Messages From Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe’s coalition government should bring to justice individuals responsible for recent and past episodes of political violence say analysts, rejecting attempts by President Robert Mugabe to forgive perpetrators of violence and move on.

Analysts told The Zimbabwean that government could help stabilize the country by bringing to justice the organizers of violence on all sides. Acting President John Nkomo told celebrations to mark ZANU PF politburo member and presidential affairs minister Didymus Mutasa’s 75th birthday in Rusape on Saturday that Zimbabweans should forget past political squabbles which led to bloody clashes.

Nkomo spoke hardly a week after Mugabe told Defence Forces Day celebrations that Zimbabwe should not seek to convict goon squads who took hundreds of lives in organized political violence sparked by ZANU PF’s devastating electoral loss in the 2008 presidential and general elections. Mugabe also suggested a blanket amnesty for security forces, who used excessive force in dealing with opposition supporters.

Admore Tshuma, a Zimbabwean journalist and political analyst, said by calling for amnesty for those guilty of political violence, Mugabe was subordinating justice to political self-interest, thereby shielding criminal elements who perpetrated violence on his behalf. “There can never be any reconciliation without accountability,” Tshuma said. “Amnesty is problematic because it promotes impunity.”

Researchers have documented serious abuses across the country, with ZANU PF militants and State actors attacking perceived MDC supporters when victory was announced for the MDC and Morgan Tsvangirai. MDC supporters later retaliated. Much of the violence was organized by local leaders and politicians from all sides, according to eyewitnesses.

Although many observers were surprised by the speed and scale of the recent violence, the underlying causes of the crisis are old and deep.

The failure to address systemic problems of governance and organized political violence was a direct cause of the recent crisis. And it dates back to the 80s. Nkomo said the squabbles between ZANU PF and ZAPU in the 80s “should be water under the bridge.”

“We need peace, unity and tranquillity to prevail so that we can move forward as a nation. If we say an eye for an eye, Zimbabwe will be blind,” Nkomo said.

But analysts urged the coalition government to support the various inquiries established under the February 2008 mediation process to investigate abuses by state forces and those responsible for the violence. How well these initiatives succeed will be central to the coalition government’s ability to improve the lives of Zimbabweans and stabilize the country.

(Source)

MDC Member of Parliament for Masvingo West, Hon. Tachiona Mharadza has been detained by police in Masvingo on trumped up charges of waving a gun and disrupting a ZANU PF meeting at ward 14 Zano in Masvingo North. Hon Mharadza was today picked up at his home in Masvingo at around 3pm and is still detained by the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of Masvingo.

According to the police, Hon Mharadza disrupted a ZANU PF meeting after waving a gun towards the gathering. Masvingo provincial chairman, Wilsatff Sitemere has however denied the charges against Hon. Mharadza.

According to Stemere, there was an MDC meeting held at Zano yesterday when ZANU PF youths converged at the meeting making noise and claiming that the gathering was a ZANU PF gathering leading to a scuffle between them and MDC youths.

ZANU PF youths however were quick to report on the case leading to the arrest of Hon. Mharadza who was nowhere near the district.

(Source: via email)

A wounded buffalo, known as one of the most aggressive animals in the African bush, gored veteran Zimbabwean conservationist Steve Kok to death, ending his years of dedication to saving wild animals from poachers’ traps, colleagues said Tuesday. He was 71.

The buffalo had injured its leg, partially severing it, while tearing itself free from a poacher’s wire snare. Kok joined park rangers in a weeklong search for the wounded animal near the lakeside resort of Kariba in northern Zimbabwe. An alert was sent to scattered communities that the buffalo was highly dangerous and the search was on to track it down, said Johnny Rodrigues, head of the independent Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force.

Kok, seasoned in bushcraft and tracking, located the buffalo Thursday and it evidently charged him before he could call for help. His gored body was found Friday. Contrary to first reports from the remote district, it was not mutilated by jackals or other predators overnight.

