UN criticised for appointing Nhema to key post

By Tererai Karimakwenda
10 May, 2008

The United Nations on Friday appointed Zimbabwe's minister of the environment Francis Nhema, to the key position of heading the U.N. Commission on Sustainable Development. The body monitors global policies on economic development and the environment. Yet Nhema’s record as environment minister clearly shows he is in no way qualified, and his personal behaviour does not warrant such a position. The appointment also highlights why many countries want major changes in the way the U.N. operates.
The controversial minister is known to have destroyed a farm he took over illegally in Karoi in 2000, and during his tenure the majority of Zimbabwe’s conservancies have collapsed and poaching has increased to unprecedented levels. The Famine Early Warning Systems Network, which keeps track of food security in sub-Saharan Africa, also issued an alert this week that starvation looms in Zimbabwe because the country produced less than half the maize needed to feed the population. General environmental degradation is extensive.

Freedom House, an independent nongovernmental organization supporting the expansion of freedom in the world, expressed utter disbelief at Nhema’s appointment. The deputy executive director, Thomas Melia said at first they thought the news couldn’t be true because it was too ludicrous to take on board. He added that after a lot of research and double checking websites at the UN, they confirmed that the Africa group had indeed selected Zimbabwe. This surprised Melia because there are, as he put it, “all of the forward looking countries making progress in development.”

Melia said: “There are few countries in the world that have undergone such a precipitous drop in the standard of living, as a result of government policies, as Zimbabwe. So the notion that an official of the Mugabe government could usefully preside over such an international deliberation struck us as ridiculous.” Melia also criticised the system of rotating geographical regional groups in heading these commissions. He said it does a disservice to the United Nations Farmer Chris Shepherd, the original owner of the 1 000 hectare farm called Nyamanda that Nhema took over, has never been paid for his property. Most farmers who continue to lose their property in the chaotic and violent so-called Land Reform Programme, implemented by the Mugabe regime, have never been paid. Nyamanda Farm used to produce 100ha of maize, 100ha of tobacco and boasted a top-class animal husbandry unit of beef, cattle, pigs and sheep.

Shepherd is reported to have checked on the farm a few weeks ago, and says that it is virtually deserted. He said the soil has not been irrigated and two of the tobacco barns which burned down after Nhema took over have not been rebuilt. Even more shocking, at least 30 percent of male workers on the farm had died from illness and malnutrition. About 10 males remain on a farm that once supported more than 250 permanent workers and their families, plus another 250 contract workers during the season.

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