Source: http://www.zimguardian.com/?p=1649
(London, November 24, 2009) US President Barack Obama has waded into ongoing efforts by the Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) by reminding the world of the “systematic murder of many thousands of people” in Matabeleland in the 1980s.
President Obama was speaking at the Robert F Kennedy Human Rights Award ceremony, in the East Room of the White House in Washington on November 23 where the 2009 award was presented to Bulawayo raised Zimbabwean human rights activist Magodonga Mahlangu and Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA), represented by co-founder Jenni Williams.
“As a young girl raised in Matabeleland — in the Matabeleland region of Zimbabwe in the early 1980s, Magodonga witnessed the — Gukurahundi massacres — the systematic murder of many thousands of people, including her uncle and several cousins — many of whom were buried in mass graves that they’d been forced to dig themselves,” President Obama said.
On the 20th October 2009, ZAPU’s Europe province wrote and requested that Professor Nowak includes as part of his terms of reference; the investigation into the Gukurahundi atrocities committed by Robert Mugabe and the ZANU led government in the Matabeleland and Midlands provinces of Zimbabwe between 1982 and 1987. This was in the context of his visit to Zimbabwe (28 October 2009 – 4 November 2009). Sadly but not surprisingly, The ZANU PF and MDC government of national unity refused Professor Nowak entry into Zimbabwe to carry out these investigations.
In 1982, Robert Mugabe and ZANU PF, in pursuit of a one party state sought help from North Korea who trained the brutal 5th brigade. In 1983, this notorious brigade was deployed in Midlands and Matabeleland in an operation code named Gukurahundi (a word meaning rains or floods that wipe away rubbish in the Shona language).
Many analysts and those close to the operations at the time confirmed that there was a plan to wipe out all the ZAPU supporters, most of whom were uMthwakazi or isiNdebele speakers.
For about five years, the 5 Brigade massacred innocent civilians using the propaganda excuse that there had been insurgency in the ZAPU strongholds. Leaders Dr Dumiso Dabengwa, Lt Gen Lookout Masuku and others were arrested on trumped up charges of treason. They were acquitted by the Supreme Court in 1983, but were detained for four more years without charge. Lt Gen Masuku died in April 1986 in what many believe to be related to treatment in detention.
More than 20,000 innocent civilian were killed and thousands disappeared. They were buried in mass graves and some thrown in disused mines. Thousands of women and children survivors were rapped and abused.
The Government has repeatedly refused to acknowledge or offer any death certificates for those killed by the 5 Brigade. Many orphans were left with no identities and were thus unable to get education. The Zimbabwean system requires that you bring either parents or death certificates in order to get a birth certificate.
There has never been any compensation for victims and survivors. Many still need counselling to recover from the trauma of what they witnessed at the time.
Most Zimbabweans from other parts of the country also need to be educated about the truth about a genocide done in their name.
Background of ZAPU
ZAPU was formed in 1961. ZAPU is the first political party to fight for democracy, human rights and liberation for all Zimbabweans regardless of tribe, colour or language. We established relations with the British and the rest of the world based on our sound policies under the leadership of the late Dr Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo.
In 1979, ZAPU signed the Lancaster agreement as part of the Patriotic Front leading to Zimbabwe’s independence. In 1980, we joined a Government of National Unity (GNU) but were dismissed in 1982 when Mugabe and ZANU PF started cracking down on our supporters and persecuting our leadership.
After Mugabe killed more than 20,000 of innocent and defenceless civilian ZAPU supporters, the party was forced into a GNU in 1987 for peace. ZAPU pulled out of the Unity Accord on 16th May 2009. We are now the opposition party in Zimbabwe with an important constituency.
Tuesday
Justice Cheda sentences a man to Death in Zimbabwe
Source:The Chronicle
A FORMER police officer has been sentenced to death by hanging for the “cold-blooded and beastly murder” of a South African tourist in 2007.
Leo Matibe, 26, was accused -- along with another ex-cop who is on the run -- of the murder of 69-year-old Martinus Jacobus Oosthuyse whose body was dumped in farmland in Nyamandlovu, about 60km north-west of Bulawayo.
On Monday, Matibe was placed on death row after Justice Maphios Cheda, sitting at the Bulawayo High Court, found him guilty of murder with constructive intent.