The Charara state parkland is adjacent to lakeshore fishing communities and is no longer a suitable habitat for lions.

Park rangers closed in on the buffalo near the scene of Kok’s death and shot it dead Saturday.

Rodrigues said Kok, a longtime volunteer for conservation groups and an active anti-poaching campaigner, patrolled the bush at first light most mornings, unraveling snares and calling in veterinary assistance for animals caught and hurt in traps as impoverished human settlements encroached in adjacent areas and poaching grew.

“Thanks to him many hundreds of animals were saved from agonizing death,” said Rodrigues.

Kok had once told friends and family on his death his last wish was to be cremated on a pyre-like wood fire in the park he loved.

But fires are forbidden under National Parks regulations. Friends told The Associated Press on Tuesday that alternative cremation arrangements were being planned and his ashes would be sprinkled instead at a nearby river estuary he loved.

Rodrigues said Kok, a quiet and humble man, was “desperately concerned” by the dwindling number of animals on Lake Kariba’s shores.

“His death is a huge blow for the wildlife in Kariba,” Rodrigues said. “He is going to be very badly missed by humans and animals alike.”

(Source)

A major gems company has reiterated a trade ban on all diamonds from Zimbabwe’s Marange fields despite an official sale last week.

The Rapaport Group said it would expel members of its global Rapnet diamond trading network if they sold them.

Zimbabwe sold $72m (£46m) worth of diamonds in the first release from Marange since the body overseeing trade in “blood diamonds” lifted a ban.

But Rapaport said the Kimberly Process could not guarantee human rights.

The Kimberley Process suspended diamond exports from Zimbabwe last November in response to allegations of atrocities committed by the military at Marange, in the east of the country, in 2008.

But last month, it ruled that abuses had ceased and said Zimbabwe could resume limited exports.

However, there has been concern that Zimbabwe’s army still controls and benefits from the mines at Marange

“There is no assurance that diamonds with KP certification are free of human rights violations,” Rapaport group chairman Martin Rapaport said in a letter to members.

Rapnet claims to be the world’s largest diamond trading network, with members in more than 70 countries and daily online listings of gems worth more than $4bn.

Zimbabwe’s unity government, in power for the last 18 months, has been trying to stabilise an economy hit by rampant inflation and shortages of food and fuel.

Diamonds from the Marange field could see the country become one of the world’s top six exporters and generate $1.7bn a year.

A review of conditions at Marange will be carried out in September by a Kimberley Process monitor, after which Zimbabwe may be able to resume full exports.

The Kimberley Process was set up in 2002 after the diamond trade was accused of fuelling several conflicts in Africa.

(Source)

Robert Mugabe lost the plot last week when he chose the occasion of his sister Sabina’s burial to chide key Western countries he is desperately seeking to re-engage to resuscitate the country’s comatose economy, Indonesia’s new ambassador to Zimbabwe, Eddy Poerwana, has said.

Although Poerwana was of the view that the diplomats who walked out on President Mugabe may have overreacted, he said the President said the wrong things at the wrong time.

“It is the right of every President to express his or her views, but at the same time when you look at the time, and considering that it was done at the Heroes’ Acre, I feel the timing was wrong,” Poerwana said.

“If you come to the funeral of my family member, I can’t say bad things about you.”

Other diplomats who spoke on condition of anonymity said President Mugabe has lost the plot and that his statement had caused almost irreparable damage to relations between Zimbabwe and the international community.

“The President is not doing any good to Zimbabweans by shouting at countries he seeks to re-engage,” a diplomatic source said.

“If at all, he is worsening the situation. Relations between Zimbabwe and the West had begun to warm up, but such statements by the President do not help things at all. It’s regrettable. It really is.”

Poerwana said the subsequent walkout by ambassadors from the United States, Greece and Germany was “regrettable”.

“I was there and I saw it and I have also had the opportunity to discuss with other diplomats. We feel the action (walkout) was very much regrettable.

