World Communist Youth Front to Meet in South Africa

<p><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#990000;"><span style="font-size:130%;">The old Soviet front </span><a href="http://www.keywiki.org/index.php/World_Federation_of_Democratic_Youth"><span style="font-size:130%;">World Federation of Democratic Youth</span></a><span style="font-size:130%;"> has been organizing international youth festivals every three to four years since the 1940s.<br /><br />The last three festivals were held in Venezuela (2005), Algeria (2001) and Cuba (1997).<br /><br />The </span><a href="http://www.wfdy.org/17wfys/"><span style="font-size:130%;">Seventeenth Festival</span></a><span style="font-size:130%;"> is to be held in Johannesburg, South Africa in December.</span></span></span><br /><br /><br /><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#990000;"><span style="color:black;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5541036727239879842" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitR-1GDQpvCHZ4Nn5CiPBSHEW27Ut5lR4Y3DPXZtMbHBR5zV5TUfisMJX1ceUQa7OjnI4Fmj3yniilpBtMB9m3_Hk3gOVeTTK_tNFVoicy7et6Y3HJJt-WB3mojTWasNUI0EtPUq0xiXWb/s400/NYDA-Festival.jpg" style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 86px; CURSOR: hand" /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;">Here is Jesus Mora, Secretary-General of the World Federation of Democratic Youth, being interviewed regarding the 17th World Festival of Youth and Students.<br /><br />Unfortunately this is in Spanish, but the graphics are explicitly communist.</span><br /><object height="385" width="640"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/FVlHJ_-dz1k?fs=1&hl=en_US"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><br /> <embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/FVlHJ_-dz1k?fs=1&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="640" height="385"></embed></object><br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;">According to the news site </span><a href="http://www.peoplesworld.org/world-youth-festival-to-be-held-in-south-africa/"><span style="font-size:130%;">Peoples World</span></a></span></span></span><span style="font-size:130%;">;<br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#990000;"><span style="color:black;"></p></span></span></span><blockquote><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#990000;"><span style="font-size:130%;color:black;">Thousands of youth and students from countries across the globe will convene in South Africa Dec. 13-21, to participate in the 17th World Festival of Youth and Students. The festival will take place in Johannesburg.</span></span></span></blockquote><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#990000;"><span style="color:black;"><p><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#990000;">World Communist Youth Festival for young totalitarians to cost SA taxpayer R29-million and legitimise radical causes.</span></strong><br /><br />The SA presidency has granted an extra R29-million to the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA) for the hosting of a nine-day ‘World Festival of Youth and Students' event themed “Let's defeat imperialism”.</span></span></span></span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span></p><p><a href="http://www.nyda.gov.za/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=363:south-africa-to-host-the-largest-international-youth-festival-in-johannesburg&catid=38:news&Itemid=220"><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">The National Youth Development Agency</span></a><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"> is a public entity, mandated to act in an impartial manner, to advance the interests of all of South Africa's youth. Instead, it is now going to be spending nearly R30 million on a conference being hosted by a radical global youth organisation, of which the ANC Youth League are members.<br /><br />This is a conference that has repeatedly been held in radical, oppressive states - in recent years, host cities have included Pyongyang, North Korea; Havana, Cuba; and Caracas, Venezuela. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Member parties who make up this organisation include the ZANU-PF Youth League from Zimbabwe, and the youth league of the Workers Party of North Korea.<br /><br />The theme of this year's conference is "Let's defeat imperialism", and topics for seminars include "The builders of the anti-imperialist media are fighters against lies and manipulation!" and "Solidarity with [North] Korea".<br /><br />According to the event's programme, President Zuma will be attending activities on day four of the event. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">That the state, the Presidency, and President Zuma himself, should be legitimising an event of this nature, and ploughing state resources into it, beggars belief and constitutes electioneering at the state's expense.<br /><br />The National Youth Development Agency should be spending every cent available to it to promote opportunities for all South Africans, and not on lavish banquets and radical gatherings that in no way advance the cause of the nation's youth. The Agency's continued existence has resulted in a significant opportunity cost for the three million unemployed young South Africans. The NYDA's R400 million annual budget could be used to fund initiatives that promise to make a much greater impact on youth development.<br /><br />The NYDA, however, has become terminally compromised. The NYDA was increasingly becoming an employment agency for Julius Malema's ANC Youth League, following revelations that its provincial boards have been filled with youth league cadres. President Zuma should disband this R400-million entity, whose only purpose seems to be to placate the ruling party's Youth League.</span></p><p> </p>

World Communist Youth Front to Meet in South Africa

The old Soviet front World Federation of Democratic Youth has been organizing international youth festivals every three to four years since...

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It's Not OK Mr Zuma

<p><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-family:arial;"><strong><span style="color:#990000;">FOLLOWING the promulgation of the regulations around the Indigenisation Act, there can be no illusions about how the international community will respond. This is another own goal of far-reaching significance.</span></strong><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_6y8DjAJByNBTyifj2okItxfvayUvstpUKpFjQOM0fXCkBOS9Tyx9EPQ9psSykeR0mAryYI2Yl3GM1y090bIYm-V_9Axf98XrwF9KfsBJ8IFvYwCqiuMAfGH-kwmDeapoz-AnU0LiqHhD/s1600-h/zuma-mugabe.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445646575343217458" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_6y8DjAJByNBTyifj2okItxfvayUvstpUKpFjQOM0fXCkBOS9Tyx9EPQ9psSykeR0mAryYI2Yl3GM1y090bIYm-V_9Axf98XrwF9KfsBJ8IFvYwCqiuMAfGH-kwmDeapoz-AnU0LiqHhD/s400/zuma-mugabe.jpg" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 259px" /></a>President Mugabe and his followers appear to think they can pass this off as an attempt to promote an equitable business environment. In fact it will be seen as yet another self-serving move that empowers the already powerful and damages the economy as a whole.<br /><br />It is clientelism at its worst. Just like the so-called land reform programme, we shall see nationalisation of private assets by a greedy clique.<br /><br />Investors will want no part in this free-for-all. They will not want to be told that they must give up 51% of their ownership of a company they have worked hard to build over the years and be presented with a list of suitable "partners" who all turn out to be members of the same party.<br /><br />Prospective "partners" have reportedly already been descending on companies in Harare to check out new possibilities for plunder. Sadc's reaction will be instructive.<br /><br />Sadc's intervention was designed to rescue Zimbabwe from political havoc that would damage not only this country but prove contagious to the region. Sadc leaders gathered in Dar es Salaam were appalled by the pictures they saw of Morgan Tsvangirai after his "bashing", as President Mugabe suitably called it, threatening more.<br /><br />Zimbabwe was marching in the opposite direction from a region that was enjoying investment, stability and growth.<br /><br />Despite appearing to buy Zanu PF's phoney nationalist rhetoric, there was a clear understanding by regional leaders that Zimbabwe was scaring off investors and creating a zone of instability in their midst. The presidential run-off poll, they unanimously agreed in 2008, was anything but free and fair.<br /><br />That is why after the poll they persuaded Mugabe to enter into a political pact with Tsvangirai. That arrangement, the GNU, is now in trouble because Zanu PF leaders have undermined the whole basis of the exercise. By leaving hardliners in place and refusing to accept the need for root-and-branch reforms, Zimbabwe is doing exactly what its friends feared.<br /><br />But of all the clumsy attempts to block change, the promulgation of the regulations surrounding the Indigenisation and Empowerment Act are the most egregious. The former ruling party has by this move signalled its contempt for the GPA and for Tsvangirai as prime minister.<br /><br />Both the GPA and Constitutional Amendment 19 define the powers of the prime minister. Not only have Mugabe's supporters driven a coach and horses through these provisions and ridden roughshod over cabinet due-process, they have done precisely what Sadc sought to avoid -- threatened economic havoc and damaged the region's reputation.<br /><br />In the circumstances, getting Tsvangirai to lift sanctions is like sending him on a mission impossible. None of the countries imposing sanctions will be able to justify to their constituents a removal of measures when there has been no progress in the GNU talks.<br /><br />How else do we explain the ongoing land seizures; the torture of political prisoners; the arrest of journalists, one bearing a letter of introduction from Minister Walter Mzembi, the other doing his job as a cameraman; and the continuing abuse of the prime minister in the official press?<br /><br />US Congressional delegation leader Douglas Meeks described Mugabe as "a great man" after their meeting at State House last month. It is understood that compliments in diplomacy work better than brickbats. But he must be assuming that readers of the New York Times, which publishes in his constituency, are ignoring its stories on Zimbabwe.<br /><br />They are not. All the disgraceful details are there. Meeks and his fellow legislators will have difficulty securing a change of policy in the current situation.<br /><br />Barack Obama wasn't fooled into believing there has been progress. Tsvangirai's call for a relaxation of sanctions after Zanu PF unleashed youths into the city centre to threaten him will not have done much to sway opinion in the US and Europe!<br /><br />Tsvangirai, the bravest of the brave in 2007, is increasingly looking like a jelly that bears the impression of the last person to have sat on it.<br /><br />President Zuma in London this week will ask Gordon Brown to lift sanctions. But Brown is likely to ask what the GNU has achieved to warrant such a move?<br /><br />Does this include the hardliners at Zanu PF headquarters who mobilised the youths who threatened Tsvangirai last week? Media houses are still unable to launch new titles. The state media continues to be abused by 2008's losers to justify Mugabe's damaging policies.<br /><br />Meanwhile, Saviour Kasukuwere is threatening more damage. He evidently doesn't think he has done enough already. Like the AAG, he wants to reap where he did not sow elsewhere in the economy. And Jacob Zuma thinks all these things should be ignored; that the GNU negotiators should "park and proceed".<br /><br />How can he expect the MDC-T to park the glaring violations of Amendment 19 and the GPA where the PM's powers are unambiguously defined but now widely ignored by the old gang of ministers, permanent secretaries, and generals?<br /><br />If Zuma wants Zimbabweans to disregard the type of leadership that thinks it's OK to plunder productive farms and businesses, he might find the same disease spreading, like cholera, across the border. </span><br /></span><p>

It's Not OK Mr Zuma

FOLLOWING the promulgation of the regulations around the Indigenisation Act, there can be no illusions about how the international community...

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Zim death truck owned by Mugabe minister!