The judge told Matibe: “In your own evidence, you stated that you knew and appreciated what you were doing. You are a trained police officer.
“This was a cold- blooded beastly murder committed without any conscience and you went on to dump the body. As a policeman, you had ample time to report the murder but you went to Harare for three weeks after the offence and still did not report.”
The court heard that Matibe, of Bulawayo’s Pumula North suburb, had been in the company of two friends – serving police officer Collin Tsikidze and Leonard Dube – when they decided to commit a robbery for money.
Shortly after midnight on September 26, 2007, the men approached Oosthuyse’s car – a Nissan Sentra bearing South African number plates -- which was parked outside a supermarket along Bulawayo’s 8th Avenue. Oosthuyse was sleeping.
Prosecutor Erick Moyo told the court Tsikidze tapped on the car’s window, showing Oosthuyse his police badge.
Tsikidze advised Oosthuyse that he was under arrest for wrongful parking and ordered him to drive to the nearby Bulawayo Central Police Station to pay a fine.
Oosthuyse let the men into his car but instead of directing him to the police station, they told to drive to the corner of Jason Moyo Street and 2nd Avenue. The frightened tourist was then ordered to stop in the middle of the road, and Tsikidze pulled out a pistol.
Dube, who was the prosecution’s star witness, immediately fled the scene.
After Oosthuyse refused to heed Tsikidze’s order to get out of the car, he was shot in the head and his body pushed to the front passenger seat, the prosecutor told the court.
Tsikidze, now one of Zimbabwe’s most wanted men, got behind the wheel and drove to Nyamandlovu where together with Matibe they dumped the body at the Bedminton Farm.
The two men drove off in Oosthuyse's car which had at the back a small refridgerator. They also robbed his dead body of a mobile phone and R700.
Oosthuyse’s body was found by locals two days later on September 28. His passport and a wristwatch were also recovered.
A post mortem report into his death was inconclusive as only parts of his body -- comprising of a fragmented skull, 13 spinal bones, left tibia, right tibia and both femurs -- were recovered.
Detectives investigating the murder got a lucky break just five days after the body was recovered when Matibe was arrested while committing a robbery at Mership House along Main Street. Police recovered a BSAP 170 CZ pistol which they linked to Oosthuyse’s murder.
In his defence, Matibe claimed that he took possession of the pistol from Tsikidze after the latter left it in a jacket which he gave to his girlfriend.
The judge rejected Matibe’s plea to find mitigating circumstances after claiming that he was drunk during the commission of the murder. During trial, Dube admitted all three man “had no money” to buy alcohol, and the judge said it followed they could not have been drunk.
“It is clear that you were actively participating in the commission of the crime,” the judge said.
A FORMER police officer has been sentenced to death by hanging for the “cold-blooded and beastly murder” of a South African tourist in 2007.
Leo Matibe, 26, was accused -- along with another ex-cop who is on the run -- of the murder of 69-year-old Martinus Jacobus Oosthuyse whose body was dumped in farmland in Nyamandlovu, about 60km north-west of Bulawayo.
On Monday, Matibe was placed on death row after Justice Maphios Cheda, sitting at the Bulawayo High Court, found him guilty of murder with constructive intent.
The judge told Matibe: “In your own evidence, you stated that you knew and appreciated what you were doing. You are a trained police officer.
“This was a cold- blooded beastly murder committed without any conscience and you went on to dump the body. As a policeman, you had ample time to report the murder but you went to Harare for three weeks after the offence and still did not report.”
The court heard that Matibe, of Bulawayo’s Pumula North suburb, had been in the company of two friends – serving police officer Collin Tsikidze and Leonard Dube – when they decided to commit a robbery for money.
Shortly after midnight on September 26, 2007, the men approached Oosthuyse’s car – a Nissan Sentra bearing South African number plates -- which was parked outside a supermarket along Bulawayo’s 8th Avenue. Oosthuyse was sleeping.
Prosecutor Erick Moyo told the court Tsikidze tapped on the car’s window, showing Oosthuyse his police badge.
Tsikidze advised Oosthuyse that he was under arrest for wrongful parking and ordered him to drive to the nearby Bulawayo Central Police Station to pay a fine.
