Land of Contrasts

Today I went to Kambuzuma, a high density suburb, to a meeting with our HIV/Aids orphan support partner. We went to visit houeseholds, where the orphans live usually with their extended family, to assess their most urgent needs. Usually it was money for school fees, food, a school uniform or shoes. Then an old woman, that cannot walk anymore, convinced me. She said she rather wants her house extended to two more rooms. At the moment she lives in an approximately 15 m2 house with four orphans. With two more she could use one for the kids and rent the other one out. This way she would get enough money to cater for herself.

However today I also went to the richest part of town to buy the milk we had ordered. Highly organised germany could learn from the way they are managing that. First you have to manage to get into that area, then you join all the other housewifes and gardeners waiting. You will get a number, just like at the employment agency. When the milk finally arrives, everyone queues happily according to those numbers. They check if everyone is in his place and then it starts. When it is your turn you go to the first desk, say your name and the lady will check if you really have ordered milk and how much. You give her your number, get another piece of paper, go to the next desk to pay and the you finally get your milk. The only problem is: that takes about two hours.

Maintaining Fridges

You don't have to worry about defrosting your fridges regularly in Zimbabwe - the national electricity supplier does that for you!

From the news: New Law on Foreign-Owned Businesses

From The Financial Times, 26 September

Zimbabwe law hits foreign groups

By Alec Russell in Johannesburg

Zimbabwe’s parliament passed a law on Wednesday giving the state controlling stakes in foreign-owned businesses, including banks and mines. It happened in the face of warnings from the opposition and businesses that the law would have catastrophic consequences for Zimbabwe’s already crumbling economy. (...) But as they battle to stay in power, allies of Robert Mugabe, the president, have insisted it will be enforced and justified it as an attempt to lift up the masses. "We cannot continue to have a skewed economic environment where our people are not able to fully participate," Paul Mangwana, the indigenisation and economic empowerment minister, told parliament. (...) MPs from the opposition Movement for Democratic Change walked out of parliament in protest as Mr Mugabe’s ruling Zanu PF party pushed the bill through. They argued that the bill is aimed at enriching a few leading figures in Zanu PF and winning votes in the parliamentary and presidential elections scheduled for next March.

Burma

There are a lot of parallels between the situation in Burma and in Zimbabwe. Only that it seems that they have already reached their last straw.

Check http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/country_profiles/1300003.stm for info on Burma

Giraffe meat

From The Observer (UK), 23 September

It's personal. Brown will not give in over Mugabe

(...) And so the impasse continues - Mugabe's critics accuse him of economic mismanagement, failure to curb corruption and contempt for democracy, Mugabe accuses his domestic opposition and the West of colluding to destroy his economy, which suffers acute shortages and inflation that, according to the International Monetary Fund, may hit 100,000 per cent by the end of the year - and now of being Scottish. Meanwhile yesterday, on the outskirts of Zimbawe's capital, Harare, where food shortages are rife and transport services and energy supplies are crippled, the police were occupied with curbing a situation of civil unrest - trying to stop a hungry crowd of desperate people from killing 'for the pot' an adult giraffe that had wandered into a township.

The eleven commandments of driving in Zimbabwe

1) There is no speed limit

2) Cars that drive slowly (about 20kmph) always stick to the far right side of the lane

3) Drunk driving is part of everyday life

4) Watch out for road holes

5) Bicycles do not need reflectors nor lights

6) Get used to driving without the help of street lamps and sign-posting

7) A speed hump sign does not necessarily mean that there is a speed hump ahead

8) No speed hump sign does not necessarily mean that there is no speed hump and speed humps are not necessarily painted

9) Keep your long distance lights always switched on when driving in the hours of darkness. Do not switch them off when another car is approaching you

10) Get off the road as fast as you can when you hear a siren. The president is approaching you.

11) Treat cattle on the road like if you were in India

Thank you Mr Brown

After pressure by the archbishop of York and others Gordon Brown threatens not to attend the EU Africa summit in December if Mugabe will be invited to the summit.

The European Union-African Union summit will take place in Lisbon in December. The travel ban on Mugabe could be lifted to allow him to attend the summit.

Brwon said that Mr Mugabe has an EU travel ban for a reason - "the abuse of his own people".