<p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;color:#000099;"><em>DEATH TRUCK: The American-owned truck which caused </em></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;color:#000099;"><em>the Prime </em></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;color:#000099;"><em>Minister's Cruiser to crash, killing his wife on Friday, March 6, 2009</em></span><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivUpyjdOqZgJ7ABU1xSTXnmoCaIyB_8nLJVeCPZGuFex85nMHwmY6yrAWsnhEYVCuK0COseAAQTLM5b9iFpCMyARtUm5EXsg0pB8NyGPhhewLXodKxsDWImdO3UAT8EquOsckKlUPbXXIk/s1600-h/udtsvangiraicrashtruck470.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5327266620909914850" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivUpyjdOqZgJ7ABU1xSTXnmoCaIyB_8nLJVeCPZGuFex85nMHwmY6yrAWsnhEYVCuK0COseAAQTLM5b9iFpCMyARtUm5EXsg0pB8NyGPhhewLXodKxsDWImdO3UAT8EquOsckKlUPbXXIk/s400/udtsvangiraicrashtruck470.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 253px" /></a><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#990000;">THE TRUCK that killed Susan Tsvangirai in a road crash was owned by one of Robert Mugabe's ZanuPF cabinet ministers!</span></strong></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">This amazing coincidence was revealed in Harare yesterday by a private investigator probing the death of the wife of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai eight days ago.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Susan was killed when a truck hit the Land Cruiser she and her husband were travelling in.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">At the time the Zimbabwe Government said the truck was a USAID vehicle taking medicalsupplies to HIV victims.</span><br /><br /><strong><span style="color:#333333;"><em><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">But yesterday:</span></em><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span></strong><br /><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">The investigator, whose name is known to Sunday Sun, revealed that the truck belonged to top Zanu (PF) politburo member and business tycoon Saviour Kasukuwere who is also Youth and Gender Development Minister in the Zimbabwe cabinet .</span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family:Arial;font-size:130%;"></span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">And a US Government spokesman in Harare conflrmed that the truck did not belong to USAID, although it WAS delivering medical supplies.</span></li></ul><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">"It was purchased using USAID funds by a contractor and belonged to the contractor," said US public affairs officer Tim Gerhardson.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">He added that the driver was a Zimbabwean employed by the contractor - and not by USAID.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">The revelations will boost fears that the death crash was more sinister than a simple accident - although Tsvangirai himself has said he is satisfied with the official explanation. </span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">The investigator, a former Harare CID officer, told Sunday Sun that inquiries showed the truck belonged to Cum Oil, a company owned by Kasukuwere.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">He said his investigations were not complete - "we are not looking for scapegoats, only the truth".</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">But he declined to reveal who hired him to investigate the crash.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">There have been calls, backed by the US and Britain, for an independent inquiry.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Clever Bere, president of the Zimbabwe National Students Union said: "Zimbabwean political history is riddled with a trail of politically motivated accidents that remain unsolved cold cases."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#990000;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP0318hQfzJ39USXmuIDEx7OY-H9_zhum24rwcIy7RGs6r0OsQISviY9n94x3r5SMMW59Bt6C7fx1SpRLV55668bSq0OKT3e9h-Aj_WU8RiejRx-1I4kCXioApdrr4L3W98x676JZceKnu/s1600-h/kasukuwere.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5327278810578024898" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP0318hQfzJ39USXmuIDEx7OY-H9_zhum24rwcIy7RGs6r0OsQISviY9n94x3r5SMMW59Bt6C7fx1SpRLV55668bSq0OKT3e9h-Aj_WU8RiejRx-1I4kCXioApdrr4L3W98x676JZceKnu/s320/kasukuwere.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 159px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" /></a>Saviour Kasukuwere, a former spy agent in the CIO</span></strong></span></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />JOHANNESBURG - The truck that killed Susan Tsvangirai the wife of the Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai in a road crash is owned by Saviour Kasukuwere, a former spy agent in the CIO and Youth and Gender Development Minister in the inclusive government, a South African newspaper The Sunday Sun revealed. "Tyson" as he is popularly known, has worked as Robert Mugabe's body guard.<br /><br />Kasukuwere was one of the first government officials to visit the Prime Minister in hospital at the Avenues Clinic in Harare.<br /><br />The amazing coincidence of his truck's involvement was revealed in Harare by a private investigator probing the tragic accident that took the life of the Prime Minister's wife Susan.<br /><br />Kasukuwere has worked in the Zimbabwean government's Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO)'s close Security Unit, a crack department in the spy organisation which reports directly to the President. Its role is to spy on CIO agents and government officials, including Zanu(PF) politicians.<br /><br />The notorious Mt Darwin MP has a menacing body and menacing looks and a close confidante of the President alongside the Defence Minister Emmerson Mnangagwa and he is normally tasked to carry out ruthless missions on behalf of Robert Mugabe.<br /><br />Sources say Kasukuwere gained the favour of Robert Mugabe and Emmerson Mnangagwa when he worked for (Central Mechanical Equipment Department (CMED) as a driver and spy agent monitoring the movement and servicing of government officials' vehicles.<br /><br />Over the years, Kasukuwere has become obsessed with eliminating Zanu(PF) rivals in Mashonaland Central to secure his position as the unchallenged political baron in that province.<br /><br />It is believed that Kasukuwere drove out Mashonaland Central businessman James Makamba into exile and General Solomon Mujuru who had vast farming interests in the region was sent packing back to his native Chivu.<br /><br />Tyson is also linked to the death of the province's budding young Zanu(PF) politicians Border Gezi, Elliot Manyika and the recent arrest of former Guruwe MP David Butau on his return from exile in the UK. Butau, like James Makamba was Solomon Mujuru's business front man.<br /><br />In 2005 he spied on Phillip Chiyangwa, Tendai Matambanadzo, a banker, and Itai Marchi Zanu-PF director of Security, and long-serving Zimbabwe diplomat Godfrey Dzvairo and they were convicted of breaching the Official Secrets Act and given sentences ranging between five to six years in jail on accusations that they sold information to South African Intelligence.<br /><br />Kasukuwere is also linked to the attempted murder of MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa two years ago.<br /><br />In the disputed violent Presidential elections run-off, he directed political assasinations, abductions and torture in Mashonaland Central and engineered attacks on US embassy vehicles.<br /><br />During his time as a Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) operative in Manicaland in the Nineties, he was nicknamed "Mike Tyson" because of his ruthlessness and precision in dealing with political foes.<br /><br />Kasukuwere is a wealthy individual and his youthful brother Stanley had a brief stint as Chairman of Dynamos football club.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdJ60Rp3OeUL5poRQ9T7hFW0EAUnGFBO02PU3EuXe1SGIBVu3L2q-hxbketl1IzmGcaLH1_teTKtqsXSQNauWg79NbUy_6mi6tK1OLBbeu8gUhgJmkEBc-Os3VkW_pmdGOVf1yoCOLC11y/s1600-h/landcruiser-after-accident.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5327266629959943362" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdJ60Rp3OeUL5poRQ9T7hFW0EAUnGFBO02PU3EuXe1SGIBVu3L2q-hxbketl1IzmGcaLH1_teTKtqsXSQNauWg79NbUy_6mi6tK1OLBbeu8gUhgJmkEBc-Os3VkW_pmdGOVf1yoCOLC11y/s400/landcruiser-after-accident.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 300px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 195px" /></a>In a report by a Zimbabwe Sunday paper The Standard, John Snow International (JSI) "Deliver project" has opened an internal investigation on how the "killer truck" that claimed the life of the Prime Minister’s wife Susan was dispatched last Friday, in a new twist to the accident.<br /><br />The truck was involved in an accident with Tsvangirai's car on Friday.<br />The Supply Chain Management System (SCMS), is the contractor of the "USAid/Deliver Projects" aimed at strengthening HIV/Aids and family planning supply chains in developing countries run by JSI.<br /><br />According to the official JSI website the "Deliver project" helps developing countries "establish effective and efficient supply chains for public health and family planning programmes".<br /><br />A confidential internal memorandum in the possession of The Standard, dated March 9 — three days after the accident — said the truck belonged to JSI but was not driven by a JSI driver.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkuO86sVZADfY8KRMO2Q4txwwczzi8yIgFuNwsClQzKuEMMenAfQExGiePr1sbaVZGQ45bhafpgUAPDqHA9jhmkTWJ0qBZvw773zg2hgNtNKLuOlnKYEUgeyS7-1z6FPRstAG6oOpKsz_s/s1600-h/tsvangiraicrashcruiser470.jpg"></a>"As you may have heard, there was a tragic car accident on Friday (March 6) in Zimbabwe in which the Prime Minister (Morgan Tsvangirai) was injured and his wife was killed.</span></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"></span></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><em><span style="font-size:85%;color:#000099;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirZjPXXTESjVE-WJKxy9x7cj7os6J6Z8XWXVFrTG7geTz00VTzg_1pSQIIiSEvpEJOxvIF6UIoh0r3vqyfUj7WTr0L74cSDKWc9m1TbIoEZnbD3LJ4BOvBD5CIE49SUKHMdq0gEQn-IZSo/s1600-h/crash.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5327293128761236210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirZjPXXTESjVE-WJKxy9x7cj7os6J6Z8XWXVFrTG7geTz00VTzg_1pSQIIiSEvpEJOxvIF6UIoh0r3vqyfUj7WTr0L74cSDKWc9m1TbIoEZnbD3LJ4BOvBD5CIE49SUKHMdq0gEQn-IZSo/s400/crash.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 232px" /></a>CRASH SCENE: The Prime Minister's Toyota Landcruiser lies on its roof after being sideswiped by an American truck, forcing it into a violent spin (March 6, 2009). Morgan Tsvangirai's wife, Susan, died on the spot<br /></span></em><br />"The vehicle involved in this accident was registered to USAid/Deliver (a JSI Project) although not driven by a JSI driver, as far as we know. At this point, further details about the accident are unknown.<br /><br />"Understandably, this tragedy has generated a lot of media interest. If you receive any inquiries from the media, we ask that you please direct them to Penelope Riseborough, WEI/JSI Director of Communication in Boston," the memorandum said.<br /><br />JSI has launched an internal investigation to unravel how the truck was dispatched under unclear circumstances, leading to the fatal accident along the Harare-Masvingo highway on March 6.<br /><br />Sources said that an "administrator", identified only as N Dube and in charge of the delivery trucks, had been quizzed by management amid reports that she had been sent on suspension pending investigations.<br /><br />The administrator was not at work when The Standard visited JSI head offices at Agriculture House in Marlborough on Friday.<br /><br />"The administrator has been quizzed on how the truck was released laden with SCMC drugs but with an unofficial driver. If it was coming from delivery in Masvingo it should have been empty," the source told The Standard.<br /><br />It was not immediately possible to get details of the whereabouts of the administrator because of the blanket ban on talking to the media.<br />David Alt, the JSI’s country director, was locked in meetings when The Standard visited JSI headquarters. He did not respond to written questions on the alleged suspension of the administrator.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMoYalbyuZofcc7eRMgGMd_gNziBlnaIaj6q_ho_zkM8vqHMg58sLmbbCqYt0pGrdZB3-ycUC7YOKe0YXPipZPgZfxS_HraA9Z7c_EW8L7-PgwbH4vNckMIA2qdXESPWuxO_s4z1M-zjRG/s1600-h/tsvangirai-funeral.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5327266625445202034" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMoYalbyuZofcc7eRMgGMd_gNziBlnaIaj6q_ho_zkM8vqHMg58sLmbbCqYt0pGrdZB3-ycUC7YOKe0YXPipZPgZfxS_HraA9Z7c_EW8L7-PgwbH4vNckMIA2qdXESPWuxO_s4z1M-zjRG/s400/tsvangirai-funeral.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 279px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 400px" /></a>However, late on Friday afternoon JSI released a statement in which it said: "We have learned with great sadness about the death of Susan Tsvangirai in a tragic accident on Friday afternoon. We cannot at this time make any comment on the detail of the accident but we are co-operating fully with the authorities to ensure the investigation is open and transparent.<br /><br />"We send our deepest condolences to the Prime Minister and his family at this terrible time and hope they find peace and comfort in the coming weeks."</span></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />Prime Minister Tsvangirai and his wife were being driven in a Toyota 4x4 Land Cruiser to their rural home in Buhera, when they were sideswiped by the Nissan UD truck driven by Chinoona Mwanda (35). The PM’s Land Cruiser was forced into a spin rolling over at least three times, killing his wife Susan. </span></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><em><span style="color:#000099;">Download attachment >></span></em> </span><a href="http://www.thezimbabwemail.com/files.php?file=Sunday_Sun_1__878103588.pdf"><em><span style="font-size:85%;">Sunday_Sun_1__878103588.pdf</span></em></a></span><span style="font-size:85%;"> </span></span><br /><br /><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><a class="contentpagetitle" href="http://www.hararetimes.com/world/parly/363-report-truck-that-killed-susan-tsvangirai-owned-and-operated-by-the-cio.html" included="null"><em><span style="font-size:85%;">Report: Truck that killed Susan Tsvangirai owned and operated by the CIO</span></em> </a></p></span></span><em><span style="font-size:85%;color:#000099;"><span style="font-family:arial;">The Zimbabwe Mail/The Sunday Sun (SA)/The Zimbabwe Standard</span> </span></em><p></p>

Zim death truck owned by Mugabe minister!

