Four arrested as offensive against Chiredzi farmers intensifies
By Alex Bell
23 March 2009

Two farmers and two farm supervisors in Chiredzi have become the latest victims of the fresh wave of farm attacks sweeping the country, and there are fears that the offensive against the Chiredzi farming community is intensifying.

The group were arrested over the weekend and spent Sunday night behind bars. The farmers, Benoit Fayd’herbe and Tony Sarpo, were released later on Monday after appearing in court and being formally charged with ‘illegal occupation of state property’. They were released on free bail and are expected back in court next month. Meanwhile the two farm supervisors, who have not yet been formally charged, are expected to remain behind bars before being brought to court on Tuesday.

One of the supervisor’s employers, who spoke to SW Radio Africa on Monday, explained that arresting his employee and the supervisor of another farm is merely an “attempt to flush us farmers out and arrest us.” He explained that the attacks against the Chiredzi farmers are nothing more than a ‘witch hunt’ that is set to intensify in the coming days. Justice for Agriculture’s (JAG) John Worsley-Worswick also explained on Monday that the arrests and the threat of arrest “is being used as an intimidation tactic to get farmers off their land,” as part of the larger land-grab drive across the country.

The renewed campaign against the country’s remaining commercial farmers has already seen more than 100 farmers facing prosecution for ‘being on state land illegally’. At the same time, invasions have been widespread, with top ZANU PF officials leading the attacks, forcing many farmers off their land and into hiding. The attacks have also taken place despite numerous court orders and even a SADC Tribunal ruling, protecting most farms from invaders, who have resumed the attacks in the name of state entitlement. The Commercial Farmers Union (CFU) has confirmed that orders from the Attorney Generals office to ignore court rulings protecting the land were passed down last month, leading to the fresh arrests, evictions and invasions. Robert Mugabe last month also condoned and encouraged the fresh attacks, saying the white commercial farmers were ‘not welcome’ and should vacate their land.

The Prime Minister’s office meanwhile has reportedly been ‘inundated’ with both local and international calls about the fresh wave of violence on the country’s farms. The unity deal which saw Morgan Tsvangirai sworn in as Prime Minister, agreed to end farm attacks and encourage food production. But the government that was formed on the basis of this unity deal has done nothing to stop the ongoing farm attacks – which not only threaten the fragile coalition government itself, but also the government’s quest to secure financial investment in the country. It also stops the production of vital food, in a country where over half the population is facing starvation and is being fed by international aid organizations.

The Prime Minister’s office has now called a meeting of security and agricultural ministries about the farm invasions. The meeting, which is only expected to be convened next week by the Minister of State, Gordon Moyo, is set to be attended bythe co-Ministers of Home Affairs, Kembo Mohadi and Giles Mutsekwa, plus Defence Minister Emmerson Mnangagwa, National Security Minister, Sydney Sekeramayi, Police Commissioner General Augustine Chihuri and CIO chief Happyton Bonyongwe, among other security chiefs. Representatives from the CFU are also expected to attend, although, with such a heavy ZANU PF contingent attending the meeting, it seems unlikely that the farmers will get a fair hearing.