Gordon Brown also said:
"I believe President Mugabe's presence would undermine the summit, divert attention from the important issues that need to be resolved. In those circumstances, my attendance would not be appropriate."

Now the EU ist under pressure!

more isolation

Today China has announced it will end its development aid to Zimbabwe by the end of the year. That is Mugabe's last big friend gone.
Also today British airways announced to stop flying directly to Harare.

Black or white farms - what do you prefer

I have asked a few rural families if the times when there were still the huge "white farms" where better, or if it is better now. These were all families that live on the land that formerly belonged to those "white farms". Of course, asking a few people does not provide a representative sample of the whole population. However, as I thought their answers were very interesting, I want to present them here.

Every single one said, he or she preferred the "old times" because:

1. It was a lot easier to find work in rural areas on the farms.

2. Farms that are now in the hands of black people only use a little part of the land they have and therefore offer less jobs ...

3. and usually pay the official wage, which is ridiculous because of the hyperinflation, whereas the little white farms that still exist (mostly reduced in size) would pay a more realistic wage.

I do not mean to be in favour of giving the land back to the whites or that it should still belong to the whites, but I do mean that something definitely went wrong in that land reform.

Starving Election Campaign

Zimbabwean election campaigns seem to have a strange dimension. In some rural areas, the world food programme is not allowed to drop off food anymore until after the next elections. Starving the population is a means to make them vote for the right party next time.

good question. What can outsiders do?

A friend from the Netherlands just asked me this question.

A Boycott is definitely better than just sending money somewhere. For example not letting Mugabe go to the EU-Africa-Meeting would be good for politics here inside the country. And then, in the short run of course people need food and water and medical aid. But that wouldn't help to build the economy up again - what I mean is it doesn't fix the water pipes, it doesn't make the agriculture work again, it doesn't make the companies produce again. For that you really need a regime change first and then manpower. People that start up something here. But of course an outsider can't do that. So it probably goes back to political pressure. Let the whole world know about it. Offer refugees from Zimbabwe a place to stay and bringing him to an international court immediately.

So it seems quite hard for outsiders to do something - and also for me that I am an outsider in the country.

Collapse

Been out this weekend to Nyanga in the Eastern Highlands. A beautiful place, the nature is amazing!
But it really feels like collapse when you know that on the way from Harare to Nyanga, there used to be a lot of farming and there is almost nothing anymore except people burning down huge areas for whatever reason I don't know.
And it really feels like collapse when you see that nobody is looking after the roads anymore and nobody is looking after the electricity lines and the water pipes anymore.
Ans it really feels like collapse when you know that Zimbabweans used to produce enough food for themselves and exported a huge amount to all the neighbouring countries while Zimbabwe is now importing I guess 99% of its food.
And it really feels like collapse when you sit at dinner in the evening with a candle on the table as the only light in the room.

milk only for posh

imagine a rich suburb like most people would think of in Latin America: a gate, a guard: "no through road", only for cardholders. maximum security outside minimum security inside. Inside there are no fences and no walls around these nice houses. to make people feel free from all the bad locals hanging around in this country.
you go there to pick up milk that you ordered and that the inhabitants of this rich suburb are selling. You struggle to convince the guard to let you in and then you see the nice ladies, dressed in expensive designer clothes, driving impressive cars and they ask you: "what, you don't even live here??? We are so sorry this milkselling activity is only for inhabitants of this area. If we sell it to others we won't have enough for ourselves. "
ARRRRGGH

Motorists should get used to being pedestrians

From The Zimbabwe Independent, 14 September

Minister says walk to save fuel

Pindai Dube

The Minister of Energy and Power Development Mike Nyambuya said motorists should get used to being pedestrians to save the scarce drops of fuel available in the country. Speaking at the official opening of the National Oil Company of Zimbabwe (Noczim) service station in Matshobana on Wednesday, Nyambuya said motorists should adjust to being pedestrians as the supply of fuel was not improving. "The country is facing critical fuel shortages and as government, we encourage all Zimbabweans to reduce the number of cars on the country’s roads and walk to save the scarce fuel we have," Nyambuya said. Analysts said Nyambuya’s statement was an admission that government was failing to find a lasting solution to the country’s fuel problems which started in 1999. Nyambuya said the new Noczim service station had the capacity to hold 55 000 litres of petrol, 55 000 litres of diesel and 10 000 litres of paraffin.