Oosthuyse let the men into his car but instead of directing him to the police station, they told to drive to the corner of Jason Moyo Street and 2nd Avenue. The frightened tourist was then ordered to stop in the middle of the road, and Tsikidze pulled out a pistol.
Dube, who was the prosecution’s star witness, immediately fled the scene.
After Oosthuyse refused to heed Tsikidze’s order to get out of the car, he was shot in the head and his body pushed to the front passenger seat, the prosecutor told the court.
Tsikidze, now one of Zimbabwe’s most wanted men, got behind the wheel and drove to Nyamandlovu where together with Matibe they dumped the body at the Bedminton Farm.
The two men drove off in Oosthuyse's car which had at the back a small refridgerator. They also robbed his dead body of a mobile phone and R700.
Oosthuyse’s body was found by locals two days later on September 28. His passport and a wristwatch were also recovered.
A post mortem report into his death was inconclusive as only parts of his body -- comprising of a fragmented skull, 13 spinal bones, left tibia, right tibia and both femurs -- were recovered.
Detectives investigating the murder got a lucky break just five days after the body was recovered when Matibe was arrested while committing a robbery at Mership House along Main Street. Police recovered a BSAP 170 CZ pistol which they linked to Oosthuyse’s murder.
In his defence, Matibe claimed that he took possession of the pistol from Tsikidze after the latter left it in a jacket which he gave to his girlfriend.
The judge rejected Matibe’s plea to find mitigating circumstances after claiming that he was drunk during the commission of the murder. During trial, Dube admitted all three man “had no money” to buy alcohol, and the judge said it followed they could not have been drunk.
“It is clear that you were actively participating in the commission of the crime,” the judge said.
Wednesday
Friday
Monday
Students removed from University for insulting Mugabe
JOHANNESBURG -- Three Fort Hare University students have been thrown out of President Mugabe's scholarship programme for allegedly insulting their benefactor, Mr Mugabe.One of them, Tonderai Kunyaye, a second-year Bachelor of Social Science (Communications) student has spoken about how the expulsion will ruin his future.Kunyaye, whose student number is 200808194, was allegedly booted out of the university with at least two others for saying "bad things about Mugabe". The dentities of the other two students could not be immediately established.The expulsions are likely to fuel suspicions that the controversial scholarship programme, originally designed for under-privileged students, is being abused by politicians.Documents seen by CAJ News Agency that were signed by Manicaland governor, Chris Mushohwe, who is Mugabe's Fort Hare Scholarship Programme executive director, confirmed the developments.One of the letters from Mushohwe was copied to the University of Fort Hare Registrar Dr N Mrwetyana, executive director of students ZM Mjekula, Vice-Chancellor Professor Alice, Dr Tom Mvuyo and Jerry Samkange, who is a member of the Presidential Fort Hare Scholarship committee.Kunyaye is also being accused of refusing to submit his results to the sponsor and patron, President Mugabe at the end of each semester, a requirement the letter says every student should comply with."The student has violated standing rules and regulations of the programme. The student has defied calls for him to submit his results to the sponsor at the end of each semester, a requirement which every student complies with."He has been broadcasting hate, malicious and defamatory propaganda through self-made music, postcards and addresses to other students in and outside your university (Fort Hare)."The student has spread false, malicious and defamatory allegations through print media which has elicited malicious controversy around the patron and sponsor of this programme (President Mugabe)," reads the letter.The letter also claims Kunyaye confessed that he was involved in illicit dealings in precious minerals in Zimbabwe during the June/July 2009 school vacation."Tonderai has been masquerading as a member of national security organisations as a way of intimidating other students on the programme."Programme authorities have evidence to all these claims from numerous reports written to us by the Zimbabwe Students' Committee there, his own friends on the scholarship and those not on the scholarship and other students who do not subscribe to his unclear agenda," reads the letter.The document claims Kunyaye conned some Zimbabwean students of up to R10 000."It is for the above reasons and many more not listed here that the sponsorship is forthwith terminated."The university is hereby advised that Tonderai is no longer a beneficiary of the Presidential Scholarship Programme."Tonderai is expected to surrender the study permit issued under the auspices of the scholarship. "He is expected to come to Zimbabwe and assist authorities here to substantiate claims contained in tapes and reports in our possession, failure to which his guarantors will be called upon to reimburse what government has expended on his education under the programme sponsorship," reads the letter.But Kunyaye said he was ready to clear his name. "I am a victim of this unjust and very oppressive type of autocracy," he said in an interview."I am prepared to give a testimony at any platform because whatever has happened to us is not in any way a cause of the scholarship programme," Kunyaye said.Mushohwe was not reachable for comment yesterday while Higher and Tertiary Education permanent secretary Washington Mbizvo did not answer calls on his mobile phone - CAJ News.