DEATH TRUCK: The American-owned truck which caused the Prime Minister's Cruiser to crash, killing his wife on Friday, March 6, 2009 THE ...

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Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe in double money scam?

<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2U4SjwKvXgRYX9q2Njvz_JfjLVWaYzbp2FhZbatGdh4jUUfw3BiHN2DasiKVNLAONvm1oz5EBm2wfDj24wRe-4zwU1XnYrtkU99idO5wMcOhZOXZI7WwNks8aFeQmd4HmGQEpJ5I6um91/s1600-h/Gono-50.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5327246791964887170" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2U4SjwKvXgRYX9q2Njvz_JfjLVWaYzbp2FhZbatGdh4jUUfw3BiHN2DasiKVNLAONvm1oz5EBm2wfDj24wRe-4zwU1XnYrtkU99idO5wMcOhZOXZI7WwNks8aFeQmd4HmGQEpJ5I6um91/s400/Gono-50.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 274px" /></a><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#990000;">HARARE - Speculation emerged this week that the Reserve Bank may have been printing two or more Zimbabwe dollar notes with the same serial numbers.</span></strong><br /><br />A source at RBZ, who asked not to be named, said there was “a real possibility” that, for each note with an officially recorded number on its face, there was a second exact copy handed to Zanu (PF).<br /><br />This system of fraud was perfected in the former Zaïre under late dictator, Mobuto Sese Seko, who produced a stash of unrecorded notes for his own use.<br /><br />The RBZ official said that he and several of his colleagues had recently been questioned over the allegations.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"> “It is quite possible,” he said. “The team heading the bank had total control of the process, so they would have been able to produce several versions of each Zimbabwe dollar note.”<br /><br />Separate reports have spoken of truckloads of money being delivered to the army, CIO, youth militia and Zanu (PF) headquarters. There are also well-documented cases of senior party members swapping Zimbabwe dollars for foreign exchange on the black market.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;color:#000099;"><em>The Zimbabwean</em></span> </p>

Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe in double money scam?

HARARE - Speculation emerged this week that the Reserve Bank may have been printing two or more Zimbabwe dollar notes with the same serial n...

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Report calls for Mugabe to be charged

<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrrWwKRxHXqDNFOmkhMpuFwhGun1iu2T3lCkn3ZQ_kU5VMjrnYMq7ixYEp1bBC31Z_jePvteqTFsqLSzPGdmoz_6y2OXr-OROy5lkE4KSATXHd3ZEbCtR7qNehR_HsyIFIitEFUx7I3eo/s1600-h/mugabe+in+jail%5B1%5D.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5306141822581173922" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrrWwKRxHXqDNFOmkhMpuFwhGun1iu2T3lCkn3ZQ_kU5VMjrnYMq7ixYEp1bBC31Z_jePvteqTFsqLSzPGdmoz_6y2OXr-OROy5lkE4KSATXHd3ZEbCtR7qNehR_HsyIFIitEFUx7I3eo/s400/mugabe+in+jail%5B1%5D.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 307px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 280px" /></a><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;">BOSTON — The mounting movement for Robert Mugabe to be charged with crimes against humanity will be boosted this week by a report that finds the Zimbabwean dictator is responsible for criminal neglect that caused the country’s deadly cholera epidemic.</span></strong><br /><br />Mugabe is culpable for dismantling Zimbabwe’s health and sanitation services and thereby provoking the cholera outbreak that has killed more than 2,000 people to date and could kill as many as 5,000 people if left unchecked, according to a new report by Physicians for Human Rights to be released this week.<br /><br />The doctors’ damning report, provided exclusively to GlobalPost, adds momentum to the growing international campaign for the Mugabe regime to be charged with crimes against humanity.<br /><br />Mugabe should be charged with crimes for “presiding over the destruction of a health system and an economy. It is not mismanagement, it is calculated. It is criminal,” said Frank Donaghue, chief executive of the Massachusetts-based Physicians for Human Rights, which will issue its report Jan. 13 in Johannesburg and New York.<br /><br />“Mugabe spends money on the military and intelligence services that keep him in power instead of on the medical and sanitation services essential to the health of the population,” said Donaghue.<br /><br />“The Mugabe government created the grounds for the cholera epidemic by allowing the water supply system to break down, by not repairing broken sewer pipes and allowing public water to become contaminated, by closing hospitals and allowing the entire health system to collapse,” he added.<br /><br />“Cholera is not just a disease, it’s a crime,” said Donaghue, who was part of the investigative team that visited Zimbabwe at the end of December.<br /><br />If a United Nations tribunal on Zimbabwe were launched, observers in southern Africa believe it would bring crucial international pressure that could speed the end of the Zimbabwean president’s 28-year rule. The International Bar Association, Amnesty International, the anti-torture group Redress, the South African Council of Churches and the South African Catholic Bishops Conference have all urged the United Nations Security Council to investigate Mugabe for crimes against humanity.<br /><br />The physicians’ report includes a statements of support from South African Nobel-winning archbishop Desmond Tutu and Mary Robinson, formerly the United Nations commissioner for human rights and Irish prime minister. While in Zimbabwe the team of medical experts interviewed more than 90 people, ranging from doctors and health specialists to ordinary Zimbabweans seeking health care.<br /><br />Human Rights Watch has documented numerous actions and policies by the Mugabe government that it says constitute crimes. “There is no question that the Mugabe government has committed serious crimes for which Mugabe and other officials must be held accountable,” said Tiseke Kasambala, senior researcher for Human Rights Watch.<br /><br />“There is ample evidence of the crimes and there are international conventions which make it possible to bring them to justice,” said Kasambala, from her office in Johannesburg.<br /><br />Some experts in international law question whether there is enough evidence to indict Mugabe and point out that the International Criminal Court has not established a strong track record of convictions.<br /><br />“It will not be easy but it is necessary,” said Kasambala. Mugabe could be charged by the International Criminal Court in the Netherlands or by a special United Nations tribunal, according to Kasambala. Human Rights Watch has a legal team that is investigating the best way to bring Mugabe to justice.<br /><br />Zimbabwe has not signed the convention on international crimes but once there is a new government in Zimbabwe, it could ask the ICC to investigate and charge Mugabe.<br /><br />The United Nations Security Council can order an investigation into crimes in Zimbabwe and form a special tribunal. “A U.N. tribunal would have more powers and scope to look at violations that constitute crimes against humanity,” said Kasambala.<br /><br />Mark Ellis, executive director of the International Bar Association, agrees that Mugabe should be investigated for crimes against humanity. “The legal basis for holding Mugabe accountable is straightforward,” said Ellis. He said the UN Security Council should immediately authorize the ICC to investigate Mugabe and serious crimes committed in Zimbabwe.<br /><br />Crimes against humanity are defined as a widespread attack against a civilian population, usually as part of a government plan. These crimes include killing, sexual violence, torture, displacement and using the distribution of food as a political weapon or depriving housing and medical care to those who oppose the government.<br />A UN tribunal brought former Liberian dictator Charles Taylor to trial. Taylor is currently on trial for crimes against humanity and war crimes before a UN special tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands. Taylor is the first ex-African head of state to appear before an international tribunal.<br /><br />“Mugabe has a history of crimes that go back to the 1980s in Matabeleland,” said Kasambala, referring to what is known as the Matabeleland Massacres, in which a special army brigade under Mugabe’s command went on a four-year campaign in southern Zimbabwe in which an estimated 10,000 people of the Ndebele ethnic minority were murdered, according to a report by the Zimbabwean Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace.<br /><br />In addition to direct state violence against opposition groups, the Physicians for Human Rights report says that Mugabe should also be charged with policies calculated to cause the deaths of thousands of Zimbabweans. The dismantling of Zimbabwe’s once excellent health and sanitation services, which brought about the current cholera epidemic, is one example, report the Physicians for Human Rights. Another example is Mugabe’s 2005 campaign in which the army bulldozed tens of thousands of homes in urban townships, which are bastions of support for the opposition. More than 700,000 homes and businesses were destroyed, affecting more than two million people, according to a UN investigation. Many of those made homeless later died of disease or malnutrition, say human rights activists in Zimbabwe.<br /><br />In the current cholera epidemic, more than 40,000 Zimbabweans have been infected with cholera and it is expected that 60,000 will fall ill with the disease before the epidemic is brought under control, according to the World Health Organization, which issues weekly bulletins on the situation. The disease has spread to all 10 of the country’s provinces and to neighboring countries of Botswana, Mozambique, South Africa and Zambia. The cholera bacteria is so rife in Zimbabwe that it has contaminated the main reservoir for Harare and also the Limpopo River, which forms the border between Zimbabwe and South Africa.<br /><br />Ordinarily cholera is fatal to about one percent of those who contract the disease. But Zimbabwe’s death rate is five percent because of the shortage of clean water, medical facilities and the high levels of malnutrition and disease already prevalent among the population.<br /><br />As a result of disease and malnutrition, the average life expectancy of Zimbabwean women has dropped from 61 to 34 years, which is the lowest in the world, according to WHO.<br /><br />The Mugabe government has closed three of Zimbabwe’s four major public hospitals. The hospitals in Harare and Bulawayo until recently were among the best in Africa. Without money, the hospitals ran out of drugs and doctors and nurses were not paid. In November the hospitals had no running water and by December they were closed.<br /><br />“The cholera that we see in Zimbabwe is a symptom of a much broader problem, the collapse of the country’s health system, the closure of hospitals, growing levels of malnutrition and the collapse of the economy,” said Donaghue, who has visited Zimbawe several times in the past year.<br /><br />“Unquestionably Mugabe and his officials must be held accountable for the destruction of the health care system and the drop in life expectancy,” said Donaghue, who will be in Johannesburg to release the report. He called on the United Nations to take action to resolve the Zimbabwean crisis. Donaghue said it is “tragic” that China, Russia and South Africa have prevented the United Nations Security Council from considering the Zimbabwean crisis.<br /><br />“We are seeing Zimbabwe’s people die in very high numbers,” said Donaghue. “International bodies must act to stop the ongoing massacre.”<br /></span><p><span style="font-family:arial;"><em><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Source:</span> </span></em></span><a class="recent" href="http://www.thehawaiiindependent.com/regions/2009/02/19/report-calls-for-mugabe-to-be-charged/" title="Report calls for Mugabe to be charged"><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;"><em>Report calls for Mugabe to be charged</em></span></a></p><p> </p>

Report calls for Mugabe to be charged

BOSTON — The mounting movement for Robert Mugabe to be charged with crimes against humanity will be boosted this week by a report that finds...

