Messages From Zimbabwe

The Pinetown-based company that sold state-of-the-art dairy equipment to Grace Mugabe for her farm, did not know they were doing business with the wife of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and regrets the deal.

Grace Mugabe established a dairy farm, Gushungo Dairy Estate, on one of the six farms she acquired after they were seized from white owners, and is selling milk to Nestle Zimbabwe.

The farms, some among the most valuable in the country, have fallen into ruin. She is apparently running this particular farm at a huge loss despite millions of rands worth of dairy equipment having been supplied and installed.

Delaval supplied Grace Mugabe with the dairy equipment imported mainly from Germany, Sweden and Poland.

The company’s national spokesperson, Rykie Visser, did not respond to the Daily News’s various messages and voice mail messages. However, on Tuesday Delaval’s international spokesperson and vice-president of marketing and communications, Benoit Passard, said they became aware of who they were doing business with only after reading recent articles in various newspapers about the sale.

When asked why the company had completed a business transaction with Zimbabwe and the Mugabe family despite sanctions, he said: “We regret that this has happened. We first made contact with the SA Dairy Association and then a long list of investors. The Mugabe name was never mentioned. This has come as a surprise to us and we would never have done business with them had we known this was who we were dealing with.”

The United Nations and the European Union have placed sanctions on Zimbabwe.

Passard said they were reviewing this transaction and taking the matter very seriously. The Daily News asked if the Pinetown-based company would be taken to task for their actions. “It’s still too early in our investigation to say,” was his response.

Nestle Zimbabwe on Tuesday said it had no choice but to buy milk from Grace Mugabe’s farm because many of its suppliers had gone out of business.

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Tempers flared between the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and Zanu PF on Monday during interviews to chose commissioners for the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC).

A member of the Standing Rules and Orders Committee which carried out the interviews, Eric Matinenga, asked former ZEC vice-chairperson, Joice Kazembe, how she rated the political environment during the 2008 elections.

Matinenga had referred to the ZEC 2008 Election Report which noted that the police had said in the period leading to the March 29, 2008 elections, the political environment was relatively fair.

This did not go down well with Zanu PF members on the committee, Defence Minister Emmerson Mnangangwa and his colleague Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa who were quick to raise a point of order.

“It is not fair to ask that question on this one particular candidate because she not the only sitting ZEC member who has come for these interviews. Why didn’t you aske this question to Theophelus Gambe who came earlier,” said Chinamasa heavily objecting to the question.

The Committee interviewed 25 candidates out of the 28 shortlisted after three candidates including one sitting commissioner failed to turn up for the interviews, which were done in public.

The Speaker of Parliament Lovemore Moyo had to overule the supplementary question on the basis that it was not valid and this also did not go down well with the MDC MPs on the panel.

Masvingo Urban MP Tongai Matutu then rose and shouted, “Let her answer the question. Do you want her to get away with murder”.

The matter was later settled but Kazembe protested what she termed “insults from MP Matutu” before leaving the Senate Chamber.

Some of the candidates who intervied included former MP Shephered Mukwekwedzeke, ZITF chief executive officer Daniel Chigaro, Dr Godwell Shana, Professor Geoff Feltoe and Mukhululi Nyathi. The panel of MPs, Obert Gutu, Marbel Chinomona, Tabitha Khumalo, Fortune Charumbira and Edward Mkhosi was asking a set of seven questions supported by supplementary questions.

Some of the question were about the functions of ZEC, and relevant experiences the candidates would bring to the commission and which national and regional guidelines and protocols govern the conduct of free and fair elections. The other question was on the candidates’ understanding of an independent electoral commission.

The SROC will have to come up with a list of 12 successful candidates that it will send to President Robert Mugabe to which he will chose 9 commissioners to be appointed to ZEC. Parliament is now left with interviews for the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission and the Anti-Corruption commission.

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Terrorism charges against a prominent Zimbabwean rights activist have been thrown out after a court ruled she had been tortured while in custody.

The Supreme Court granted Jestina Mukoko a permanent stay of prosecution after she told how security agents took her from her home and beat her.

She was accused of plotting to topple President Robert Mugabe.

Critics say the charges were fabricated in an attempt to silence opponents of Mr Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party.

Chief Justice Godfrey Chidyausiku agreed with Ms Mukoko’s lawyers that security agents had not upheld her rights.

“The state, through its agents, violated the applicant’s constitutional rights… entitling the applicant a permanent stay of criminal prosecution,” Mr Chidyausiku said.

The AP news agency reported that Ms Mukoko wept and hugged friends as she heard the judgment, saying the charges had not made sense.

