Week Ending 3rd November 2009

ZIMBABWE WEEKLY UPDATE

Politics

• The leaders of Mozambique, Swaziland and Zambia meet on Thursday (5 November) in Mozambique’s capital, Maputo, to discuss the current non-implementation of the Global Political Agreement (GPA). Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai said that if the SADC Troika on Security, Defence and Politics did not produce results, he would insist on a full summit of the 15-member Southern African Development Community (SADC) to resolve the crisis.

• President Robert Mugabe and Democratic Republic of Congo President Joseph Kabila held critical talks yesterday on the country’s political stalemate. Kabila, SADC’s current chairman, held a five-hour meeting with Mugabe at State House in Harare. Kabila has been pushing for a resolution to the impasse, which he claimed is serious but “not out of control.”

• The African Union, on the other hand, insists on seeing the crisis in Zimbabwe as a domestic squabble about civil servants’ appointments, and thus not worthy of the AU’s involvement – unless SADC fails to resolve the matter.

• The Vice-Presidential nomination is to be thrown open to all provinces in Zimbabwe, the Politburo announced this week. It has hitherto been an underwritten agreement that one of the two Vice-Presidents should come from the ranks of former PF Zapu officials, and represent Matabeleland.

• Mugabe may appoint acting ministers in place of MDC officials who are boycotting cabinet meetings, state media said last Wednesday. The MDC responded and accused Mugabe of trying to tear apart the unity government. “That is a laughable proposition,” MDC spokesperson Nelson Chamisa told AFP. "You cannot appoint an acting minister when there is a substantive minister. It will create a parallel government." Political analysts say the appointment of acting ministers would further anger the MDC, according to Reuters.

Violence

• Amnesty International has warned that Zimbabwe is on the verge of sliding back into the post-election violence that dogged the country last year. The organisation said that key to addressing the crisis in Zimbabwe was the need to regulate the country's security agencies and end the culture of impunity for human rights abuses.

• Twelve soldiers allegedly died last week after being tortured by military intelligence officials from the Presidential Guard. The torturers were “investigating” the disappearance of AK47 rifles from Pomona barracks. Reports said 236 soldiers and support staff were also arrested at the scene.

• In a seemingly related incident, the MDC’s transport manager was tortured at the hands of Zanu PF. Pascal Gwezere was abducted from his home on October 27 and underwent “severe torture” for four days. His lawyer said Gwezere showed clear signs of severe assault. “His whole body is swollen. His left leg is in a terrible state, he bled from it for two days,” he said. “He cannot walk properly. We re trying to get him to be seen by a private doctor, but the state is preventing us.” Gwezere is charged with the theft of weapons from a military barracks in Harare, as well as “undergoing terrorist training in Uganda.” The MDC has called the charges “trumped-up”. He is the first party official reported to have been tortured by authorities since the signing of the power-sharing agreement.

• These incidents of torture were happening while Manfred Nowak, the United Nations’ Special Rapporteur on Torture, was being refused entry into Zimbabwe on Wednesday night (28 October). The envoy was deported to Johannesburg the following morning. Nowak had been invited to the country by Tsvangirai to investigate abuses against Zanu-PF opponents. Nowak told reporters in Johannesburg that his expulsion showed that "the government, as a unity government, does not function".

Diaspora

• Britain announced last week the planned deportation of some 10 000 failed Zimbabwean asylum-seekers and refugees in the coming months. UK Immigration Minister Phil Woolas said he was looking at "normalising" returns to Zimbabwe because the situation was "improving" after the signing of the power-sharing deal in February. Returns were put on hold three years ago when violence and instability gripped the country under Mugabe’s rule. But Zimbabwean Association, a charity group, said conditions had not returned to normal and that deportees faced the risk of persecution for supporting the MDC.

• A grouping of Zimbabwean organizations, including the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition and Zimbabwe Solidarity Forum, organized a spirited demonstration in Johannesburg on Sunday, waving placards demanding that “Mugabe Must Go”.

Business

• Pressure is mounting on the Kimberley Process to ban Zimbabwe from the global diamond trade over alleged human rights violations and rampant smuggling. Members of the KP Certification Scheme (KPCS), implemented in 2003 to prevent trade in blood diamonds, are gathering this week in Namibia for their annual meeting. Zimbabwe’s Marange diamonds are high on the agenda after a KP review mission in July called for a temporary suspension of six months for Zimbabwe to comply with KP standards. A suspension would stop the Zimbabwean government importing and exporting rough diamonds. Meanwhile, Partnership Africa Canada (PAC) released their 2009 Diamonds and Human Security Annual Review, which states that the Kimberley Process is “failing” and the governments involved in its administration “refuse to get tough on blatant smuggling, human rights abuse and money laundering.”

The South African Broadcasting Corporation’s investigative programme, Special Assignment, screened a documentary titled: “Zimbabwe’s Blood Diamonds”. The transcript can be read on the Zimbabwe Democracy Now website.

• ArcelorMittal South Africa Ltd (ACL.JO), a branch of the world's largest steelmaker, is one of two bidders short listed to buy a majority stake in the 89 percent state-owned Zimbabwe Iron and Steel Co., or Ziscosteel. Ziscosteel is the second largest integrated steelmaker in sub-Saharan Africa after ArcelorMittal South Africa, but is so heavily indebted it stopped operating last year.
• Supermarket wars: OK Zimbabwe Ltd. has indicated that negotiations with South Africa's largest supermarket chain, Shoprite, which were reported to have collapsed two weeks ago, are still ongoing. The deal is said to be worth R167 million. South Africa’s Pick ‘n Pay meanwhile, is planning to invest in the TM chain, but the deal is awaiting a conclusion to the Meikles group saga.
Commercial Farming Sector

• The Commercial Farmer’s Union (CFU) on the weekend said that the majority of its members were unable to plant crops for the 2009/2010 season due to ongoing farm invasions, signaling a tough agricultural season ahead. “"Owing to the ongoing violations of commercial farmers and their workers, the prosecution threats and lack of security of tenure, the majority of commercial farmers will not be able to plant crops this season," said CFU president Deon Theron. He said an increase in violence against the few remaining Zimbabwean commercial farmers and their workers was cause for great concern.

• A farm in the Chinhoyi district north of Harare was violently attacked on Friday, heightening tensions amidst a spate of violent incidents led by Zanu-PF. On Friedawil farm, owned by Louis Fick, a South African citizen, five workers were shot and injured by a man believed to be an employee of the Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank, Edward Mashiringwani. Mashiringwani has for months led a campaign of intimidation against Fick. Scores of workers were assaulted with barbed wire and sticks and several homes were torched. Six farm workers were arrested by the police, who are under orders to never act against Zanu PF invaders. For almost a week the thugs have barred Fick and his staff from feeding and watering all of his livestock, an act of serious animal abuse and cruelty. Fick is one of 79 farmers protected by the SADC Tribunal ruling of 28 November 2008.

Environment
• Dr Morris Mutsambiwa, Director of National Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, said via The Zimbabwe Herald that nearly 200 rhino have been killed - and locals are among those cooperating with poaching syndicates operating in the region. “We have lost close to 200 rhinos in the last two to three years. From the intelligence we are gathering we strongly believe that there are syndicates which operate in the region involving locals, South African citizens and also people of Asian origin, which seem to be the main market for the rhino horns,” Dr Mutsambiwa stated. Elephant poaching is also on the increase, he said.
ENDS

Source: Zimbabwe Democracy Now
www.zimbabwedemocracynow.com