Friday
ZANU PF intimidates Mthwakazi Parties
ZAPU’s ‘illegal’ t-shirts seized at Beitbridge
By Violet Gonda (SW Radio Africa)
3 September 2009
The Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) and the Matabeleland Freedom Party (MFP) have accused the police and customs officials at Beitbridge border post of political harassment and seizing their campaign material.
Thulani Dhlamini from ZAPU told SW Radio Africa on Thursday that the ZAPU executive in South Africa had sourced funding for the printing of t-shirts for a rally in Plumtree.
But he said the materials were confiscated last week by police, state agents and custom officials at the border with South Africa, who said the t-shirts were illegal. Dhlamini said even the single t-shirts they had as individuals were confiscated. The ZAPU official claims they were told by the authorities that ‘only ZANU and MDC T-shirts were allowed to be worn in Zim,’ and that they were undermining the unity government.
They were allegedly held in custody for 18 hours at the Beitbridge police station where they were subjected to interrogation about the names of party officials and their positions. Dhlamini said they were only released after being forced to apologise verbally to the Member in Charge for bringing the t-shirts into Zimbabwe. However, the pamphlets and t-shirts were not returned to them.
Meanwhile, the Matabeleland Freedom Party has also accused Zimbabwean border authorities of political harassment. MFP member David Magagula told us that officials at the border either confiscate opposition party regalia or charge exorbitant fees to make it impossible for the parties to ship their goods into Zimbabwe. Magagula claims he was recently charged R3 000 for about 150 t-shirts. He said: “This was exorbitant and far more than we had printed the t-shirts for. So we told them we were going back to South Africa with our t-shirts but we made as if we were returning and then we hid the t-shirts and passed.”
He accused the authorities of only ‘recognising ZANU PF and MDC’, and refusing to acknowledge that there are other parties in the country. He said: “Many people voted for MDC but it did not mean they liked the MDC or they liked Morgan Tsvangirai. It is only because they had no alternatives. It was a vote of protest because people don’t want Robert Mugabe.”
He claimed some border officials said Zimbabwe is now a two party state and called them ‘dissidents’. “That shows we are not wanted, why do we force ourselves to be Zimbabwean, when Zimbabweans do not want us.”
Controversially, the MFP does not want to be ruled by a person who is not from the Matabeleland region. Magagula said: “The party was formed so that we liberate Matabeleland from Mashonaland, along borders that were there before colonialism.”
Observers say ZANU PF continues leading the country down this trap of not recognising other political parties, creating intolerance and disharmony. Additionally the Gukurahundi massacres have still not been dealt with, and this will forever remain a painful issue in Matabeleland while the government continues to ignore it.
Wednesday
Productive commercial farm burnt down to ashes in Zimbabwe
2 September 2009
A productive commercial farmer in Zimbabwe has been left homeless after his farmhouse was burnt into ashes in an apparent arson attack by suspected ZANU-PF militias, it has emerged.
The beleaguered commercial farmer in Chegutu, Mr Ben Freeth has faced months of intimidation and attack by land invaders this year and was on Monday night without a home after his farmhouse was burned down.
Farm workers weeping for lost property: photo Sokwanele
Mr Freeth has endured some of the worst attacks on Mount Carmel farm since the renewed offensive against the commercial farming community began in earnest this year.
His farmhouse, the homes of some of his workers and an on-site factory for the farm produce, were also burned down in the fire, which started while he and his family were at Church.
Mr Freeth explained on Monday that because land invaders have stolen all their equipment, including their tractors and irrigation pipes, the family was not able to put out of the fire when they returned home. He described how, with a strong wind, the fire quickly spread, destroying his home and the houses of his staff.