"In most developed countries, especially in Western countries company executives wearing expensive suits use public transport or walk to work but here in Zimbabwe one person wants to have 10 cars on the road each day," Nyambuya said. Zimbabwe has been facing serious fuel shortages on the formal market after the government in June gave the cash-strapped Noczim a monopoly to import fuel after the imposition of a freeze on prices.

Why???

The ruling party will be jubilant, and the state media will be jubilant, if Mugabe goes to this summit. No matter what is happening there, here inside the country it will be seen as a huge political victory. And according to the Herald there will surely be standing ovations on the summit for Mugabe again.

From The Mail & Guardian (SA), 11 September

Commonwealth: EU should invite Mugabe to summit

Ingrid Melander

Brussels - The European Union (EU) should invite Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe to a planned summit with Africa because barring him would jeopardise relations between Africa and Europe, the Commonwealth's secretary general said. The EU and Africa want to hold their first summit in seven years early December in Portugal. But they first need to overcome the problem of whether to invite Mugabe, whom the West and rights groups accuse of human rights violations. Plans for an EU-Africa summit have been on hold for years because Britain and other EU countries have refused to attend if Mugabe is there, while African countries have refused to come if he is barred. Some EU officials have suggested Zimbabwe could be represented at a lower level than Mugabe, perhaps by the country's foreign minister. "It's useful to have him [Mugabe] there for the dialogue to go on," Commonwealth chief Don McKinnon told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday during a two-day visit to Brussels. "Africa's relation with the EU is very important. If the dialogue gets cancelled because Africa refused to get on with the request [to veto him], it would be a bigger problem."

Zimbabwe left the Commonwealth in 2003 after being suspended the previous year. The body groups Britain and 52 mostly former British colonies, 18 of which are African nations. Portugal, the current EU president, is keen to improve relations between the bloc and Africa and has said it will not discriminate among African states. But diplomats say some EU leaders such as Britain's Gordon Brown are not keen to share a forum with Mugabe. "The EU makes it very difficult for Africans," McKinnon said, adding that he had been in African countries where "Mugabe is still very much a hero". An aide to McKinnon said the Commonwealth, which supports projects on democracy and development, could eventually be willing to re-engage with Zimbabwe, but only under certain conditions. "A democratic Zimbabwe would need to make an overture to come back and we would make the overture to receive it," John Philips said. Mugabe blames Western sanctions for galloping hyper-inflation, food shortages and a spiralling economic crisis. Critics say the 83-year-old leader has destroyed the economy with his policy of taking over white-owned farms.

Cars before people

From VOA News, 11 September

Sparing with food assistance, Harare splashes out on luxury cars for top officials

By Patience Rusere and Blessing Zulu

The government of Zimbabwe last week earmarked some US$11 million for food aid to an increasingly hungry population - but meanwhile it's splashing out more than US$20 million to buy luxury vehicles and SUVs for ministers and members of parliament. Harare’s allocation of Z$347 billion dollars for food aid in the supplementary budget it took to parliament last week will only pay for about 36,000 metric tonnes of grain out of the estimated 450,000 to 500,000 tonnes needed to feed the country for the next three months - in other words less than 10% of the fourth-quarter requirement. That Z$347 billion translates into some US$11million dollars at the official exchange rate of Z$30,000 for one U.S. dollar. Meanwhile, grain on the world market is running between US$300 and US$350 per metric tonne, agricultural experts said. The government said it’s targeting some 600,000 households, or some 3.6 million people, according to the experts, who figure six people per household.

(...)

Finance Ministry sources said President Robert Mugabe’s top of the line Mercedes Benz S600 cost around US$250,000. His ministers are getting Mercedes Benz E240 sedans and Toyota Land Cruiser Prados. An official at the Zimbabwe Motor Company said Mercedes E240s cost some 53,000 euros each, or around US$73,000. Senators and house members must settle for vehicles costing less than US$30 000. Director Godfrey Kanyenze of the Labor and Economic Development Research Institute told reporter Blessing Zulu of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that with an election on the horizon, and factionalism on the rise inside Zanu PF, President Mugabe will give priority to appeasing senior ruling party officials.

