elaborating, that there were still a lot of problems facing the all-inclusive government.

“There are issues that we are still facing but these can be solved politically,” said Tsvangirai. “Conditions of the GPA must be fulfilled in full and we will do that.

“Eighty percent of the GPA is about giving Zimbabweans the necessary freedoms.”

Tsvangirai blamed the state media for publishing falsehoods about his trip.

“There are some who are still resisting this change but only the will of the people will prevail not even that of individuals or an army,” he said. “There is no greater enemy of Zimbabwe other than those who don’t want the will of the people to prevail.

“The MDC has never had any media. And we have been scolded over the past 10 years. The media might lie but the people know the truth.

“If we are in a government together, then why should we separate and compare who is doing the best? If we are in a national soccer team can you tell which team is the better between Dynamos and Highlanders?

“We want change in the media.”

(Source)