Meanwhile, many hundreds of farm workers have been left jobless and desperate as a result of the farm attacks, adding to the country’s already staggering unemployment rate of 94%. More than 80 farms have been seized since the offensive against the farmers began in earnest last month, and according to the General Agricultural and Plantation Workers Union, more than 700 families have been displaced as a result. JAG’s Worsley-Worswick also explained that many workers, who have been allowed to remain on the invaded farms, are now being exploited by the invaders themselves.
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Zimbabwe prisoners starve to death as service collapses
By Violet Gonda
23 March 2008
A major humanitarian crisis is unfolding in Zimbabwe’s prisons, due to lack of food and a total break down of the prison service. It’s reported that inmates ravaged by disease and hunger are ‘dying like flies’ with no solution in sight. This is happening while the ‘chefs’ continue to splash out millions of dollars on fancy cars for themselves.
Although access to the prisons is restricted, reports from relatives and friends of inmates have exposed the dire situation. This past week an estimated 1,300 people at Harare Central Prison were left to starve, as the prison ran out of food completely.
While some relatives and friends are providing a vital lifeline for their loved ones by taking in much needed food regularly, the prison service is now relying heavily on donations of soya beans and mealie meal to feed the general prison population.
A rights activist, speaking on condition of anonymity on Monday, said the inmates at Harare Central are fed just once a day, at around 3pm, and on Sunday they had a few soya beans, with nothing else.
We were not able to get prison authorities to confirm the situation, but our source said about 10 inmates are dying everyday at Harare Central Prison alone.
“It’s pretty shocking when we’ve got between 1,300 and 1,500 prisoners in a prison and there is no food to feed them. If you are in the bush you can forage, but in a prison there is not much you can do if you are not getting food,” the activist said. Many prisoners have suppressed immune systems, due to HIV infection, a situation that is worsened by lack of proper food.
It’s also reported there is no coal for the boilers at Harare Central and so inmates are cutting down trees on the side of the road for firewood. Our source said: “I don’t know how the prisoners are able to cut down the trees because if you look at some of them on the side of the road, their legs are about the size of a woman’s wrist.”
MDC official Roy Bennett, who spent a month in Mutare Remand Prison, said it’s a major humanitarian disaster. “There is absolutely nothing in the prisons. Prisoners get one meal a day – a piece of sadza the size of your hand and water with salt in it. Those prisoners who do not have relatives or people outside supporting them are in worse conditions – or look like those emaciated, skeletal bodies we saw during the holocaust. Basically it is a human rights tragedy and a serious abuse of human rights.”
He said that five people died while he was there, in the most terrible circumstances, ‘unconscious and defecating in their blankets.’
An additional horror is the fact that because of the general break down of the prison system, dead bodies are not removed immediately. Bennett said, “They sit in the laundry, there is no mortuary. Most of them sit there for four days – one sat for five days. They had to put them in plastic bags.”
Many detainees are in prison without ever having been convicted in a court of law, which has exacerbated the overcrowding conditions in remand prisons. On numerous occasions prison authorities have failed to take the detainees to court because of the fuel shortages.
Meanwhile, the pressure group Sokwanele is appealing to well wishers to donate food to Harare Central Prison. The group said donations can be sent to Chaplain Kurida on +263 4 793891 extension 163. Sokwanele said: “Please give what you can: especially beans, vegetables, mealie meal, salt and soap. The soap is to help clean the cells and prevent the spread of infections and diseases – the prisoners have weakened immune systems from nutrition-poor diets and are exposed to horrific conditions.”

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Police briefly detain award winning poet

By Lance Guma
23 March 2009

Police once again showed their intolerance to criticism, after briefly detaining an award winning poet, Julius Chingono, in Harare on Saturday. The incident came a few days after Bulawayo police detained journalists from the state owned Chronicle newspaper, over a story attacking the force for corruption. On Saturday Chingono recited a poem in front of over 200 people in Harare’s First Street, close to the portable police cabin in the area. His recital was part of proceedings to mark World Poetry Day, an event organized by the Zimbabwe Poets for Human Rights, in collaboration with the Media Institute of Southern Africa- Zimbabwe Chapter.

Chingono’s poem ‘My uniform’ talked about how policemen abuse their uniforms to jump queues for bread and other essential commodities. ‘When the bread bin is empty, I put on my police officer’s uniform, medals dangling down my chest, to the rowdy bread queue to maintain order, to buy bread without a hassle.’ He used the same analogy to explain how they jump the queues to buy maize meal, sugar and fuel. Soon after he completed his poem police manning the portable cabin summoned him for questioning. He was later released.

Last week, police in Bulawayo charged the Chronicle newspaper with criminal defamation, after a story claimed officers were involved in the Grain Marketing Board maize scandal, which saw many tonnes of maize being sold on the black market, and also into neighbouring Zambia. The paper’s editor, Brezhnev Malaba, and reporter Nduduzo Tshuma, were summoned to the police station and made to sign a warned and cautioned statement. Commentators say the incidents highlight just how far the country has to go in terms of promoting a culture of tolerance and acceptance of criticism.
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Government struggling to pay civil servants salaries
By Tichaona Sibanda
23 March 2009

Southern African leaders are expected to finalise a regional economic aid package for Zimbabwe, as the inclusive government struggles to pay civil servants their March salaries.

The SADC leaders will meet on March 30th in Cape Town, South Africa, to discuss a regional economic deal that would help spur the country’s recovery from the massive economic and humanitarian crises, South African Foreign Affairs spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa said; ‘We expect a final decision to be taken on the US$2 billion Zimbabwe economic aid package proposed by the SADC finance ministers last month.’

Finance ministers from the 15-nation SADC met for two days in February and agreed to push for donor help to rebuild Zimbabwe’s ruined economy. But the new Finance Minister, Tendai Biti, last week laid out an economic recovery plan that will require a total of five billion US dollars in aid. A huge amount in the face of the global economic recession.

Robert Mugabe last week pleaded with ‘Zimbabwe’s friends’ to finance the recovery plan, which the inclusive government hoped would be backed mainly by Western donors. As usual he also called for the lifting of sanctions, once again ignoring the fact that there are no economic sanctions on Zimbabwe – only targeted sanctions on the ruling elite.