African Markets

Compared to african markets, ikea on a saturday is not crowded at all! I have spend this saturday on one, with to african companions. Which was good because people wouldn't let me go. It was all over: " hello madam, how are u - hello sister i do everything for u - do u wanna buy - i am hungry,..."

But there was loads of sugar and oil on the black market - for probably ten times the official price. But even here no flour or mealy meal

from the news and it is so true!!!

From BBC News, 8 September

Zimbabwe's precarious survival

By Sue Lloyd-Roberts

Harare - With the Zimbabwean economy in ruins, it is the people leaving the country who are helping those who have remained to survive.

For a country which is in a state of economic collapse, there is a surprising amount of movement in Zimbabwe today. Drive through the darkened streets of Harare at night - for there is no electricity - and you see hundreds of people walking purposefully at two and three o'clock in the morning. They are the few who need to get to work - only one in five of the adult population still has a job. They take up their positions on street corners waiting for a passing car or pick-up truck. There is no petrol, and regular bus services are already a distant memory. "I sometimes wait four or five hours to get to work," said one office worker. "But even the bosses don't complain." Everyone in Zimbabwe understands life is difficult. A couple of hours later, as dawn breaks over the capital, many people - the mothers and unemployed - start forming long, silent queues that wind around entire blocks of the city. There is a rumour that bread could be arriving in the city today. Five hours later, people are still waiting. Policemen arrive, apparently helpfully supervising the queue and giving a surreal air of normality to the city scene. "They just pretend," said one man in the queue with five children at home to feed. "They get the first news if a lorry is on its way with bread, sugar, or mealie meal and they jump to the top of the queue and loot the food."

Once one of the richest countries in Africa, Zimbabwe has become a barrow, bucket, and bag economy. You see people walking for miles, wheeling barrows, buckets on their heads, and plastic bags in hand. Like the "bag ladies" in the former Soviet Union, they are always on the ready just in case something turns up. But it seldom does. People are starving. The evidence is in the hospitals where tiny, wizened babies lie dying in their cots while their mothers look on helplessly. One mother cradles a child who is losing her hair and her skin, a sign of the most advanced form of Kwashioka or vitamin deficiency. It is certainly the first time I have seen this condition in 20 years of reporting on the developing world. "Zimbabwe once offered the most comprehensive medical service in Africa," a doctor explains. "It is now becoming a textbook case of medical horror." Many children arrive with grandmothers. Grandmother or child-headed families are a growing social phenomenon in Zimbabwe today, often the result of the Aids epidemic. In other cases - if parents still have the energy and the means - they flee abroad to look for food and to send back money. Buses loaded with people and luggage wait for days around the petrol stations on the roads leading out of the country. When fuel eventually arrives, they lurch off, swaying precariously under the weight of so many passengers, on the five-hour journey to the border with South Africa. Zimbabwean immigration officials do not bother them and, on the South African side, they can be paid off with bribes. For those who do not have the money and who have to duck through the bush, there is a greater risk.

Gangs wait on either side of the river for the groups of desperate refugees. "They had guns and knives," one girl tells me. "There were 15 boys and five girls in our group. They killed one boy when he refused to give them his shoes. They raped all the girls." Still, they arrive in South Africa at the rate of thousands a week. The many victims of political persecution will never go back while Robert Mugabe is alive. Others just come for a few weeks to make enough money to take home. I met two teachers. Liliana told me she worked as a domestic cleaner while Patience told me she worked as a prostitute. "What else can I do?" she said. "My husband is dead and I have three children back home to feed." It is a situation that suits the governments on both sides. Among the refugees, there are doctors, engineers, agricultural experts, just the kind of people who are needed by South Africa's growing economy. Zimbabweans have long since given up hope that the South African leader - Thabo Mbeki - will put pressure on his old friend, Robert Mugabe, to reform. And as for Robert Mugabe, an opposition politician in Harare says: "This makes him a very, very happy dictator. He gets rid of his opponents and they in turn send back money to their families in Zimbabwe and that keeps things ticking over." Anyone expecting a swift conclusion to Zimbabwe's agony will be disappointed. Thanks to the ingenuity and tolerance of people still in the country and the remittances sent back by those who have left, Zimbabwe's death throes could last a long time yet.