“I could not believe people could charge me with something like that,” AP quoted her as saying.

Ms Mukoko disappeared from her home in early December 2008 and was not heard from for three weeks.

The government denied holding her, but at the end of the month she appeared in court facing terrorism charges.

At the end of 2008 dozens of activists claimed they had been abducted by the security services.

Many of them were supporters of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

Their detention has continued to cause tension between ZANU-PF and the MDC, who are partners in a power-sharing government.

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Zimbabwe appears to be showing signs of recovery, but it is starting back from a very low base.

Food is on store shelves, most teachers have returned to work, long lines at banks and gas stations have dissipated, and the worthless currency has been replaced by multiple foreign bills.

But school supplies are scarce, parents pay for education with livestock, hunger is widespread, and the United Nations says Zimbabwe has similar problems to a war zone.

Just a year after the longtime ruling party ZANU-PF agreed a power sharing deal with Movement for Democratic Change, there is still a long way to go.

On Friday President Robert Mugabe speaks to the UN General Assembly. On Thursday, he will sit down for an exclusive interview with CNN Chief International Correspondent Christiane Amanpour.

The interview will be Mugabe’s first with a major Western media organization in years, and it comes just weeks after a ban on CNN entering Zimbabwe was lifted.

Since the power-sharing deal, scores of MDC MPs have been arrested in what many believe is an attempt to undermine the party’s parliamentary dominance.

One of them was Roy Bennett, who spent a month in prison and is the MDC’s pick to be deputy agriculture minister.

Bennett is a longtime enemy of Mugabe, and the president now says he can be sworn into office only if he is cleared of the sabotage charges he faces.

But Bennett says he believes Mugabe will never swear him in. “He is an inherent out-and-out racist. The ZANU-PF party is out-and-out racist - it’s obvious.

“The fact that I am white is one of the first problems. The second problem is that I have the support of my fellow Zimbabweans.

“You are dealing with a person who is a severe dictator, who under no circumstances wants to relinquish power”.

MDC leader and Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai added: “The delay which is taking place for his swearing in is deliberate - to frustrate him, to frustrate our constituency, to send a message: ‘look, we can do this; we can do this unilaterally’ - and that is what we are trying to oppose”.

The MDC has also rejected as unilateral the reappointments of the governor of the reserve bank and the attorney general.

According to the political agreement, Mugabe was to consult Tsvangirai before filling these key posts.

But the minister of state for presidential affairs, Didymus Mutasa, insists that the two appointments are not covered by the deal because they were made before the unity government was formed.

“Mr. Tsvangirai’s concern is no concern at all, because these people were appointed before Mr. Tsvangirai was appointed, and how could our president consult a person who was not there?” Mutasa asked.

Since Zimbabwe got rid of its worthless currency, the Zim dollar, in February - opting to use multiple foreign bills like the South African rand, the US dollar and the euro - food and other basic goods are back on the country’s once empty store shelves.

But Zimbabweans without access to foreign currency can’t shop. For those who don’t get paid in U.S. dollars or don’t have relatives abroad to send them money, livestock can be an alternative currency.

In rural Zimbabwe chickens are valued at just under US $4 each, and some parents use them to buy education - US $24 a year but still beyond the means of many - for their children.

School headmaster Nonkulilelo Ndlovu said, “When the parents bring a chicken to sell or to offer as school levy, teachers sometimes buy it, so if they agree on the price, the teacher would get the item, pay the fees, and then if there is any change, he would give the parent the change”.

The unity government has managed to get some striking teachers back into classrooms by offering them an improved salary of U.S. $150 a month, but it’s hardly a living wage.

The education department estimates that it could take 10 years to get Zimbabwe’s education system to where it was in the early 1990s.

Until recently, the country’s banks would on a daily basis be packed with people lining up to withdraw money as inflation soared to above 200 million percent. Prices would go up by the hour, but now they have stabilized.

And now a debate is raging around when Zimbabwe will have its own currency again.

Finance Minister Tendai Biti has threatened to resign if the Zim dollar is returned prematurely. He wants the economy to recover first.

The reserve bank governor, on the other hand, wants the Zim dollar back in circulation for the sake of sovereignty.

The United Nations Development Programme says the humanitarian needs in this country are similar to those in war zones.

Spokesman Agostinho Zacarias said, “At the moment, I think it is one in every 14 people, we can consider them malnourished”.

He added that the global economic crisis has resulted in Zimbabwe receiving only 40 percent of the funds it needs for food aid. Donor countries are waiting for real change in Zimbabwe before they release financial assistance for the country’s economic recovery. Meanwhile, ordinary Zimbabweans continue to struggle.