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Scores of Zimbabwe farms 'seized'

<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEBYzkC9mYCWM3eT39F30v8gMrvASQV3JN_XjCyyUNi_b_fN5gickMBdUyC8_GVBYRS3zWpBemW5oRjmyWVzK2gq7bS0vxDpLGomA6RnaUH24tAEZgn-AxNrtIt1A6KVmPHwqPJa1r1Y8/s1600-h/zim-farms-seizure.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5306127880995799794" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEBYzkC9mYCWM3eT39F30v8gMrvASQV3JN_XjCyyUNi_b_fN5gickMBdUyC8_GVBYRS3zWpBemW5oRjmyWVzK2gq7bS0vxDpLGomA6RnaUH24tAEZgn-AxNrtIt1A6KVmPHwqPJa1r1Y8/s400/zim-farms-seizure.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 267px" /></a><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;">Scores of white-owned farms in Zimbabwe have been invaded since the country's national unity government took office, a union chief has told the BBC.<br /><br />Commercial Farmers Union President Trevor Gifford said 77 properties had been occupied in the last fortnight.</span></strong><br /><br />MPs, police, the military and Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe officials had taken part in the invasions, he said.<br /><br />Many of the farmers targeted recently mounted a successful legal challenge to government land reforms, he added.<br /><br />The BBC attempted to contact a number of officials from President Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party - including the ministers of agriculture and lands - but no-one was available to comment on the farmers' union claims.<br /><br />Attempts to contact the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), whose leader Morgan Tsvangirai was sworn in as prime minister earlier this month, were also unsuccessful.<br /><br />The Southern African Development Community (Sadc) Tribunal ruled in November the Zimbabwe government's programme of seizing white-owned property for redistribution to landless black farmers was discriminatory and illegal.<br /><br />The government said at the time that it would not comply with the ruling.<br /><br /><strong><span style="color:#999999;">'Ethnic cleansing'</span></strong><br /><br />The power-sharing deal between Zanu-PF and the MDC was eventually agreed after disputed elections and months of talks, during which the economy slid into a deepening crisis.<br /><br />Mr Gifford told the BBC News website the recent spate of invasions was focused on the provinces of Mashonaland Central, Mashonaland West, Masvingo and Midlands.<br /><br />The CFU president blamed the invasions on a minority of figures close to Zanu-PF who were "using their offices to ensure ethnic cleansing can take place before the prime minister is able to stabilise the country".<br /><br />"This is being led by members of the old regime in Zanu-PF who are not willing to see the transition take place to a new unity government," Mr Gifford added.<br /><br />"Zimbabwe is facing a severe food crisis and we're in the midst of the agricultural season so the impact of this will worsen the catastrophe."<br /><br />More than half Zimbabwe's population is in need of food aid and inflation - estimated by some economists at 10 sextillion per cent - has left its currency almost worthless.<br /><br />Mr Gifford said there were about 400 functioning white-owned farms left in Zimbabwe.<br /><br />Meanwhile, Roy Bennett - the MDC's nominee for deputy agricultural minister - faces a bail hearing on Tuesday after he was arrested this month accused of terrorism on charges his supporters say are trumped-up.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:Arial;font-size:130%;"><em><span style="font-size:85%;color:#cc0000;">Source <a class="ArticleTitle" href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7906031.stm" id="article-title" target="_blank">Scores of Zimbabwe farms 'seized'</a> <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7906031.stm">BBC News </a></span></em></span><p>

Scores of Zimbabwe farms 'seized'

Scores of white-owned farms in Zimbabwe have been invaded since the country's national unity government took office, a union chief has t...

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Corrupt Zanu-PF loots SA R300 million Aid to Zim

<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7dLZUcVOgVPG5l67fjmj9_rdNprqKMBu1i97HgtZ0ctd29DK729xqxdYK1fXcNfsvwxBri3T-PMejY5S-90X_HMf8AiKZg5n9NfwVZM6vOzk58WjMmGi6-t_ujThgHH2A7v0NMGsrNHM/s1600-h/mugabe_in_space.jpg"></a><p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1jGZrRFuP9_M0vMrdtPs-pEkMjRMddoiIWzDqzUcqXE4zDLA2DVdOdK72r7tZWJlu0afx7wqGaUjTOYj3iyLY3z0HZMLNra4GcQvj8NfIF_uRzYcet7qThgptPdRv9A4SOndQg6DndQs/s1600-h/mBurningTaxMoney.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5306001747263106946" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1jGZrRFuP9_M0vMrdtPs-pEkMjRMddoiIWzDqzUcqXE4zDLA2DVdOdK72r7tZWJlu0afx7wqGaUjTOYj3iyLY3z0HZMLNra4GcQvj8NfIF_uRzYcet7qThgptPdRv9A4SOndQg6DndQs/s400/mBurningTaxMoney.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 250px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 320px" /></a><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;">IN CASE anyone is concerned about what happened to the R300m worth of <a class="a_keyword_link" href="http://www.agriculturalcountry.com/" target="_blank">agricultural</a> inputs SA gave to <a class="a_keyword_link" href="http://www.zimbabwepost.com/" target="_blank">Zimbabwe</a> at Christmas, your worst <a class="a_keyword_link" href="http://www.climateoffear.com/" target="_blank">fears</a> have been realised. Yes, Zanu (PF) got its hands on the goodies. And perhaps a few farmers with party cards.<br /><br />SA entrusted the operation to the Southern African Development Community (SADC), which cobbled together the Zimbabwe Humanitarian and Development Assistance Framework (ZHDAF) to undertake the distribution of farm inputs. </span></strong></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;">However, the inputs arrived in Zimbabwe while ZHDAF was still being put together and it appears that due to the urgency of getting the inputs out, the Zimbabwean government was entrusted with the operation. </p></span></strong></span><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><span style="color:#cc0000;"><span style="color:#000000;"><span style="font-size:180%;">C</span>orrupt Zanu-PF Members of Parliament have been implicated in a massive inputs scandal involving a syndicate that looted maize seed and fertilizer that were procured under the South African R300 million aid to Zimbabwe to bail out Zimbabwe’s crippled agriculture sector.</span><strong> </strong></span><br /><br />The inputs were brought into the country recently but unfortunately fell in wrong hands of Zanu-PF members in influential positions.<br /><br />The revelations show that corrupt Zanu-PF members are abusing the South Africa's R300 million agriculture aid meant to support Zimbabwe's ailing farming sector.<br /><br />The MDC warned South Africa against handing over the aid to the Zanu-PF government before the conclusion of the inter-party talks. <em><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">see</span> </span></em><a href="http://southafrica-pig.blogspot.com/2009/01/south-africa-does-u-turn-gives-r300.html"><em><span style="font-size:85%;">South Africa does U-Turn Gives R300 Million Aid Direct to Zanu PF</span></em></a><em><span style="font-size:85%;"> </span></em></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">The eight corrupt Zanu-PF legislators, who are close allies of Mugabe, believed to be Mugabe's henchmen, were working cohorts with some farmers and members of the public to swindle large quantities of the ammonium nitrate, Compound D and maize seed.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Mugabe’s henchman, Brigadier General Douglas Nyikayaramba, handles the inputs that were sourced by South Africa.<br /><br />Nyikayaramba’s inputs committee has denied to name-and- shame the Zanu-PF thieves but sources in Parliament have promised to let the cat of the bag.<br /><br />However the four accused Zanu-PF supporters are Shingirai Mawere, Simon Machiri, Simbarashe Benhura, Paddington Mutasa.<br /><br />The other fraudsters are two Malawians who acquired 30 tonnes of Urea Fertilizer and 160 litres of diesel under unclear circumstances.<br /><br />The inputs committee says Mashonaland East Province tops the list of corruption cases, with 22 while six cases happened in Mashonaland East, and Matabeleland North has four cases. Mashonaland West and Masvingo have three cases each, while two cases were recorded in Harare.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">The process has lacked transparency and accountability. A key player in the distribution process is the Grain Marketing Board (GMB), a parastatal with a record of being a political agent of the state in Robert Mugabe’s food-for-votes schemes. GMB’s general manager, Albert Mandizha, who appears on Australia’s sanctions list, was senior assistant police commissioner . His predecessor was a former soldier.<br /><br />During the Zanu-PF conference in December, party members stole nine beasts, mealie-meal and other foodstuffs, as thuggery in the regime reared its ugly head.<br /><br />Zimbabwean farmers have failed to plant the summer crop due to a biting inputs shortage. Once Africa's breadbasket, the southern African nation has low agricultural outputs because of poor farming preparations.<br /><br />The UN says more than 5.5 million Zimbabweans require food aid this year.<br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><a class="ArticleTitle" href="http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=84&art_id=vn20090208103918992C425413" id="article-title" target="_blank">SA's R300m aid gift to Zim a 'waste of money'</a> <a href="http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=84&art_id=vn20090208103918992C425413"><em><span style="font-size:85%;">Independent online (SA)</span></em> </a></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><br /><a href="http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=84&art_id=vn20090208103918992C425413"><em><span style="font-size:85%;">Cape Argus</span></em></a><em><span style="font-size:85%;"> February 08 2009</span></em> <em><span style="font-size:85%;color:#cc0000;">(Do these boons have any clue about anything??)<br /></span></em><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2JGdSwQuG2hKWjBJsSzZvZ51u7s3dpSityTvXXvnNMdxw_B3L2bHcvh-hEk-0bmZWMR0k2AGRce3ZCpT8AkMbb53HcCVilOKvoNtHbSHlJ2oDhzxXPKVdkyrSOJiU7AwRbZZA7JjdIvc/s1600-h/Mugabe-Kwazvimba2009.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5306022808525343170" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2JGdSwQuG2hKWjBJsSzZvZ51u7s3dpSityTvXXvnNMdxw_B3L2bHcvh-hEk-0bmZWMR0k2AGRce3ZCpT8AkMbb53HcCVilOKvoNtHbSHlJ2oDhzxXPKVdkyrSOJiU7AwRbZZA7JjdIvc/s400/Mugabe-Kwazvimba2009.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 240px" /></a><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;">South African taxpayers' gift of R300-million to Zimbabwe was a waste of money and was misused for the benefit of President Robert Mugabe's cronies in Zanu-PF.</span></strong><br /><br />The donation - or aid - was announced late last year by Finance Minister Trevor Manuel, who pledged the gift would only be handed over after an internationally-recognised government of national unity was formed. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><em><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">see</span> </span></em><a href="http://southafrica-pig.blogspot.com/2009/01/south-africa-does-u-turn-gives-r300.html"><em><span style="font-size:85%;">South Africa does U-Turn Gives R300 Million Aid Direct to Zanu PF</span></em></a><em><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></em><br />President Kgalema Motlanthe repeated this assurance. </span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><br /><br />An instant SADC foundation, the Zimbabwe Development Assistance Framework, was formed to channel agricultural inputs to Zimbabwean farmers.<br /><br />This framework is still not yet fully operational and its impartiality has been questioned.<br /><br />The aid began moving into the country before Christmas.<br /><br />It is mostly seed, fertiliser and fuel from South African companies and was sent despite warnings from Zimbabwean agriculturalists that most of it was too late for this summer season, and unless distributed carefully would be abused.<br /><br />Most of the seed arrived months too late to plant and is being eaten, and the wrong fertiliser was ordered for this time of year in the maturation cycle of annual crops like maize.<br /><br />Before Christmas, 60 000 litres of diesel was also sent into Zimbabwe for distribution.<br />A senior civil servant, working in the depleted technical support network for farmers, Agritex, in the fertile Mashonaland West province, confirmed that South African aid was often only available to Zanu-PF supporters in parts of the country, particularly Mashonaland West, Mugabe's home province, and Mashonaland Central where Zanu-PF is also in control.<br /><br />The senior Agritex officer from Mashonaland West, who spoke on condition that he was not identified, said SADC had tried to provide for fair distribution by not using civil servants such as those from Agritex to disperse it.<br /><br />"The South Africans don't know how the system works. Not all of us are Zanu-PF. There are still a few professionals left in Agritex and we could have stopped this. The chiefs have to obey Zanu-PF even if they don't want to."<br /><br />In theory the monitoring of the South African-sponsored SADC aid was done by three church groups, seen by many Zimbabweans as aligned to Zanu-PF; the Evangelical Fellowship, the Zimbabwe Council of Churches and the Johannes Masowe Apostolic Church.<br /><br />At the height of the distribution last month the Catholics, cited as monitors in the department of agriculture circular, were supposed to have joined but had not yet been invited.<br /><br />Abdenico Bhebe, Movement for Democratic Change MP for Nkayi, one of the driest parts of Zimbabwe in the south west, said on Thursday his constituency had received no SADC aid packages.<br /><br />"Nothing, nothing, and there is also not enough food aid coming in either because the government is not fulfilling its part of the memorandum of understanding it signed with the NGO sector by providing 40 percent of food.<br /><br />"There is only Western food aid coming in, and people are hungry. We have received none of the SADC seeds and fertiliser but it would be too late now anyway."<br /><br />A hostile Agritex official at its head office in Harare denied that it was possible to misuse the aid, because he said a SADC official, whom he called Mr Whale, attended many of the distributions.<br /><br />But he conceded Whale couldn't be everywhere when the aid was handed out.<br /><br />Each village head was given - to dole out to seven or eight farmers in his precinct - three packs of South African seeds, 25kg of maize, 20kg of beans and 5kg of Rapoko, ground nuts, sorghum and cowpeas, and 50kg of fertiliser.<br /><br />Experienced seed growers for both commercial and communal farmers said the deadline for planting maize, sorghum and groundnuts passed in November, and that if seeds were sent to Zimbabwe after this, when so many people were hungry, they would all be "consumed as food".<br /><br />According to the latest Ministry of Agriculture circular, distribution began on January 19, although maize seed had arrived in Zimbabwe a week earlier.<br /><br />Most of the rest of the inputs arrived a week later.<br /><br />The World Food Programme has upped its estimates of Zimbabweans needing food aid from 5.2 million to more than 7 million and it says it does not have enough donations to buy food for those in need and so it cut rations again this month.<br /></span><br /><br /></p></span>