Ruwa

is a little rural community just outside Harare, where we spent the day yesterday seing how people live and looking at the work of Kufunda there. A large part of the community used to be one big farm, that was taking away from their owners a few years ago. The farm houses still exist. The main house, a huge beautiful spanish-style house, is used as a school now. The classrooms are far too small for so many children and there are only few benches and tables in some of the classrooms. The house is slowly falling apart because nobody seems to have cleaned, painted or repaired anything since it given to its new owners.
The school does not have the means to provide lunch for the children, so most of them use the lunchbreak to play instead of to eat. And they seem to have a lot of fun doing that.
Only very few of the fields are still being used to grow food and the water, that is desperatedly needed for agriculture has stopped running.
People are nice and friendly and we were immediately invited to try the fresh peanut butter that was being produced in a little pot in the kitchen on one of the little farms. Or let's say houses with a little garden. And they insisted that we had lunch with them: sadza and porridge to eat with your hands.

The short version

...of the last few blog entries from newspapers is:

• Zimbabwe will completely run out of flour in two days
• some opposition party member just got killed
• and the official exchange rate has turned from 250 to 30 000 ZimDollar per US$ which is still miles away from the black market rate

From Zim Online (SA), 6 September

Zim vice-president orders minister to halt farm seizures

(...) Traditional leaders are said to have told Mugabe during a conference in Harare last month that most of their subjects were grateful for the support they were getting from white farmers and that the farmers should be viewed as development partners. Zimbabwe has largely survived largely on food handouts from international relief agencies since land reforms began seven years ago after black villagers resettled on former white farms failed to maintain production. Poor performance in the mainstay agriculture sector has also had far reaching consequences as hundreds of thousands have lost jobs while the manufacturing sector, starved of inputs from the sector, is operating below 30 percent of capacity.

From The Times (UK), 6 September

Violence looms as Zimbabwe runs out of food - except for the elite

Jan Raath in Harare

The OK supermarket in Mbare township is so empty that your voice echoes off the high warehouse roof. On row after row of white shelving, wiped clean each day, sit a dozen cabbages. The bakery has ten plain scones. That is all the food there is in the largest supermarket serving tens of thousands of people in the oldest, and teeming, township in Harare. One night last week, Rosa, a church volunteer, scoured Mbare for supplies to make the daily ration of maizemeal, the national staple, and some green vegetables, to be cooked without vegetable oil and often without salt. She found two loaves of bread. "How do I feed the 14 people in my house with two loaves of bread?" Rosa asked. "Sometimes there is nothing and you go to bed with no dinner. We are living like orphans." Her neighbour’s breast milk for her one-year-old daughter dried up recently, she said. "She couldn’t find fresh milk or sterilised milk anywhere. So she feeds the child on Mazoe." It is a brand of orange cordial.

It is now ten weeks since President Mugabe forced businesses to slash prices of all goods and services in the belief that he could crush inflation, which he says is a plot by the Zimbabwean private sector, in collusion with Western governments, to overthrow him. Two things have happened: inflation has rocketed and, according to the Government, the country will run out of wheat in three days. Zimbabweans appear set to face an almost total absence of food and ordinary household goods. An eruption of public anger, to be met with violent suppression by Mr Mugabe’s security forces, is likely to follow, observers say. Initially Mr Mugabe’s June 25 price blitz sparked a gleeful storming of shops, where managers looked on aghast as their businesses were stripped at the Government’s bidding.

Then household basics such as meat, chicken, cooking oil, milk, maizemeal, margarine, sugar and soap vanished into the black market. In the past couple of weeks it has become almost impossible to find beer, cigarettes, tea or baked beans in shops. Outside the OK in Mbare rows of women stand behind little stools, each bearing a long bar of carbolic soap, packets of cigarettes or bottles of vegetable oil. "These are the policemen’s wives," Rosa said. They gain their name from the latest phase of Zimbabwe’s descent into hunger and chaos: thousands of vendors have been arrested and their goods seized in Mr Mugabe’s attempt to smash the black market. "The policemen grab the goods, they give them to their wives and then they come and sell here," said Rosa (not her real name - nearly everyone is too afraid to be quoted in Mr Mugabe’s Zimbabwe).