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Deputy Minister Thamsanqa Mahlangu connived with security personnel to smuggle his girlfriend and her friend into a room booked for him at Crown Plaza Hotel, a Harare magistrate court heard on Monday.

The allegation comes as a new revelation in the case in which Mahlangu, who is also the MDC-T youth chairman, is accused of stealing Joseph Chinotimba’s mobile phone.

Giving evidence in court, Detective Inspector Henry Dowa said the woman in question Geraldine Phiri told him that she had met Mahlangu at a youth forum.

“During investigations, the first accused (Geraldine Phiri) told me that she had met the third accused (Mahlangu) at a youth forum. She also told me that he proposed love to her and they exchanged numbers.

“Phiri told me that she contacted Mahlangu on July 16 this year telling him that she was coming to Harare together with her friend,” he said.

“They also said they found transport from Hwange at around 1pm and arrived in Harare around 1 am. When they arrived, they called Mahlangu who had made arrangements with the hotel security to ease their way into his hotel room,” he said.

The deputy minister is charged together with his personal assistant Malvern Chadamoyo, Phiri and her friend Patience Nyoni.

However, the defence team dismissed the evidence given by Det Insp Dowa arguing that it was based on hearsay and did not have any bearing on the case.

On Monday, the defence mounted an application for discharge at the close of the State case citing lack of incriminating evidence.

Mr Charles Kwaramba of Mbidzo, Muchadehama and Makoni Legal Practitioners is representing Mahlangu and his personal assistant Chadamoyo while Mr Phillip Nyakutombwa of Sawyer and Mkushi Legal Practitioners is representing Phiri and Nyoni.

Mr Nyakutombwa argued that there was no evidence linking his clients to the commission of the offence, as there was no witness who could identify them.

Mr Kwaramba argued that Mahlangu and Chadamoyo possessed the phone innocently intending to return it to the owner and had nothing to explain to the court.

The State led by Mr Public Mpofu is however maintaining that the four have a case to answer.

Mr Kwaramba said the Det Insp Dowa was not at the VIP Lounge at Harare International Conference Centre hence he did not know what happened on the day in question.

Earlier, Mahlangu’s boss Minister Saviour Kasukuwere chronicled how his deputy and Chadamoyo had brought the mobile phone in question to him, claiming that Chadamoyo had picked it up.

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Thirteen MDC members were assaulted, and two of them seriously injured, after they refused to surrender their party documents to ZANU PF supporters in the area. Peter Katsokonye, speaking from his hospital bed in Harare, said they were attacked last Tuesday by a group of men as they left an MDC meeting.

“They used stones and sticks to assault me, while shouting ‘why are you rejecting to join us, and why are you continuing to attend MDC meetings’,” he said. “I only managed to identify three war veterans. They left me unconscious and I was picked up by passers-by. MDC district chair for the area Chengatanai Chimunhu said meetings were being interrupted by Zanu supporters. MDC followers were also being forced to attend ZANU rallies.

“Even the police in the area are refusing to sanction our meetings. ZANU leaders in the area are telling people that the inclusive government is between President Mugabe and Prime Minister Tsvangirai in Harare and not in this area. Our people are being followed individually and being threatened that they are going to be killed come the next election period,” said Chimunhu.

“What disappoints us is that these are the same people who caused terror last year and they are at it again and are boasting that they are immune to prosecution.”

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Founding Father of the Namibian Nation, Dr Sam Nujoma, has spoken strongly against Western powers, which he accused of funding opposition parties especially in the African continent and elsewhere in the world for their own interests. He has also taken issue with those who want to topple the president of Zimbabwe.

“The white imperialists should be careful not to topple Comrade President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, because if you touch Zimbabwe, then you touch Namibia and the whole Southern African Development Community (SADC).”

He was addressing a Swapo star rally at Ongwediva in the Oshana Region over the weekend.

“It is because of the Western powers and those colonialists that oppositions are formed in our countries in the African continent and elsewhere in the world,” he said.

According to Nujoma, the United States and Britain imposed suctions against Zimbabwe because the Zimbabwean people demanded their land from white minorities who occupied a high percentage of good land in Zimbabwe.

“How could one impose sanctions against people who are demanding their own land and it was made that those who have too much land or many farms should give some to the government so that the landless black people could be resettled there?” Nujoma asked.