Corrupt Zanu-PF loots SA R300 million Aid to Zim

IN CASE anyone is concerned about what happened to the R300m worth of agricultural inputs SA gave to Zimbabwe at Christmas, your worst fea...

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Robert Mugabe has whip hand in coalition of convenience

<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4eYbW6yleFqdWwr1uDOAoR7NxYZkyDuakw9M2zLTfx-vT2ehyphenhyphen1YJnfNhfrNNzqzrkxLfqdAPzdfTyZIReayDiOA600e-kDhZlvATgeXLY7va68PFW3zIpiJ15VqY4TEEG9gFcrq5mi2U/s1600-h/MUGABE-MY-PRECIOUS.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5301688601447756978" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4eYbW6yleFqdWwr1uDOAoR7NxYZkyDuakw9M2zLTfx-vT2ehyphenhyphen1YJnfNhfrNNzqzrkxLfqdAPzdfTyZIReayDiOA600e-kDhZlvATgeXLY7va68PFW3zIpiJ15VqY4TEEG9gFcrq5mi2U/s400/MUGABE-MY-PRECIOUS.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 282px" /></a><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;">ROBERT MUGABE, the Zimbabwean president, will have the power to dismiss his arch-opponent from a government of national unity even though the two men have agreed to join forces in an effort to rescue the country’s ruined economy.<br /><br />Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), who will become prime minister, could be sacked for incompetence under the terms of a deal that leaves the 84-year-old president firmly in control.<br /></span></strong><br />There were mixed reactions to the deal in Zimbabwe. Some feared Mugabe would use Tsvangirai, 56, to extend his power. Others felt that the opposition leader would neutralise the president. One opposition sympathiser said she was “hop-ing for the best but preparing for the worst”.<br /><br />Many nonetheless applauded the opposition’s decision, hoping that a unity government would unlock overseas aid, which is needed to rebuild the shattered country.<br /><br />Western diplomats in Harare pointed out that development aid hinges on economic and political reform and Mugabe’s long history of reneging on commitments holds out little promise of change.<br /><br />The United States and Britain, Zimbabwe’s biggest aid donors, are unhappy that the deal leaves Mugabe in charge of security and the military.<br /><br />Britain provides £40m of emergency aid each year to Zimbabwe. That could be increased to £200m overnight if it is decided that Tsvangirai’s premiership will bring progressive government.<br /><br />One difficulty is that Britain and the US stated publicly in December that any government in which Mugabe served was unacceptable. British ministers now have a dilemma - do they eat their words and give aid, or do they deny Tsvangirai the assistance that he and Zimbabwe require? Britain’s decision is likely to influence other European donor nations.<br /><br />The US is in a less difficult position since President Barack Obama would not consider himself bound by President George W Bush’s officials.<br /><br />The need for aid is acute. Zimbabwe is fighting a cholera epidemic that has killed more than 3,100 and made more than 60,000 ill since August. The collapse of the health and sanitation infrastructure had made it impossible to bring the disease under control. In addition 80% of the population need food aid.<br /><br />The power-sharing arrangement will be fragile, at best. Half the new government ministers will be from Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party, which led Zimbabwe to its plight. Tsvangirai’s authority will be severely restricted: Mugabe will chair the cabinet; Tsvangirai will chair a council of ministers.<br /><br />Analysts said it was difficult to imagine such a divided government taking the steps that the crisis called for.<br /><br />One particularly unhappy feature for the opposition is its failure to win control of the police. Under the deal it will share responsibility for the interior ministry with Zanu-PF, an arrangement many see as unworkable. Mugabe retains control of the military and intelligence ministries.<br /><br />Nonetheless, Tsvangirai won his party’s reluctant backing for the coalition at the MDC’s national council on Friday after coming under pressure from southern African leaders.<br /><br />His predicament was reflected in his statement that “this government will serve as a transitional authority leading to free and fair elections”. Mugabe has never acknowledged that the unity government is a transitional entity and considers himself president for a full term of office.<br /><br />One fear is that Mugabe will use the government to smash the opposition, which has been severely weakened by intimidation and internal rivalry.</span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></span><p></p>

Robert Mugabe has whip hand in coalition of convenience

ROBERT MUGABE, the Zimbabwean president, will have the power to dismiss his arch-opponent from a government of national unity even though th...

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Mugabe junior ‘should be sent back to Harare’

<p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;">HONG KONG — The Hong Kong government was yesterday urged to review a decision to allow the daughter of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe to live and study in the city.</span></strong></span> <span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;"><p align="center"></span></strong><em><span style="font-size:78%;color:#000099;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5296088869299042242" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXCU4LM78IRrQaD-EBSK_EBC81SZTENIi0e7dDR-xGVKQi2H-gpeMkhXq-WGlHYikU5Z48q9ti5D3oF8AvVzLLkC3rSwvmtZI5MlMl8meqRp_48yuL97dXOrhz-PjmzZevdxZLqDKlp5g/s400/bona-mugabe.gif" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 216px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" />Bona Mugabe</span></em></p><p>Bona Mugabe — whose father is banned from travelling to Britain, the US and Europe — has been studying at the University of Hong Kong since late last year, according to the Sunday Morning Post newspaper.<br /><br />Bona Mugabe’s presence in Hong Kong emerged after her 43-year-old mother Grace allegedly assaulted photographer Richard Jones 10 days ago as he took pictures of her shopping while visiting the city.<br /><br />Robert Mugabe also reportedly visited Hong Kong in August, before being refused permission to fly on to China for the Olympic Games.<br /><br />Senior Hong Kong legislator Emily Lau Wai-hing called for a review of the decision to admit Bona Mugabe. She is studying under an assumed name and her identity is not known to her fellow students.<br /><br />Australia last year deported eight students whose parents were senior members of the Mugabe regime, saying it wanted to prevent those involved in human rights abuses giving their children education denied to ordinary Zimbabweans.<br /><br />Asked about Bona Mugabe’s admission, a University of Hong Kong spokeswoman said: “We believe that education should be above politics and young people should not be denied of the right to education because of their family background or what their parents have done.”<br /><br />She also denied there had been any negative reaction from fellow students to the presence of Bona Mugabe, saying: “We are not aware of any reactions relating to the case you refer to.<br /><br />“We believe that many of our students will share our belief of right of education for everybody and our view that people should not be responsible for what other members of their family have done.”<br /><br />A university official, who asked not to be named, said Bona Mugabe — who has returned to Zimbabwe with her mother for the Chinese New Year holiday — had enrolled under a different name and many students were unaware of her presence.<br /><br />When she returns to Hong Kong, the university would “keep a watchful eye more from a student life perspective”, the official said.<br /><br />Legislator Emily Lau called for a debate over the admission of students such as Bona Mugabe.<br /><br />“Because there is (currently) no policy, obviously anybody can come to study in Hong Kong. Nobody has ever raised this issue.<br /><br />“If a regime is so atrocious and responsible for the deaths and suffering of so many people every day, maybe there should be a way for us in Hong Kong to show our repugnance. Many people find Zimbabwe a very, very obnoxious regime.”<br /><br />Bona Mugabe’s presence has provoked an outcry from some residents, with one writing to a Sunday newspaper: “Send her back to be educated by the system that her father destroyed.<br /><br />“Could the (government) indicate why it allowed the daughter of a man who has so much blood on his hands to come to Hong Kong in the first place?” </p><p></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;color:#000099;"><em>See also:-</em></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;"></span><br /><em><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;"><a class="ArticleTitle" href="http://www.kbc.co.ke/story.asp?ID=55147" id="article-title" target="_blank">Mugabe's daughter studying at Hong Kong University: report</a> <a href="http://www.kbc.co.ke/story.asp?ID=55147">Kenya Broadcasting Corp </a><br /><a class="ArticleTitle" href="http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24965832-32682,00.html" id="article-title" target="_blank">Exposed: Mugabe girl Bona studies in Hong Kong</a> <a href="http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24965832-32682,00.html">The Australian </a></span></em><br /></p><span style="font-family:Arial;font-size:85%;"></span><p></p>

Mugabe junior ‘should be sent back to Harare’

HONG KONG — The Hong Kong government was yesterday urged to review a decision to allow the daughter of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe to...