“There was only enough time for me to get my family’s passports and our computer, but that was all,” Freeth explained. “We have literally been left with the clothes on our backs.”Mr Freeth’s staff have also lost everything, and Freeth said he is determined to rebuild and give his staff a chance to also rebuild their lives. He explained that arson would never be proved, but argued that the fire would not have been so devastating if land invading ‘thugs’ had not stolen their equipment. Freeth added that surrounding farmers would usually rush to help fight a fire, but the renewed attack against Zimbabwe’s farmers means most have fled. Freeth said he, his family and workers were left alone to battle the blaze.
“While we were fighting the fire, some of the thugs were driving around on our tractor with our water pumps and dowsers, but they didn’t come near us,” Ben explained. “They were probably laughing at us.”
The attack came mere days after South African President Jacob Zuma delivered an implied rebuke to Robert Mugabe over the continuing lawlessness on white-owned commercial farms, when he said that the six-month-old coalition government should ensure productivity on all agricultural land. Zuma was in Harare last week to mediate in the unity government dispute and made it clear that he backed Tsvangirai’s insistence that Mugabe had failed to meet his obligations to restore democratic reforms.Last year, Freeth and his parents in law, Mike and Angela Campbell, were abducted and severely beaten, on the day that Mugabe was announced the winner of the farcical one-man presidential runoff election in June.
Mr Freeth, his family and his workers have since endured months of intimidation and harassment by farm invaders, working for ZANU PF top official Nathan Shamuyarira. The intimidation continued, regardless of the formation of the unity government in February.
In April some of Freeth’s staff were arrested and severely beaten when they tried to defend the farm against the land invaders. Mike and Angela also fled the farm months ago because of the constant stress of the harassment by the land invaders.The invaders meanwhile have completely taken over the farm, destroying and looting property and plundering the farm produce for personal gain. All the attacks have been reported to the Chegutu police who have repeatedly refused to aid Freeth and his family.
Mr Freeth has also written urgent letters to Prime Minister Tsvangirai pleading for the unity government’s intervention, but the pleas have apparently fallen on deaf ears.
Despite promises by the unity government to encourage food production on farms, there still has been no effort to stop the attacks that have left the community reeling. The government has instead been at pains to dismiss the farm invasions as isolated ‘disturbances’, which Tsvangirai said were blown out of proportion by the media.
Mr Freeth’s farm is supposed to be protected by a ruling passed down by the human rights court of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) last year.
The SADC Tribunal ruling ordered the government to protect more than 70 farms against future attack in the name of land ‘reform’. But the ruling was ignored and even nullified by Mugabe, who condoned the renewed farm invasions this year. The Tribunal then ruled the government was in contempt for ignoring the earlier ruling, but this has done nothing to prevent the attacks from continuing on the farms.Meanwhile, the complete breakdown of the rule of law in Zimbabwe continues to take its toll on the farming community’s elderly people, after a farmer’s wife was found murdered in their home this weekend.
75-year-old Sophie Hart was discovered bound and apparently strangled, when her husband returned to their home in Kadoma on Sunday. The house had reportedly been ransacked, but not much was missing, suggesting the intruders were merely after cash. The death brings to three the number of murders of elderly farmers that have taken place in the country since the unity government was formed in February. The Commercial Farmers Union has previously said the attacks show the rule of law no longer exists in Zimbabwe, and that the elderly are soft targets for criminals. Sokwanele/Zim Diaspora/SW
Outspoken Zimbabwean archbishop says government still wants him dead
ZIMBABWE-NCUBE Sep-1-2009 (610 words) xxxi
Outspoken Zimbabwean archbishop says government still wants him dead
By Gunther Simmermacher
Catholic News Service
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (CNS) -- The former archbishop of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, said agents of his country's government still want to assassinate him over his criticism of human rights violations under President Robert Mugabe.
Archbishop Pius Ncube, 62, who now lives in western Zimbabwe's Hwange Diocese, made his claims in a letter to South Africa's national Catholic weekly, The Southern Cross, with the request that Catholics pray for him. The Southern Cross published Archbishop Ncube's letter in its Sept. 2 edition.
Before his resignation as head of the Bulawayo Archdiocese in September 2007 after having had an affair with a woman, Archbishop Ncube was internationally known as one of Mugabe's most vocal critics.