The black market too is starting to dry up. "Now people are buying because they don’t know when they are going to see them again," a supermarket chain executive said. The two main supermarket chains in Zimbabwe are each due to lay off 1,000 workers this month. The country’s main bakery closed one of its largest outlets yesterday because of lack of wheat – a shipment of 36,000 tonnes is being held in a Mozambique port because the Government cannot pay for it. "Manufacturers are going to run out of stock to produce with," the executive said. "There is a very strong possibility that food will disappear completely." At a commemoration last month of the 20th anniversary of the death of the Zimbabwean writer Dambudzo Marechera, author of The House of Hunger, the snacks comprised small squares of dry bread and glasses of water. Last week, another retail executive said, a Cabinet minister telephoned a supermarket chain manager and asked for beef. He offered to pay more than ten times the official price that he was instrumental in setting.

Schools reopened this week amid deep anxiety among parents of boarding pupils that their children will not be fed. Reports this week have said that prison authorities have stopped feeding prisoners and asked their relatives to bring food. The conspicuously wealthy ruling party elite feels none of this. Joice Mujuru, the Vice-President, has just seen her daughter married in celebrations that included chartering an Air Zimbabwe Boeing 737 for $10,000 (£5,000) to fly guests to a lavish ceremony at a five-star hotel at Victoria Falls. Annual inflation in July, a month after the crackdown began, hit a record 7,600 per cent. Last week the value of the Zimbabwean dollar on the black market fell to a new low of £1 to Z$500,000. Mr Mugabe’s most recent act was to freeze wages and give new sweeping powers to the state commission that alone can sanction wage and price increases. "We wonder on what planet President Mugabe lives," said Wellington Chibebe, secretary-general of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions. "He has never slept on an empty stomach, he has never walked from State House [his official residence] to his office, and he has never experienced water and electricity cuts."

From The Financial Gazette, 6 September

Mudede: I’m under pressure

Clemence Manyukwe, Staff Reporter

Registrar General (R-G) Tobaiwa Mudede has for the first time complained of pressure from politicians with regard to the voter registration exercise, which the opposition claims has been used to disenfranchise its support base. A report by the Defence and Home Affairs Parliamentary committee also disputes the R-G’s view that the Citizenship Act requires that people born locally to parents of foreign descent must first renounce their "potential foreign citizenship" before they can be recognised as Zimbabwean citizens. Failure to renounce their foreign title, according to the Registrar General, results in forfeiture of Zimbabwean citizenship. Mudede has used this interpretation of the law to deprive millions of Zimbabweans of the right to vote. But quoting the Government Gazette General Notice 584 of 2002, under the subheading Renunciation of foreign Citizenship, the committee said a person who is a citizen by birth cannot be deprived of his or her citizenship, and cannot be asked to renounce foreign citizenship he or she never acquired. "It is recommended that the R-G should abide by the rulings and interpretation of the courts and Cabinet, as given in the Zimbabwean Government Gazette General notice 584 of 2002," reads part of the committee’s recommendation. The committee undertook the probe on citizenship after the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights told Members of Parliament that Mudede was unlawfully withdrawing citizenship from people with rightful title to citizenship, resulting in a flood of lawsuits that his department was losing.(...)

Opposition candidate murdered in Marondera

From SW Radio Africa, 5 September

By Lance Guma

Those predicting a free and fair election next year were left re-evaluating their optimism after an opposition candidate was stabbed to death last Friday. Jabulani Chiwoka, an MDC candidate in next year’s rural district council elections, died from stab wounds after suspected Zanu PF thugs attacked him at a beerhall in the Svosve communal area of Marondera. Another party activist, Tafiranyika Ndoro, is in a Marondera hospital recovering from stab wounds. The Svosve area witnessed the first farm invasion in June 1998, which preceded the more violent invasions of 2000. Zanu PF militants in the area have traditionally ensured the place is a no-go area for the opposition. Some reports quote Kerry Kay, a secretary for welfare in Tsvangirai’s MDC, saying Chiwoka attended a local Zanu PF meeting last Thursday before delegates there branded him a trespasser. She said his national ID number was jotted down as others made threats to him. The stabbings are alleged to have taken place an evening after that meeting.