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Lavish life of Mugabe’s looter-in-chief

<p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;">As starving Zimbabweans faced their bleakest Christmas ever, the head of the state bank puts the last touches to his 47-bedroom palace</span></strong></span><br /><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288732189621599506" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNnEJHnTbtgomCp0LKyteY4KMIgGv-pX0-XfVr3zI4uva4F2pWWh7GPA51lDvWzvcRP7Xe6kjpfmdYlfKTpNkQqoQAKlfBZFVd4nxFOyLeQe7s5FwuUFZkl_imC4DqD57cN-S6cRD66wQ/s400/Gono-50.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 274px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /></span></strong></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">IN the rich and leafy northern Harare suburb of Borrowdale Brook, Gideon Gono, who as governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe is President Robert Mugabe’s right-hand man and financial adviser, is having the finishing touches put to a lavish mansion that he started building several years ago.<br /><br />The castle-like house has 47 en suite bedrooms and a glass swimming pool with underlights, a gym bigger than many good houses in the Zimbabwean capital, a mini-theatre and landscaped gardens.<br /><br />His house is one of the biggest in Harare - bigger, in fact, than Mugabe’s, which is nearby, hidden behind a high wall and guarded by soldiers.<br /><br />No one except Gono knows for sure how much the mansion cost, but the architects originally said they expected it would reach more than $5m on completion. This is enough to build and equip at least four primary schools in Zimbabwe.<br /><br />Gono is not ready to move in just yet. Extra security sensors were recently installed on the outside perimeter and biometric iris recognition and finger print authentication systems were fitted in the interior, but he has yet to be convinced that it is entirely safe.<br /><br />Whether he moves house or not, Gono hardly had to face a miserable Christmas, unlike the millions whose lives have been wrecked by the once-prosperous country’s economic meltdown. They are coping with constant power and water cuts, food shortages and now the terror of cholera. The disease has struck because the government has spent so much money corruptly rather than investing in a clean water supply for its people.<br /><br />More than 1,100 have died in the epidemic, nearly 21,000 have been infected and there is no end in sight.<br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Gono, however, has plenty of houses and several farms that were seized from white commercial farmers over the years. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288731752253964674" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioGZ9KQLoeF-HpNY4x1TcKeNg6IzSgcHNoLhiwL0cfx-Gptuk6Gdz4pZv43cXUKRem_xYCZKRGKUitWFJgNNKTeNvrJpv-e7X_BgSZQ-BRHUTnDlP_eK_6kxED65aEZOChJuBHr_Bk248/s400/gono-mug-ape.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 271px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /><br />Zimbabwe was the breadbasket of southern Africa and one of the world’s top exporters of tobacco until 2000, when Mugabe started seizing white farms under the guise of redistributing them to black Zimbabweans to right the wrongs of the colonial past. But he gave them largely to his cronies and entourage.</span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></p></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><p></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">This chaotic land reform programme, plagued by violence, was condemned as racist by five African judges in southern Africa’s regional court in a test case bought by 78 farmers, a ruling that Zimbabwe has refused to accept although it is bound by treaty to do so.<br /><br />The land seizures have created chronic food shortages and a crisis that has led a third of the population to flee abroad and half of those remaining to depend on food aid to survive.<br /><br />As Mugabe’s right-hand man, Gono is a beneficiary of the crisis. “He has been looting big time,” said one of his many critics, a once wealthy Harare businessman who had crossed swords with Gono several times. “Mugabe has just reappointed him governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe [RBZ] for another five years, so it must be great for him.<br /><br />“Any loot that comes in he grabs. It is no longer the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe; it is a bank reserved for him and the president's cronies. If Mugabe has a degree in violence, which he has often said he has, Gono has a degree in corruption.”</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288736031734713426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0iJUiOV_OaEctMHCfbOLRvoTMGF1aw26Eoqx2CBXxkHkZgjudZ0EV7_nOx1zazqVq3qhWU4kMZoTe-vBynWDvOCfcAP7I4zxFyzirUfHaerWVkiKcslAekSS_cq84TbyBIK2gaqmYe-4/s400/gono-mugabe.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 277px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /> In fact, Gono, who started out as a tea boy at the central bank, has a doctorate in strategic management, but it is from a nonaccredited American university.<br /><br />Some of Gono’s farms are not in working order - far from unusual among Mugabe’s entourage, who have so many farms that they sometimes do not know what to do with them.<br /><br />Take the case of Elias Musakwa. A stalwart of Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party, he is a gospel singer at night with his own recording studio, a banker by day working with Gono in the upper echelons of the RBZ, and an occasional farmer at the weekend on a farm he seized.<br /><br />Last year he grabbed a dairy farm that once supplied 2% of Harare’s milk. It now has four goats and a few sheep, while hundreds of cows that produced the milk have perished. <br /><br />While so much is collapsing all around, one of Gono’s biggest farms near Norton, 50 miles from Harare, where he has installed two white managers, is fully functional, a glaring example of how he and the powerful men around Mugabe abuse their power. When it is dry, the farm draws water to irrigate the fields though a pipe-line linked to a reservoir 25 miles away which Gono installed at vast expense. The reservoir water is supposed to be for the people of Harare.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">The city has minimal municipal water of its own. In the poorest suburbs, where houses are made out of tin and plastic, children were playing in pools of untreated sewage last week and families were still collecting water from broken pipes.</span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"></p></span><p><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288744873098622226" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpfMRKnCB-NsiwPaSAo_4mKQZTx-6QDhig9svvzFhp-kt-sEoc354x-CdZNmgEIho3LqLk5IANJfSQ3xMIoIW5l_wWhGK1fLs0PMZbHXwcImx_WK0FiDr_qrASnUX2yVVVzk2WRcqMV_M/s400/zimbabwe-cholera-415x275.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 265px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Cholera has killed 224 people in Harare, with more than 9,000 suffering from it. Many affluent parts of the city have no municipal water but survive on a system of privately dug boreholes.<br /><br />In 2003, when Gono took office, inflation was 619%. It is now well in excess of 231m%. A police inspector’s Christmas bonus last week was worth one American cent on the widely used parallel black market. </span></p><span style="font-family:arial;"><p></span></p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Little wonder that, on Friday, anger against Gono spilt into the streets of Harare for the second time in a month. A mob threw rocks at the Reserve Bank building. Many were low-grade civil servants such as prison staff who had been trying to get money for Christmas, only to find that the banks had run out of cash despite the introduction that morning of new Z$1 billion, Z$5 billion and Z$10 billion notes.</span> <p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288744871886818274" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEha0RzzRiKZlzrXCSAJt2PizvfcIDO7GBy39HhrCIi5JS_1HPsJmF8CInyXUYubqPYpVftV4ajSQqZx91c8qWShNlYa9jnrXlx-LAbS0dznAO_iwTqBNNKxC9jK6UNgOXYbx1phPAPvlec/s400/zim-protesters.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 249px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">“We have fallen into the abyss,” said a friend. “Economically we were teetering on the edge. Now we have fallen over and it is demonstrable for a number of reasons. You go into a shop and if you don’t have US dollars you starve. People don’t want Zimbabwean dollars. They are worthless.”<br /><br />He pointed out of the window into a grubby lane below where people had dumped thousands of banknotes which had become redundant.<br /><br />There are many heroes in Zimbabwe still trying to make the country work. One is a 28-year-old male nurse at a Bulawayo hospital who was struggling this weekend to care for a ward of 63 children on his own.<br /><br />Unable to obtain their wages from the banks because of the shortage of banknotes, many of his colleagues have given up coming to work. It was too burdensome and expensive for them to travel or they have moved to South Africa to try to earn a living.<br />Behind the male nurse was the body of a two-year-old boy lying under a sheet on a table. He had died that morning from severe malnutrition and septicaemia from sores on his body.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288752441793591282" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLdlkmZ-aKBzSEEGlqhqJ_M1ubugvR5Ggg3ausE4fgReOo4H3hNy4FDzSJS5NUQGhxiQAbGZNxYUTuSjO0UR8ve7U5FPIwk1ORosWKd-Wqfsk0ti7h3kufAMoWowxzn4_NozJ-urf3zi4/s400/zim-food.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 387px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /> “We survive by so many ways,” the nurse said. “We adjust; we barter. I have been tempted to leave like many of my colleagues so many times, but I need to look after my mother, father and young brothers and sisters.”<br /><br />Looking at the small bundle beneath the sheet, he said: “This boy should never have died.”<br /><br />“When you meet somebody like that young man you feel that is why there is still hope in this country,” said Stella Allberry, health secretary of a faction of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change who has been jailed before. “The one God-given thing we have is hope. And the one thing I don’t want Mugabe to take from me is hope.”</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Hope for too many has disappeared, however. At a cholera clinic near the Mozambique border, a 23-year-old mother was watching her seven-year-old daughter die of cholera and malaria on Monday. It had taken her almost 12 hours to bring the child to the clinic on foot. Others were carried there in wheelbarrows.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288751020086106418" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNuzi7ssYMUSVt6ZEAmKfZR8c9U7UvzNr3DUMKxKni7ZwwH9LmqM3YqESteA3CEGCazRb5GEmcWqhX54PAoYpImw4IPl9E6gRqXy895JkFZ8UxhIO1pRrR4PLMmz-wygbgoeIKSgedMUU/s400/zim-cholera-clinic.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 290px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">As the country crumbled, Mugabe’s ruling Zanu-PF party was desperately trying to put on a show of unity at its annual party conference. Even before it began, the facade of unity was cracking. The party is increasingly riven with factionalism, shown by an unprecedented outbreak of fighting at its Harare headquarters on Monday night. Police had to use water cannons to break up a pitched battle over the election of a new leadership for Harare province.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">This internal party violence followed the mysterious wounding of Perence Shiri, the powerful air force chief, in an alleged assassination attempt, and the arrests and abduction of opposition members, human rights activists and journalists who have vanished without trace.<br /><br />The government charges that the opposition has set up secret military training camps in Botswana to overthrow it, aided by the West.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Zimbabwe is entering an unpredictable, unstable and dangerous phase. In the next few days Gono is expected to head off for a holiday in Malaysia. Mugabe would normally go there, too.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288758362983402658" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixY_MmTksrK6hUvykkMPR1_JYSMUmW8yaORGTK4gz4Vy9LS38V6QzMfpZd7i75FR9r_GSs69MUzK_q2SjENpSW3uoTpWNbMbcnyqBXDUJB90uI5yfamC1v2dskw7JF7z9nlCAvsNtcIHU/s400/mugabe-gono-l-i-c.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 267px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">Apart from a holiday, both men have assets in the region in the aftermath of western sanctions and it is a favourite destination. But diplomats last week wondered whether the 84-year-old president would risk leaving Zimbabwe at this time. </span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">He has been in power for 28 years and is outwardly still defiant. “Zimbabwe is mine,” he said, rejecting calls to step down. “I will never, never sell my country. I will never, never, never surrender.”<br /><br />Nor, say many suffering Zimbabweans, are they going to surrender hope for change as they celebrated the bleakest Christmas of their lives. </span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><br /><strong><span style="color:#000099;">Failed nation</span></strong><br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">- Health</span><br />The toll from cholera has left more than 1,100 dead; 1.3m people have HIV.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">- Economy</span><br />Official inflation rate is 231m% and 80% of workforce are unemployed.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">- Hunger</span><br />47% of population undernourished, 34% of children under five chronically malnourished.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">- Political violence</span><br />200 opposition activists were killed, 5,000 abducted and 200,000 forced to flee in June presidential election.<br /><br /><strong><span style="font-size:85%;color:#000099;"><em>Sources: United Nations, WHO, media reports</em></span> </strong></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><strong><br /></strong></span></p>