Mugabe has frequently attacked Archbishop Ncube in speeches and interviews. Even before his resignation, the archbishop said he was being harassed routinely.
"Where I now live, every two weeks the state intelligence is there to visit me, which they never did when I was in Bulawayo. I now refuse to talk to them," he told The Southern Cross.
He said he was being followed by car and alleged that his telephone and fax lines were being tampered with. Communications are intercepted and blocked or delayed, Archbishop Ncube said.
"My attitude is that the government of Zimbabwe has no right to hound me and get me out of Zimbabwe," he said. "I have a right and duty to live in Zimbabwe. This has been their method to intimidate thousands of their critics so that they leave the country."
He said that, "in compliance with the suggestions from the Vatican," he has abstained from publicly criticizing the government, "a thing which is alien to my convictions."
"I do not agree with quiet diplomacy when people are suffering," he said.
However, he added, that those who are harassing him "are not more powerful than God and our spiritual mother Mary."
"I ask the people of God to help me by their prayers for my protection," he said. "I thank all those who pray for me. I will continue to pray for the delivery of Africa from tyranny."
In his letter, Archbishop Ncube referred to an incident last year when a bomb he believes was intended to kill him injured a priest instead.
On April 6, 2008, Archbishop Ncube was still out of the country, but the government allegedly heard a rumor that he had returned.
"They therefore made an arrangement to kill me," Archbishop Ncube said.
"They planted a bomb in my car. A priest used my car," he said, and about 12 miles from Bulawayo the priest -- whom Archbishop Ncube declined to name to protect him from repercussions -- noticed that he was being followed by two cars.
Archbishop Ncube alleged that the people following the priest "detonated a bomb and the (priest's) car swerved and fell into the ditch." He added that he had been advised to get a driver for security reasons, and the bomb specifically targeted the passenger side of the vehicle.
"Had the bomb been directed to the driver, this priest would have died instantly," the archbishop said.
While the priest was lightly injured and covered in debris, the cars that had followed him passed without stopping or investigating.
"A third car, driven by a Chinese man, stopped nearby," Archbishop Ncube said. The driver allegedly proceeded to take photographs of the scene.
"The priest asked (the man) why he did not help him rather than photograph him, since he was injured. (The man) nervously scurried away and drove off fast," Archbishop Ncube said, adding that it was nearly four hours before the priest was taken to a hospital.
END
Copyright (c) 2009 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
CNS · 3211 Fourth St NE · Washington DC 20017 · 202.541.3250
Outspoken Zimbabwean archbishop says government still wants him dead
By Gunther Simmermacher
Catholic News Service
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (CNS) -- The former archbishop of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, said agents of his country's government still want to assassinate him over his criticism of human rights violations under President Robert Mugabe.
Archbishop Pius Ncube, 62, who now lives in western Zimbabwe's Hwange Diocese, made his claims in a letter to South Africa's national Catholic weekly, The Southern Cross, with the request that Catholics pray for him. The Southern Cross published Archbishop Ncube's letter in its Sept. 2 edition.
Before his resignation as head of the Bulawayo Archdiocese in September 2007 after having had an affair with a woman, Archbishop Ncube was internationally known as one of Mugabe's most vocal critics.
Mugabe has frequently attacked Archbishop Ncube in speeches and interviews. Even before his resignation, the archbishop said he was being harassed routinely.
"Where I now live, every two weeks the state intelligence is there to visit me, which they never did when I was in Bulawayo. I now refuse to talk to them," he told The Southern Cross.
He said he was being followed by car and alleged that his telephone and fax lines were being tampered with. Communications are intercepted and blocked or delayed, Archbishop Ncube said.
"My attitude is that the government of Zimbabwe has no right to hound me and get me out of Zimbabwe," he said. "I have a right and duty to live in Zimbabwe. This has been their method to intimidate thousands of their critics so that they leave the country."
He said that, "in compliance with the suggestions from the Vatican," he has abstained from publicly criticizing the government, "a thing which is alien to my convictions."
"I do not agree with quiet diplomacy when people are suffering," he said.
However, he added, that those who are harassing him "are not more powerful than God and our spiritual mother Mary."