Opposition spokesman Nelson Chamisa confirmed the incident but refused to be drawn into disclosing the circumstances surrounding the murder. He says the MDC are awaiting a report from their province

before they can make any authoritative comments. Although he added that police were still investigating the murder he warned that, ‘police don’t normally cooperate when crimes are politically motivated.’ He expressed concern at the possibility of a bloody election campaign ahead saying, ‘the Zanu PF demon of violence seems to be re-incarnating.’ Last week a section of the country’s war veterans demonstrated in support of Mugabe’s disputed candidacy for presidential elections scheduled for next year. With some of the participants calling for MDC president Morgan Tsvangirai to be barred from the poll, observers say the event was a warning shot to the opposition and a subtle reminder that Zanu PF still has a violent wing that can be unleashed any time.

striking contrasts

We went to the see the Aids-orphans in Kambuzuma again today to distribute the first donations to the most pressing cases and take more pictures and write down more histories so that more support might be possible from Germany. Food, school fees and basic medical treatment that is. But that was not as easy as we thought. Local authorities and police in present virtually everywhere and without there knowledge and permission it is not even possible to interview a single person, take one picture of an unspectactular suburb or give assistance to anyone.

And
on the other hand, in this country that is screaming for decay everywhere you can still go to a fitness center and do stupid aerobics courses. The power might go off, but then a powerful generator will start so that you can finish your hour of fitness.

Zimbabwe runs out of flour

From News24 (SA), 5 September

Chris Muronzi

Harare - Zimbabwe's flour supplies will run out on Thursday, the country's largest baker said. The state-owned daily newspaper, The Herald, reported that Lobels Bread, the largest bread-maker in the troubled southern African country, is only left with two days' supply of flour. This comes after reports that 36 000 tonnes of imported wheat are grounded in Beira, Mozambique because of foreign currency shortages that have hit the country. Zimbabwe is facing an acute shortage of foreign currency owing to a negative balance of payments position. Lobels operations director Lemmy Chikomo said the current bread shortages was because of a critical wheat shortage adding that his company had since scaled down operations after its strategic stocks ran out. "Flour availability has deteriorated and this has forced us to use our strategic stocks since May. Now we are only left with two days' supply. [...] The company says it was releasing almost 200 000 loaves of bread daily into the market but this month production drastically dropped to 40 000 per day.

[...] Chikomo added that the price slashes in June resulted in an artificial shortage of bread. Lobels accrued a $100bn debt since May this year, as it had to borrow funds to pay its employees and sustain operations, the paper reported. Bakers petitioned government to review the price of bread from Z$30 000 to Z$73 000 a loaf but their plea fell on deaf ears. According to bakers, it costs bakers Z$55 561 to produce a standard loaf. President Robert Mugabe ordered businesses to reduce prices of goods in June by 50% accusing industry of causing a runaway inflation. [...]

FIFA to inspect Zimbabwe's host capacity ahead of 2010 World Cup

From AFP, 4 September

Harare – A delegation of FIFA officials will arrive here Monday to assess the country's capacity to host visitors for the 2010 World Cup to be hosted in South Africa. "The FIFA officials will assess the capacity of Zimbabwe to host visitors for 2010," Karikoga Kaseke, chief executive officer of the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA), said in a statement. "They have specifically requested to see three- to five-star hotels in Harare, Bulawayo and Victoria Falls as well as other service facilities in the tourism sector." Zimbabwe, which plans to invest 20 million dollars on hotels and stadiums, is one of the host country's neighbours expecting to rake in the windfall of the month-long event by hosting training camps, accommodation and fan parks for teams and visitors during the tournament.[ ...] We have to make sure that the industry standards are brought up to expectations of FIFA," he said. "We will not hesitate to exclude any facility, and I mean any facility that does not meet the required standards. There is no compromise in this position and they will be no sacred cows."