Lavish life of Mugabe’s looter-in-chief

As starving Zimbabweans faced their bleakest Christmas ever, the head of the state bank puts the last touches to his 47-bedroom palace IN th...

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South Africa does U-Turn Gives R300 Million Aid Direct to Zanu PF

<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSWe3TFNRqjMZut-Xg7FlKeu9xG5BXxKLo_yiZxoJvMj5JwXROzPcKRC9Wsod-Y6GfK_pi_rOzMoAxCENQ2q-A2I_7rb3pHg0e-l5ugOA_LgAk3aGUghk59iuSXp_6Dzo3O5ph8LIArUY/s1600-h/mug-zim-zanu-pf.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5288731078425356370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSWe3TFNRqjMZut-Xg7FlKeu9xG5BXxKLo_yiZxoJvMj5JwXROzPcKRC9Wsod-Y6GfK_pi_rOzMoAxCENQ2q-A2I_7rb3pHg0e-l5ugOA_LgAk3aGUghk59iuSXp_6Dzo3O5ph8LIArUY/s400/mug-zim-zanu-pf.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 352px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 383px" /></a><strong><span style="color:#cc0000;"><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">The South African government has gone against its word and provided the regime in Harare with farming inputs, forming part of the 300 million rand package it promised to dispense only when a unity government was in place.</span></strong></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><span style="color:#cc0000;"></span></span><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><span style="color:#000000;">But Zimbabwe's agriculture Minister Rugare Gumbo confirmed to the state media this week that farming inputs forming part of the aid package had arrived in the country.</span><br /><br />This contravenes the conditions of the aid that were outlined in September when the plan was announced, which said the R300m in aid was conditional upon the successful formation of a unity government between Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF and the two factions of the MDC.<br /><br />South Africa has also failed to explain why and how inputs have been given to the regime, when they announced back in September that they would only provide funds through aid agencies and Non Governmental Organisations.<br /><br />Responding to what it called 'confusing reports in the media' South African government spokesperson Thabo Masebe confirmed that they were providing the aid to Zimbabwe. He however said it would be released through new SADC mechanisms that were announced last week and they were satisfied that it would reach the intended recipients in a non-partisan manner. He did not explain the Zimbabwe state media reports that said the aid was already there.<br /><br />It is well known that Mugabe uses food aid as a political tool and blocks it's distribution to areas that voted for the MDC in the March elections. Farming inputs are also distributed in a partisan manner, given only to ZANU PF card carrying members.<br /><br /><span style="color:#cc0000;">MDC MP for Mbare in Harare, Piniel Denga, told us they 'smelt a rat' when it was announced during last week's ZANU PF conference in Bindura that their supporters would get a Christmas bonus of farming inputs.</span><br /><br />'Since we knew they lacked the capacity to buy these inputs we just wondered where the goods would come from, but now we know thanks to the state media. <span style="color:#cc0000;">The South African government can never be trusted on issues concerning ZANU PF, they protect and look after their interests</span>,' Denga claimed.<br /><br />The legislator added; 'What the South Africans should know is that by giving inputs like fertilizer to ZANU PF is as good as sprinkling it along the mighty Zambezi river - just wait and see.'<br /><br /></span></p>

South Africa does U-Turn Gives R300 Million Aid Direct to Zanu PF

The South African government has gone against its word and provided the regime in Harare with farming inputs, forming part of the 300 millio...

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'Major failure of leadership'

<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjQJPxa29KSiNBGvKxmwnSzatfqE_SxOhtmJUxfICNAVmK7oE-yMsZBanfRx67XZVSAsq7Wpl95kTttOfJJjLw40HK42DGY0YZUWofFT1bht-pjv0o-pAfuAVcb9VA1L1BtXacH8froXM/s1600-h/ZimWorldCuplarge.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5270228757873313138" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjQJPxa29KSiNBGvKxmwnSzatfqE_SxOhtmJUxfICNAVmK7oE-yMsZBanfRx67XZVSAsq7Wpl95kTttOfJJjLw40HK42DGY0YZUWofFT1bht-pjv0o-pAfuAVcb9VA1L1BtXacH8froXM/s400/ZimWorldCuplarge.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 346px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" /></a> <span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><em><span style="font-size:85%;color:#000099;">By Eddie Cross</span></em><br /><br />As you all know the SADC summit took place last Sunday with five heads of state attending, and with officials and ministers representing those who could not attend.<br /><br />They deliberated for 12 hours and then issued a communique that basically endorsed the position adopted by Thabo Mbeki and then the SADC troika.<br /><br />The most significant part of the exercise was that all 14 states supported the decisions reached. There were no dissenting views.<br /><br />It was a minor political victory for Robert Mugabe, Mbeki and the troika. It was a major failure of leadership.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjECF3XJN4HSlknKrhA-0S4XCtZj-aA4TSOq9PWHOwtUgMu0z93a2VBMANIfXHazO0hFxM2R-pdyOVkMf4IRxfODGllIeS35lxZ6s-rCuC7Ec3fE6yRP-ofDiSDLjA2OWpXlmDCnI0CPJM/s1600-h/zim-mugabe-must-go.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5270211348756437250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjECF3XJN4HSlknKrhA-0S4XCtZj-aA4TSOq9PWHOwtUgMu0z93a2VBMANIfXHazO0hFxM2R-pdyOVkMf4IRxfODGllIeS35lxZ6s-rCuC7Ec3fE6yRP-ofDiSDLjA2OWpXlmDCnI0CPJM/s400/zim-mugabe-must-go.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 287px" /></a>The final decision that the two main parties should share control of the ministry of home affairs, and that the rest of the power-sharing deal should stand as agreed by Mbeki, is neither rational nor workable.<br /><br />It ignores the political realities in Zimbabwe, reduces the chance of success for the new government and could lead to the total collapse of the deal if the Movement for Democratic Change decides to reject the package.<br /><br />In a rerun of the Kenyan situation - in which regional leaders striving for compromise imposed a solution on Kenya that is a hydra-headed monster, barely capable of walking, let alone running the country - the SADC states have taken the easy route.<br /><br />In doing so they have run the risk of creating a failed state in Zimbabwe and unleashing uncontrollable violence and destruction. </span><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">But, take it or leave it, it's a done deal and an appeal to the African Union or the United Nations, both dysfunctional institutions, will change little. This is the end of the road for negotiations.<br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV-N869enFRwP_InDINXclXku3J5gd1skUaxlrvOawdHsXQozRlMw4oHMx5rSUkmdFR5axLtahIRVGbP-qA3fRYHC2J0FHb1TH6_85_oqw8wH1WlcsXUSbPEHDD608kCaypsfArIYqhvc/s1600-h/mugabe_bmbata.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5270207465745257682" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV-N869enFRwP_InDINXclXku3J5gd1skUaxlrvOawdHsXQozRlMw4oHMx5rSUkmdFR5axLtahIRVGbP-qA3fRYHC2J0FHb1TH6_85_oqw8wH1WlcsXUSbPEHDD608kCaypsfArIYqhvc/s400/mugabe_bmbata.jpg" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 267px" /></a><br />At this stage Zimbabwe's future is totally in the MDC and Morgan Tsvangirai's hands.<br /><br />If we accept what has been decided and go into the new government on this basis, we will be committing ourselves to a near-impossible task.<br /><br />It will be up to us to turn the economy around, establish conditions for free and fair elections in two years' time, and to try and heal the country, now more deeply divided than ever.<br /><br />In this exercise neither Zanu-PF nor the Arthur Mutambara group have anything to offer, except to try and not be spoilers.<br /><br />They bring nothing to the table except failure and corruption, and unrepresentative participation in the state's institutions.<br /><br />Not one of the Mutambara representatives in the new government will be elected, while the great majority of the Zanu-PF representatives hold their seats through intimidation and rigging.<br /><br />The problems facing any new government are staggering.</span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZChDzIIm31ihmcuOyNlwSk5j4ytmF_ETBuRVjV_4tJ3TIjwcFmRc1eWGDqE40fBVleH7_QE-AH-97awYtRN7mf211jdMN6pYyPKu4jQq33ZzLEwcXMijM_-BkvCpbQ5v52wYQPKAdF2Q/s1600-h/zim-usa.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5270228313285073874" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZChDzIIm31ihmcuOyNlwSk5j4ytmF_ETBuRVjV_4tJ3TIjwcFmRc1eWGDqE40fBVleH7_QE-AH-97awYtRN7mf211jdMN6pYyPKu4jQq33ZzLEwcXMijM_-BkvCpbQ5v52wYQPKAdF2Q/s400/zim-usa.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 267px" /></a></span></p><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDAalMR3OiORaBOEcETCIN5y3ps7xVsObuQjk8cTsnrNgKODLl8JNxLn3qU3iYFAfg7PPuog5KpgNatasxW93K8aOLlCkrK8s403HdVh29G7J_zSHPtyQ2u7z0J_6OZ4GYhveKT04S8aQ/s1600-h/zim-cholera.jpg"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTSRVFGJ_QCZB8etzH5VO9M8kk504_qxleAgv-4BxhrDhfe01R6BLus67NMb2vKGPpq8Y9pBSTNpFQkCplr5R2SXCwv-BwTiOtf3r8GRPjwisPhfA7kCewejw0vZct6605cghyphenhyphenzOFGZas/s1600-h/zim-starvation.jpg"></a>Gross Domestic Product has collapsed to less than half of what it was 10 years ago, the currency is worthless and cannot be used for ordinary transactions anymore, and thousands are dying weekly from starvation, malnutrition and disease.<br /><br />About 95 percent of all teachers in the public sector are not working, three million children are out of school and hospitals and clinics are either closed or non-functional.<br /><br />Food supplies have run out and everywhere people are desperately looking for whatever food is available.<br /><br />The latest news is the aid agencies feeding the majority of the people will run out of food in January, and are cutting allocations by half in December to try and reach four million of the most affected people.<br /><br />The MDC's dilemma is that if it walks away from the SADC deal it will leave ordinary Zimbabweans naked in a blizzard that will offer only death or flight.<br /><br />The tragedy of this situation is that Mugabe and Zanu-PF do not give a damn. They want the deal to fail and think they can do "very well" on what is left of the Zimbabwe economy.<br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_9cAYzCT3JGtF7d3GKsNBpCbpaYgBKIRVsSekaaR2heWoDYL_Qu-SLOoRobdhyphenhyphena8vaIx_UPXSYOaqGWyZi7VnbJU9FWn6R4IzKNtZEL6OKg366oUFDXPjnyBHvEWs7DXeyG0C0gvU1VA/s1600-h/zim-poor.jpg"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXjVW-FurhbMdZSZD5wfOSVuOvyaskxDfoK5k9hJolaFqsmiEWpWSFFi5JgDOCOVpSIJoyeXMcqnNhUpGSihaonWkHbVegGX6VfnjlQ57RK3pbA3wTnXsz50PlUvXVTx1mRR62uSiVjGQ/s1600-h/zim-WFP.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5270228502328548626" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXjVW-FurhbMdZSZD5wfOSVuOvyaskxDfoK5k9hJolaFqsmiEWpWSFFi5JgDOCOVpSIJoyeXMcqnNhUpGSihaonWkHbVegGX6VfnjlQ57RK3pbA3wTnXsz50PlUvXVTx1mRR62uSiVjGQ/s400/zim-WFP.jpg" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 280px" /></a><br />They do not worry in any sense about the impact of Zimbabwe's final collapse on our neighbours. They are only concerned about one thing - how to hold on to their total control of the state and thereby protect their standard of living and personal security.<br /><br />The tragedy of the SADC summit is that it is clear that after all these years - and numerous declarations of commitment to democratic principles and all the recognised human and political rights - when it comes to applying those lofty principles to a real-time political crisis in their midst, they mean nothing.<br /><br />But that is the reality of African politics at this stage in our history. Not pretty or easy, but the stark reality.<br /><br />So, what do we do?<br /><br />Our national council met last week after receiving a report from the leadership, together with recommendations on the way forward.<br /><br />Unlike our compatriots, we care, we care deeply for the plight of Zimbabweans - all of them affected by the collapse and crisis created by failed leadership, greed and corruption.<br /><br />This time the consequences of rejection of a flawed deal for our people will be immediate and terrible.<br /><br />Morgan Tsvangirai stated in Johannesburg that a million people face death from starvation if the SADC-brokered deal collapses. He was not exaggerating. </span></p>