“The whites have been on our necks and colonised us for a long time, they crossed with our people through the Atlantic Ocean and made us slaves in their countries. ‘Omushiningwa iha dhimbwa, ashike omushiningi oye owala ha dhimbwa’. (The victim will not forget, but the wrongdoer will forget easily.) The whites must be careful, if they play with us we will thoroughly deal with them,” a fired Nujoma stated.

The Swapo rally took place at Ongwediva Mayor’s Park on Saturday.

Nujoma urged all the Namibian people from the age of 18 and above, including the born-frees to vote for the Swapo Party during the Presidential and National Assembly elections to take place from November 27 – 28.

“We have our President (Hifikepunye) Pohamba well known ‘Bulletproof’ and we want him to continue leading for another term. We are confident and we know that Comrade Pohamba will win during November elections. All those who have been members of the National Assembly should remain in and we must add more born-frees after the national elections,” said Nujoma.

Nujoma said there is need to create “more guns and bullets” for the land of the brave and “our guns and bullets are our children”.

“How do we turn our children into guns and bullets, we can only do that if we teach them computers, Mathematics and science subjects at a very tender age. Let’s do that right now while they are in kindergarten,” he said. “Only if children understand computers, Mathematics and science subjects, then we in Namibia, SADC region and the entire African continent can talk about standing on our own feet.

“Parents must ensure that children are guided and attend school everyday so that they acquire enough knowledge and skills to challenge the imperialists, because today they are telling anything but not necessarily the truth because they know that we do not have the know-how,” the Founding President said.

He said imperialist countries are now poor because they finished all their natural resources. Because they have all knowledge and skills, they come to African and Asian countries to tap the natural resources and take them to their countries for their own benefit.

Nujoma compared the white minorities with a black mamba (snake), which even if you keep it in a room, it will bite you one day if you step on it.

“Whites are dangerous, just like a black mamba, if they oust Mugabe, they will oust another president in the African continent,” he said.

“Namibia ‘oshilongo shomapendafule kashi shi kiiyego kekekeke ashike oshegonga lya yagwa, (Namibia is a land of the brave but not for jokes and laughter),” said Nujoma.

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Information Minister, Webster Shamu, and his permanent secretary George Charamba, on Thursday read the riot act to senior managers at the ZBC for failing to make Robert Mugabe the lead story during prime time news.

Mugabe’s official opening of the mining conference was slotted at the at 21:02 due to what insiders at ZBC said were technical hitches blamed on faulty Chinese imported broadcasting equipment.

The footage of President Mugabe at the mining conference had no sound, much to the chagrin of Shamu and Charamba who both stormed Pocket after 2pm on Thursday in which they summoned about 10 senior managers for allegedly botching up President Mugabe’s coverage of the officially opening of the mining conference which was attended by more than 300 delegates.

Insiders said some of the managers taken to task by Shamu and Charamba included Happison Muchechetere, the chief executive officer, Tarzzen Mandizvidza, Freedom Moyo (bulletin manager), Jacob Phiri, Brian Rwafa (responsible for reporters) and five other senior managers responsible for editing.

“We had problems with the VCT 4 editing equipment which were are using hence the bungling of the bulletin on Wednesday but both Shamu and Charamba accused us of incompetence and sabotage,” said one of the managers that attended the dressing-down meeting on Thursday.

“Shamu went to remove his jacket as if he wanted to fight us. They were shouting especially at Mandizvidza and Rwafa whom they specifically accused of incompetence,” said another source.

Another added: “Charamba said whether we like it or not President Mugabe was top news and should lead all the bulletins. He went on to say those that thought otherwise were free to leave the ZBC.”

The Ministry of Media, Information and Publicity has kept tight reign at the ZBC and other stables in the state media.

In a statement on Thursday the MDC said it was seriously worried by the manner the Ministry of Media, Information and Publicity has abdicated its national responsibility to the taxpayer in pursuit of the shameful parochial interests of protecting one exclusive political party in the inclusive government.

It said the public media has been abused to become the theatre and arena of maligning and vilifying the MDC, its leadership and members at the expense of covering pertinent issues affecting the ordinary man and woman.

“The Ministry of Media, Information and Publicity is the spokes-ministry of the inclusive government in its entirety. The public media, under the express orders of ministry officials, have become willing vehicles of spreading hate speech, divisions and tension in the inclusive government through overt bias and positive coverage of ministers and officials from one political party,” it said.

The MDC condemned the partisan use of public institutions such as the public media to the detriment of national and public interest.

“For years, the MDC has been a perennial victim of unbridled propaganda. Ironically, the ridicule, abuse and vilification have intensified since the formation of the inclusive government in February 2009. The latest victim is Finance Minister Hon Tendai Biti who is on the receiving end of a vicious war by Zanu PF bigwigs used to free handouts who are now fighting tenaciously and extra-legally to have access to IMF funds that are outside the control of the usual Father Christmas-the Central Bank.