But the international community, quite naturally, has said there must be a return to the rule of law before any aid can be released. The United States government said the power-sharing government had ‘a long way to go’ before the Obama administration could consider lifting the targeted sanctions, and recently extended them for another year.

US state department spokesman Robert Wood, told reporters in Washington that they have not yet seen sufficient evidence from the government of Zimbabwe that they are firmly on a path to inclusive and effective governance, and as well as respect for human rights and the rule of law.

Meanwhile our Harare correspondent Simon Muchemwa said there has been a re-emergence of bank queues as a result of cash shortages in the country. Banks have switched to dispensing cash in foreign currency, but there is a serious cash shortage of the main foreign currencies now used.

Muchemwa said most banks have failed to provide the cash for this month’s salaries for public servants, soldiers and employees of state utilities, which saw thousands of desperate workers stranded over the weekend with most forced to sleep outside the financial institutions.
Biti recently assured the nation that the new inclusive government had obtained funding from donors and other external sources to meet salaries for February, March and April.
But Muchemwa said; ‘I understand government has directed banks to advance payment to civil servants in the hope that they will soon raise the cash to pay back to the banks. In other words government seems to be borrowing from banks, money that will be remitted once they get an injection of funds from the economic package promised by SADC.’

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Grace Mugabe gets diplomatic immunity for assault charge
By Lance Guma
23 March 2009

First Lady Grace Mugabe will escape prosecution from charges that she assaulted a British photographer in Hong Kong, after she was granted diplomatic immunity. In January Grace flew into a rage after Richard Jones took pictures of her as she left the five-star Kowloon Shangri-la Hotel, with a female friend and a bodyguard. The bodyguard pinned the photographer to the ground while the first lady struck him repeatedly in the face. A diamond encrusted ring she was wearing caused cuts to his face. But on Sunday authorities in Hong Kong confirmed long held fears that Grace was entitled to diplomatic immunity, as the wife of a sitting head of state.

The photographer reacted furiously to the decision saying; ‘I think it’s a disgrace for the Hong Kong government to allow a person to walk on a street in Hong Kong, punch a member of the media, and walk free from it. This is a town where the freedom of the media is a strong tradition,’ he told the AFP news agency. Michael Vidler, the lawyer representing Jones, said they had secured CCTV footage and statements from witnesses, which was enough to provide strong evidence against Grace in court. They also felt the lacerations to Jones face were serious enough to warrant a charge of ‘wounding’ rather than the more minor ‘common assault’ charge.

Although Hong Kong is a self governing territory, matters relating to defence and foreign affairs are controlled by China. In this case Hong Kong’s Department of Justice issued a statement saying: ‘Grace Mugabe is not liable to arrest or detention, and enjoys immunity from prosecution,’ and that these rights fall under Chinese regulations on diplomatic immunity and privileges. However Michael Sheridan, who is the Far East correspondent for the Sunday Times newspaper, said ‘diplomatic immunity should not be a shield for unacceptable and illegal behaviour.’

While over half the country faces starvation, Grace has been accused of regularly raiding the Reserve Bank for hundreds of thousands of United States dollars to fund her lavish shopping trips abroad. The Mugabe’s were also reported to have bought an expensive mansion in Hong Kong, although they denied this. Their daughter Bona Mugabe is also alleged to be attending a university in Hong Kong, despite denials from the Universities there. She is thought to be studying under a false name.

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Prime Minister Tsvangirai to return to Zimbabwe Tuesday
By Violet Gonda
23 March 2009

Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai is expected to fly back to Harare on Tuesday, from South Africa where he went to recover following the tragic accident that killed his wife Susan.

James Maridadi, the Prime Minister’s spokesperson, confirmed Tsvangirai would be arriving on Tuesday and is expected to start work the following day.
The Prime Minister took time off and traveled to South Africa with his children, soon after burying his wife in Buhera and attending the burial of the late former Defence Forces chief, General Vitalis Zvinavashe, at Heroes acre over a week ago.
Deputy Prime Minister Thokozani Khupe has been acting premier in his absence.
It has not been an easy time for the premier who has had to deal with his own personal grief and juggle this with the enormous task of trying to rebuild a bankrupt and crisis ridden country.
It’s reported that he is well rested and will this week officially open a two-day national tourism stakeholders’ conference that begins on Wednesday. He will also chair the Council of Ministers meeting on Thursday among other engagements.
http://www.swradioafrica.2bctnd.net/03_09/newsreel230309.mp3

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