“It is not in the norms of diplomatic behaviour. Whatever inconvenience, we still have to say they should have just sat,” he said.

The Indonesian diplomat was speaking to journalists at a luncheon at his Harare home on Wednesday.

He said he had spoken to members of the diplomatic community and they had told him they felt the President and the diplomats’ action could not be justified.

“But the behaviour (walk-out) was not consistent with diplomatic norms,” Poerwana said. “If I do that, it reflects badly on the people of Indonesia and I don’t think their behaviour reflects the will of the people from their countries.”

US Ambassador Charles Ray, Germany envoy Albrecht Conze and the Greek and European Union chargé d’affaires Stephanos Ioannides and Barbara Plinket respectively, walked out on the President after he told the West to “go to hell” several times for allegedly interfering in the affairs of the country.

“They think they can dictate the pace here, remove so-and-so, Mugabe first – to hell with them, to hell, hell, hell with them,” President Mugabe seethed.

“They cannot be good for us today when they could not be good to us yesterday. They detained us, jailed us, shot at us, bombed us and slaughtered us in our hundreds.”

The diplomats were summoned for a tongue-lashing by Foreign Affairs minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi the following day, but they stuck to their guns and insisted they did nothing wrong.

They snubbed the Heroes’ and Defence Forces’ Day commemorations this week.

Their defence attachés attended the ceremonies in their stead.

Poerwana presented his credentials to President Mugabe last month.

The latest diplomatic tiff between Zimbabwe and the West comes at a time when President Mugabe’s government is desperately seeking to normalise tattered relations between them.

Envoys have been sent to the European Union from Zimbabwe but have returned empty-handed. The President complained on Heroes’ Day, observed on Monday, that the EU was not being sincere over re-engaging Zimbabwe.

“We have sought to re-engage the EU on the issue of the immediate removal of the evil sanctions that are hurting our people,” he said.

“We seek friendship not enmity, togetherness not apartness, good understanding not division.

But no sooner had we started the re-engagement than we realised that the EU is far from being sincere, as the bloc keeps shifting goal posts. . .

We appeal to them: ‘Please think again. Think again Europe, think again America, you are wrong’.”

Political analysts have said President Mugabe was losing the plot by insulting the same people from whom he appeared to be begging for friendship.

(Source)

Recent remarks by President Robert Mugabe at the National Heroes’ Acre that the process of reconciliation was national are a breath of fresh air.

However, President Mugabe has to walk the talk if these calls are to be taken seriously.

Zimbabweans’ greatest fear is that his calls are meant to ensure ZANU PF supporters – who constitute the majority of those who perpetrated political violence since the formation of the MDC in September 1999 – may get off the hook.

Sentiments swirling are that ZANU PF supporters who engaged in these heinous acts will be the biggest beneficiaries of the blanket amnesty proposed by President Mugabe.

What Zimbabwe needs is transitional justice. There can be no national healing unless those responsible for politically-motivated violence and murders are brought to book for disregard of human lives and property.

If South Africa and even Ghana have had Truth and Reconciliation Commissions, why then should the uneasy coalition government of President Mugabe, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara be an exception?

Unless such radical actions are taken, then the message of national healing will lack meaning and relevance.

There is no way there can be national healing and reconciliation when perpetrators of violence are walking freely on the streets, at times coming face-to-face with their victims.

This then just becomes grandstanding which no right-thinking Zimbabwean will take seriously.

The deadly snare of political conflict will remain a reality, and that demon cannot be exorcised unless bold steps are taken to send a very strong message that political violence will not be tolerated.

It is important for action to be taken against those who have perpetrated wanton violence and reparations made to surviving victims or their kin.

Unless President Mugabe toes this line, then his messages on unity are going to be taken as vanity because this is not the first time people have heard the rhetoric.

The only way ZANU PF can cleanse itself is by taking action against those of its members who raped, tortured, maimed and murdered all in the name of the party, which has in the past boasted of its “degrees in violence”.