“It would not be illogical to conclude that the life of Hon Biti, just like other MDC officials and ministers, is in danger judging by the vitriol being spewed by The Herald and the ZBC. A month ago, Hon Biti received a live bullet in his mail and it appears there has not been any investigation on the matter.

“The past seven months have seen the sunset of political debauchery and corruption and the emergence of a new sunrise of hope for the people of Zimbabwe. That hope; the nation’s hope is under serious threat from the partisan use of strategic national institutions to undermine the new political dispensation. The Ministry of Media, Information and Publicity and its puppet media have lost all credibility in the eyes of Zimbabweans who want to nurture the new era of prosperity and hope.

The MDC regards the lampooning and hate speech against its Ministers and officials as a threat to the Global Political Agreement.  We are worried about the threat posed to the longevity of the GPA by a retinue of sulking remnants from the old order which is hell-bent on undermining the hope that had begun to be engendered by the inclusive government.”

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The Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers Union (CFU) has condemned Robert Mugabe’s remarks at the just ended Zanu PF youth conference in the capital in which the veteran leader attacked remaining white commercial farmers.

“The speech to the ZANU (PF) youth may provide fuel for further politically motivated violence and disturbances on commercial farms at a time when peace and stability are required to ensure confidence and increased agricultural production in the current summer cropping season,” CFU President Deon Theron said in a statement.

CFU said the statements by Mugabe are  ”contrary” to the spirit of the Global Political Agreement signed by Mugabe his one-time rival Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.

Mugabe at the conference attacked western powers saying these ‘bloody whites’ who want to poke their nose in our business ’should leave us alone.’

Mugabe warned farmers who resist to move from farms that have been allocated to new farmers saying ‘I will just send the police to drive them away.’

However, the CFU says they have been complying with the government led land reform programme but their members are being discriminated in getting land to farm.

“The CFU would like to place on record that farmers have complied with the criteria set out by the Ministry of Lands, Land Reform and resettlement in that applications have been made to continue farming and occupation of their farms. To date,regrettably, Government has not responded to the numerous applications which were made,” Theron said.

Although, Mugabe reiterated that white farmers who were booted out of their properties as a result of the controversial land reform programme which started in 2000 to date were to be compensated CFU said the majority of their members are yet to be paid.

“We request that those of our members and former members, who may so desire, be adequately and fairly compensated for their improvements, equipment and materials without delay and without prejudice to any other claims they may have against the state,” the CFU said.

“It is regrettable that the vast majority of our members and former members,  the majority of whom were driven off their farms over the past 10 years, have not received any form of compensation.”

Zimbabwe land reform has been condemned by western countries as several white farmers were killed by Mugabe’s militants and replaced by inexperienced farmers.

Zimbabwe has been reduced to a basket case due to the failure by the new farmers to produce enough food to feed the nation and export.

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Australia will consider easing a ban on high-level contacts with Zimbabwe, Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said on Tuesday, adding it was too soon to end targeted sanctions against Mugabe.

Smith, in a statement to Parliament, said Australia would also contribute an extra A$8-million ($6,9-million) in aid to Zimbabwe to fund emergency food supplies, agriculture projects and help reinvigorate education.

Smith said more needed to be done to restore democracy and human rights in the country, and to fully implement the power-sharing agreement signed a year ago between Mugabe and his political rival Morgan Tsvangirai, now prime minister.

“Much more significant progress will be required before the Australian government undertakes any broader review of Australia’s sanctions with respect to Zimbabwe,” he said.

The slight easing comes after a European Union delegation visited Zimbabwe and said relations were entering a new phase, although full cooperation hinged on the implementation of the power sharing deal and an end to rights abuses.

Smith said there were growing signs of hope and optimism in Zimbabwe, with major improvements to the country’s economy and health system, as well as lower levels of political violence.

Australia in 2002 banned direct ministerial contact with government ministers in Zimbabwe, and in 2004 imposed travel and financial-transaction bans on members of Mugabe’s regime and senior supporters.

Australia also tightened scrutiny of student visas for the children of senior Zimbabwean government officials.

It was now time for Canberra to consider working with some Zimbabwean government ministries and to look at direct ministerial engagement with some government members, Smith said.

“Australia will consider opportunities for ministerial engagement on a selective case-by-case basis with those ministers of the Zimbabwean government who we judge to be making a real and genuine contribution to Zimbabwe’s social and economic recovery,” he said.

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