Milk again

... finally after about two weeks of pounding the all the supermarkets in the region.
That means:

• run to the car
• take as meany people as possible with you
• rush to the supermarket
• see that it is the usual 2 halflitrebags per person
• take your two bags per person pay and go in again using another cash desk until there is no more milk which will only take you two or three turns

more news from the news

From VOA News, 3 September

Toughening sanctions, Australia deports children of Zimbabwe elite

By Blessing Zulu

Washington - Political tension between Zimbabwe and Australia spiked on Monday after Canberra followed through on a recent announcement that it was stepping up sanctions against Harare by deporting eight students who are children of top Zimbabwe officials. Government sources in Harare said the move sent shock waves through government and ruling party circles where there is fear that other Western countries such as the United States, Britain and Canada may take their cue from Australia and deport the dependents of top government and ruling Zanu PF officials. (...) The Zimbabwe National Students Union said it welcomed Canberra's move. Analyst Innocent Chofamba-Sithole told VOA from London that complaints from officials in Harare are hypocritical as the government attacks the West but its officials send their children to study there. On the same flight that carried the students back to Africa was opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, whose contacts with top Australian officials in recent days during a visit Down Under drew heated criticism from Harare officials and state media. Tsvangirai spokesman William Bango said that during the connecting flight between Johannesburg and Harare, Zimbabwe Republic Police Commissioner Augustine Chihuri accused Tsvangirai of spurring Australia to deport the students.

News from the news

From Reuters, 3 September

Zimbabwe takes over H.J. Heinz oil firm stake

Harare - Zimbabwe's government has taken over U.S food giant H.J Heinz's 49 percent stake in the African nation's leading cooking oil maker for $6.8 million and handed its management to a firm with ties to the state. Agro-processing company Cotton Company of Zimbabwe (Cottco), which was a state enterprise until its privatization in 1997, announced it had bought H.J Heinz's stake in Olivine Industries in a deal facilitated by a government-owned investment company. This is the first major deal involving the takeover of a firm following President Robert Mugabe's vow to give Zimbabweans greater control over foreign-owned assets. Mugabe's government has accused some businesses of halting production in a plot to undermine the inflation-ravaged economy. Zimbabwe's parliament is considering enacting a law that seeks to transfer majority ownership of businesses - including foreign-owned banks and mines - to locals.

From The Associated Press, 2 September

In deepening economic crisis, 2 die in Zimbabwe agriculture show stampedes

Harare - Two people died in stampedes at the exit gates of Zimbabwe's annual agriculture show, which was packed with crowds lured by scarce snack foods and soft drinks and stalls selling cheap Chinese toys and consumer goods. A woman and a child - one of scores of lost children separated from family members - died in two separate surges against the gates Saturday, police spokesman James Sabau told state radio Sunday. Attendances at this year's show at the Harare Exhibition Park were the highest for several years, with many people hoping to find produce which has disappeared from normal stores in Zimababwe's acute economic crisis. It was also the biggest in years as exhibitors said they were lured to the show in hopes of being allowed to sell their animals.

A cattle auction was banned Thursday at the showground by price control authorities after it became clear bidders from butcheries, hotels and groups of private buyers were willing to pay up to 10 times the government's fixed price for on-the-hoof beef in the meat-starved nation. A government order to slash prices of all goods and services by about half in a bid to tame the world's highest inflation in June has left shelves bare of meat, corn meal, bread, milk, eggs and other staples. Officials at the six-day event said about 100,000 people entered the gates on Friday. No tally was immediately available for Saturday. Crowds jostled at the exit gates at the closing Saturday, hurrying to get into lines for public transport outside, witnesses said. Acute gasoline shortages have crippled transportation services. Commuters routinely wait more than three hours to board buses for a 30-minute trip to Harare's satellite townships.(...)

smart sanctions again

Smart sanctions - I can't stand the word any longer!

They seem to be the cause of all the bad in Zimbabwe and that's what you hear every day, over and over again.
Did they realise that Tony Blair is not in office anymore?

But I have learnt something new yesterday from an interview with the president:
When the government of Zimbabwe took away the white farmers' land, initially they wanted to compensate the farmers not for the land, but for everything they had built on the land, the infrastructure (and that's true actually). But then the British government stopped giving budget support to Zimbabwe and so the government of Zimbabwe was not able to pay for the compensations anymore (and that is also true). So it is in fact the fault of the British that the farmers did not receive any compensation. So they should in fact address the British government with their complaints.