'Major failure of leadership'

By Eddie Cross As you all know the SADC summit took place last Sunday with five heads of state attending, and with officials and ministers ...

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Mugabe the Great - African success story

<p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">In recent years, outcry against Mugabe has increased. This is due to one reason, jealousy. Robert Mugabe is a financial genius! Ol' Robert has made Zimbabweans Billionairs, with a big B...literally!<br /><p></span></p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><em><span style="font-size:85%;color:#000099;">Zimbabwe Z$100 billion bearer cheque. It looks like a bank note and is issued by the Reserve Bank but it has an expiry date on it of 31 December 2008.</span></em> </span><p><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5271842421236135794" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimRge-cp2v7BQ4J8QVY6kumEN6gNU274Il9vQH6AXXu3dSha2iszDC19JsyCGCXTuzSkxdN2gPEZjY6oK4MhzrQRkR6ef2G25ZY36HkOVYKbJTq_AsbYw_PUIgqbqH-I8ls8jg1ESY5Wg/s400/zim+100billion+note.jpg" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 279px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" />In July this year Zimbabwe introduced a bank-note worth Z$100bn in response to rampant inflation - but the note barely covers the cost of a loaf of bread.<br /><br />Some Zimbabweans are already calling for higher denominations in a country where the official annual inflation rate has exceeded 2,200,000%.<br /><br />Independent economists believe the real rate is many times higher.<br /><br />Zimbabwe's meltdown has left at least 80% of the population in poverty, facing mass shortages of basic goods.<br /><br />The country's central bank has introduced several new notes already this year in response to the hyperinflation.<br /><br />In January, a Z$10 million note was issued, followed by a Z$50 million. By June the denominations had reached tens of billions.<br /><br />Daily bread<br /><br />In a notice in the state-controlled Herald newspaper, central bank governor Gideon Gono said the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe would introduce the new notes - known as special agro-cheques - to help consumers.<br /><br />But Zimbabwe residents say the latest note is already worthless, and does not even cover their daily lunch.<br /><br />"Nowadays, for my expenses a day, I need about Z$500 billion," one resident said.<br /><br />"So Z$100 billion can't do anything because for me to go home I need Z$250 billion, so this [note] is worthless." </span></p>

Mugabe the Great - African success story

In recent years, outcry against Mugabe has increased. This is due to one reason, jealousy. Robert Mugabe is a financial genius! Ol' Robe...

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Mbeki Sanctioned Mugabe Power-Grab, Says Party

<p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4yoDbeDxYt7uEkM0cWeG28Fr5qqHD1kRQTVvXFtwCftFwXpRYr4skYdZET0_fKm53xF4D4mvyqZv5hCRtIMxKch9J-qbIRY_HyZ2rwUJ-j1Cj_JTXEjIf32i25eVs-oH4tKoWNOCNvqA/s1600-h/mbekimugabeapril2008.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5261587068955226770" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4yoDbeDxYt7uEkM0cWeG28Fr5qqHD1kRQTVvXFtwCftFwXpRYr4skYdZET0_fKm53xF4D4mvyqZv5hCRtIMxKch9J-qbIRY_HyZ2rwUJ-j1Cj_JTXEjIf32i25eVs-oH4tKoWNOCNvqA/s400/mbekimugabeapril2008.jpg" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 257px" /></a><span style="font-family:arial;font-size:130%;">THE two factions of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) are seething with anger ahead of the make-or-break Monday meeting of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Organ on Politics, Security and Defence over what they perceive as bias on the part of the facilitator, Thabo Mbeki, in favour of President Robert Mugabe.<br /><br />Details of the former South African president's mediation effort leaked to The Financial Gazette following his week-long visit that culminated in the dispute over the allocation of ministries being referred to the SADC Troika indicate that Mbeki believes President Mugabe's plan is sufficient to pacify the two MDCs.<br /><br />Sources privy to the stop-go negotiations said Mbeki's view is likely to resonate with the members of the SADC Troika, comprising Angola, Mozambique and Swaziland, which would be represented at the meeting by Prime Minister, Sibusiso Dlamini.<br /><br />President Mugabe had agreed to cede the Finance Ministry to the MDC-T and had no problem with his party sharing the Home Affairs Ministry with Morgan Tsvangirai's faction.<br /><br />But this week the MDC said the details contained in a document entitled "Reflections and Proposals of the Facilitation: Towards the Achievement of the Objectives of Equity and power-sharing in the Constitution of the Inclusive Government in Harare", buttressed its claims that Mbeki should be replaced as mediator in the eight-year-long crisis for being partisan.<br /><br />"This document proves what we have been saying, that Mbeki is not an honest broker," said Tendai Biti, the secretary-general of the MDC-T. "He wants us to rubber-stamp the allocation of ministries as ZANU-PF deems fit. As I have mentioned before, we refuse to ride a bicycle without wheels," he added.<br /><br />Priscilla Misihairabwi-Mushonga, deputy secretary general of the MDC-Mutambara, said her political formation was aware of Mbeki's proposals.<br /><br />"But we are going to be putting our responses on Monday next week before and in the presence of the Troika," she said.<br /><br />"However, I am not in a position to say whether we agree or disagree with contents of the Mbeki statement," added Misihairabwi-Mushonga.<br /><br />Patrick Chinamasa, the ZANU-PF chief negotiator, was not immediately available for comment at the time of going to print.<br /><br />The Financial Gazette can reveal that Mbeki, who returned home last Saturday after the three principals to the power-sharing deal reached a stalemate, saw no problem in ZANU-PF being allocated about 10 ministries the MDC-T considered key to the economic turn-around and political transformation of the country.<br /><br />These included the contentious ministries of Home Affairs, Defence, National Security, Foreign Affairs, Agriculture, Local Government and Land Resettlement.<br /><br />There is also a dispute over the appointment of 10 provincial governors and delays in issuing Tsvangirai a replacement passport.<br /><br />An eight-page document Mbeki circulated among the three parties last Friday as the basis of his proposals was almost in sync with the list of ministries gazetted by President Mugabe on October 10, before the talks began.<br /><br />In the document dated October 17, Mbeki says the priority tasks agreed by the parties when they signed the power-sharing agreement defined which, among the various portfolios, would serve as Ministries.<br /><br />He groups the priority tasks into seven categories: adoption of a new constitution, rule of law, restoration of economic stability, the land question, state organs and institutions, delivery of social services and national healing, cohesion and unity.<br /><br />He proposes the allocation to the MDC-T of the Ministry of Constitutional and Parliamentary Affairs, responsible for overseeing an envisaged new constitution-building process.<br /><br />Mbeki also proposed the Ministry of Home Affairs be co-chaired "since all the parties recognised the rights of all citizens to a safe and secure environment in which the police service plays an important part, both ZANU-PF and MDC-T share the responsibility."<br /><br />He says the Ministry of Economic Planning and Investment Promotions, allocated to the MDC T, would play the leading role in the overall development and implementation of the Economic Plan within which the all-inclusive government will pursue the objective of economic recovery.<br /><br />Mbeki proposed that eight other ministries directly relevant to the recovery of the economy be allocated to ZANU-PF, four to MDC-T and two to the MDC-M.<br /><br />Under the set up, ZANU-PF would have Transport, Local Government, Urban and Rural Development, Mines, Mining Development, Lands and Resettlement, Agriculture, Environment and Natural Resources, Tourism and Small and Medium Enterprises and Cooperative Development while MDC-T takes Energy and Power Development, State Enterprises and Parastatals, Information Communication Technology and Public Works. </span><p>

Mbeki Sanctioned Mugabe Power-Grab, Says Party

THE two factions of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) are seething with anger ahead of the make-or-break Monday meeting of the Southe...

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