It is the hope that – as part and parcel of the ongoing national healing process – all these dreadful cases will be revisited, examined and justice served before the country can move forward as one without skeletons in anyone’s cupboards.

(Source)

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher refused to annul Robert Mugabe’s election in 1980 as first black leader in independent Zimbabwe following shocking violence by his supporters against opponents, the last Rhodesian military commander, Lt. Gen. Peter Walls said.

Thatcher whose government supervised the trantional Rhodesian elections which resulted in the black majority government after Mr Mugabe emerged winner, had powers within her jurisdiction to annul the elections, but she chose not to.

Lt. Gen. who died in South Africa last month acknowledged in a BBC interview before his death that he had asked Mrs Thatcher, the British prime minister at the time, to annul the results of the election that brought Mr Mugabe to power because vast numbers of voters had been intimidated. Mrs Thatcher refused, British officials said.

Lt. Gen. Walls who played a central and sometimes ambiguous role in the first days of his country’s transition to majority rule only to fall out bitterly with its first black leader.

The prospect of black rule sent tremors of concern through many whites, and as elections – brokered by Britain, the former colonial power – approached in early 1980, the country seemed on a knife edge, balanced between the expectations of the black majority and fears that white soldiers under General Walls might resist the new order and even stage a coup.

In a memoir published in 1987, Ken Flower, the intelligence chief of both the last white government and the first black one, said General Walls himself had helped deepen fears of a coup among the British officials overseeing the transition to majority rule. But, Mr. Flower said, the idea of a coup was never seriously debated by the military and security elite.

White apprehensions sharpened on March 4, 1980, when the election results were announced and the clear victor was Mr. Mugabe, seen by many whites as a Marxist rabble-rouser who would hound them out of the country.

But instead of staging a coup, General Walls publicly appealed to the white minority “for calm, for peace,” Mr. Flower recalled.

Mr. Mugabe also went out of his way to assure whites. In what seemed a political masterstroke, he appointed General Walls to oversee the planned fusion of the former white-led army with the two guerrilla armies.

In one widely reported exchange after several attempts on his life, Mr. Mugabe was said to have asked why the general’s soldiers were trying to kill him. General Walls reportedly replied that if his men had been involved in the attempts, Mr. Mugabe would be dead.

Deep down, though, profound mistrusts lingered from the war years, and Mr. Mugabe began to pay heed to reports circulating at the time that General Walls had indeed plotted against him.

Increasingly estranged from Mr. Mugabe, General Walls offered his resignation within months of independence and later moved to South Africa’s Eastern Cape region, where he lived for many years in relative obscurity.

As the overall commander of Rhodesian forces from 1977 onward, General Walls oversaw an ultimately doomed campaign to halt a shifting bush war conducted by guerrillas loyal to Joshua Nkomo, a nationalist patriarch, and Robert Mugabe, who went on to become the increasingly autocratic – and so far only – president of Zimbabwe after the country achieved independence in 1980.

As the fighting unfolded, Rhodesia, named for the British archcolonialist Cecil John Rhodes, was an international pariah, shunned by most countries with the exception of apartheid-ruled South Africa, its neighbour.

The Rhodesian forces were far superior to the sometimes ill-equipped guerrillas, displaying their military might with cross-border strikes against insurgent rear bases in Mozambique and Zambia, even as General Walls spoke of winning the “hearts and minds” of the black majority inside the country.

By 1980 the options open to Rhodesia’s white minority had narrowed, whittled away by international economic sanctions, the withdrawal of unconditional South African support and the growing recognition that a deal with the guerrilla leaders was inevitable.

Born in Rhodesia in 1927, General Walls had a long military career, training at the British military academy in Sandhurst and the staff college at Camberley. As a commander of a Special Forces unit, he also fought insurgents in colonial-era Malaysia.

(Source)

Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has sent a message of condolence to the family of the late Chief Khayisa Ndiweni who died on Wednesday.

In his condolence message, PM Tsvangirai said he had learnt the death of the paramount chief with great sadness.

“It was with great sadness that I learnt of the death of Chief Ndiweni yesterday. “Chief Ndiweni was an embodiment of natural leadership and an unwavering custodian of the values and virtues of our tradition,” he said. “He was eloquent, open-minded and true to his word and deeds and knew no political figures but Zimbabweans,” PM Tsvangirai said.

He said the loss was not only for the family but for the nation at large. PM Tsvangirai said the traditional leaders of whom Chief Ndiweni has been a prominent personality over several years, play an important role in nation building, promotion of cultural cohesion and stability.

“On behalf of the government of Zimbabwe and my own behalf, I join the Ndiweni family not in mourning but in celebrating a life of exemplary leadership well lived.”

Chief Ndiweni died in his sleep in the early hours of Wednesday morning at his homestead in Ntabazinduna, about 30km from Bulawayo.

His death came three days after celebrating his 97th birthday at his homestead. He became chief in 1939 at the age of 26 and served as a traditional leader for 71 years old.

A fierce critic of President Robert Mugabe’s rule and the unitary system of governance, Chief Ndiweni was a strong proponent of federalism.

He is the former leader of the United Federal Party and took part in the Lancaster House Conference in 1979 which led to the independence of this country.

He is survived by his wife, 11 children, 30 grandchildren, 13 great-grandchildren and one great- great-grandchild. Funeral arrangements are yet to be announced.

(Source)

Ambulances rushed to Harare international airport on Thursday after a Boeing 767 on a flight from London was involved in an accident while landing, an aviation official said.

“I can confirm that a 767 plane coming from London has had an accident at Harare airport,” David Chawota, the head of Zimbabwe’s Civil Aviation Authority, told AFP.

“We are trying to establish what has caused the accident. We have set up an emergency help line desk to assist.”

He would not name the airline or say what exactly had happened to the plane.

But officials from South African Airways and Kenya Airways said they were told the incident was a drill.

“The airport is carrying a drill,” a Kenya Airways official said. “We also didn’t know anything about it, but there are ambulances and police around the airport to make it like a real situation.”

A British Airways spokesperson in London said none of the airline’s planes had been involved in the incident.

Air Zimbabwe chief executive officer Peter Chikumba also said none of its planes was involved.

“No it was not one of ours,” he said. “We don’t know what happened. But I am aware that it is the civil aviation which has issued that statement.”

“They called me to say there has been an accident at the airport. So I wasn’t at the airport, I am actually driving to go to there,” he added.

A Boeing 767 can carry up to 375 passengers.

In November last year, an Air Zimbabwe plane veered off the runway in Harare after hitting a group of warthogs.

(Source)

Armed soldiers led by Major Muti Musakwa last night forcibly removed property and goods belonging to MDC Zvimba West district treasurer, James Jonga. Jonga runs a supermarket at Murombedzi growth point in Zvimba, Mashonaland West province. Last night the soldiers ransacked and looted groceries in his shop saying he should vacate the premises as he was an MDC official. The soldiers were also incensed on why Jonga had made a contribution during the Constitution-making outreach meeting held in the area last week.

In Chendambuya in Headlands, Manicaland province, ZANU PF militia led by the ZANU PF district chairperson, John Kanindiriri are assaulting people who fail to attend forced ZANU PF meetings in the area. Kanindiriri is forcing people to attend ZANU PF meetings everyday ahead of the Constitution-making outreach meetings this month.

Meanwhile, in Hurungwe, Mashonaland West province, Chief Chundu is moving around the district accompanied by two ZANU PF activists, Peter Madamombe and Bilo Kaunde threatening to beat up anyone who will contribute during the COPAC public meetings opposing ZANU PF’s discredited Kariba draft. Chief Chundu also repeated the threats while addressing villagers at Kapiri business centre on Monday and at Kachiva business centre on Tuesday.

(Source: via email)