"I ask the people of God to help me by their prayers for my protection," he said. "I thank all those who pray for me. I will continue to pray for the delivery of Africa from tyranny."
In his letter, Archbishop Ncube referred to an incident last year when a bomb he believes was intended to kill him injured a priest instead.
On April 6, 2008, Archbishop Ncube was still out of the country, but the government allegedly heard a rumor that he had returned.
"They therefore made an arrangement to kill me," Archbishop Ncube said.
"They planted a bomb in my car. A priest used my car," he said, and about 12 miles from Bulawayo the priest -- whom Archbishop Ncube declined to name to protect him from repercussions -- noticed that he was being followed by two cars.
Archbishop Ncube alleged that the people following the priest "detonated a bomb and the (priest's) car swerved and fell into the ditch." He added that he had been advised to get a driver for security reasons, and the bomb specifically targeted the passenger side of the vehicle.
"Had the bomb been directed to the driver, this priest would have died instantly," the archbishop said.
While the priest was lightly injured and covered in debris, the cars that had followed him passed without stopping or investigating.
"A third car, driven by a Chinese man, stopped nearby," Archbishop Ncube said. The driver allegedly proceeded to take photographs of the scene.
"The priest asked (the man) why he did not help him rather than photograph him, since he was injured. (The man) nervously scurried away and drove off fast," Archbishop Ncube said, adding that it was nearly four hours before the priest was taken to a hospital.
END
Copyright (c) 2009 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
CNS · 3211 Fourth St NE · Washington DC 20017 · 202.541.3250
Tuesday
Zimbabwean Refugee murdered on his return to Zimbabwe
BIKITA, August 31, 2009 - A Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party activist who had gone into exile in the run-up to last year's bloody June 27 run-off elections was murdered upon his return home over the weekend, police and the legislator for the area, Heya Shoko, confirmed.
Bikita West Member of Parliament (MP) Shoko said Edwin Chingami (32), an ardent MDC supporter who was an election observer for the party at the initial March 29 harmonized elections, was killed at a funeral in Ward eight, Chirove village under chief Nhema over the weekend.
Chingami had fled the country for fear of retributive violence that had hit the country.
"He had come for the funeral wake of his niece when some ZANU PF youths started accusing him of being a sell-out who had fled the country. They started beating him up and witnesses said he fled but was hit by a stone on the head," Shoko said.
Provincial police spokesperson Inspector Phibion Nyambo confirmed the incident, but denied the murder was politically motivated.
"We received a report of murder at a funeral. The suspects were drunk as there was beer at the funeral wake. I have not heard that the victim was killed because of his political affiliation," said Inspector Nyambo.
But MDC-T provincial chairman, Wilstuff Sitemere confirmed that Chingami, a district youth chairperson, was murdered for campaigning for the MDC-T, as well as standing as the party's elections observer.
"He was the target by ZANU PF youths aligned to former legislator Claudius Makova for vigorously campaigning for the MDC. They had told him that he will die whenever he returns, that's why it took him so long to come back. But this time around, his relative had died and he had no option but come back. We sadly mourn his death, he is a martyr," Sitemere said.
Contacted for a comment, the Minister of National Healing, John Nkomo, said he was unaware of the incident. Nkomo however said that he would investigate the matter so that the culprits are dealt with harshly.
"As the national healing Ministry, we urge people to throw their political differences so that the country can move forward. We also urge the justice system to deal harshly with the perpetrators of fresh political violence," said Nkomo.
Wednesday
MDC UK's ZANU PF Traits
This story was posted to the web by zim diaspora.
THE missing MDC-UK £54 151, 37 haunted Jonathan Chawora's executive on Saturday when tampers flared during a provincial council meeting in Wallsall attended by less than 30 party members loyal to him, our undercover reporter found out.
We can also reveal that the inadequate gathering was told that a party member from Walsall branch admitted misappropriating funds. No disciplinary action was ever taken even though the issue had long been reported to both the district and Chawora's executive.
Our under cover reporter also witnessed a half-baked financial statement being presented to the meeting triggering a barrage of criticism of the MDC-UK financial mismanagement. Our reporter says the statement was immediately dismissed by supporters as a mockery to the integrity of the party.
The skeletally attended meeting was bombarded with questions of financial credibility and even those known to be loyal to Chawora demanded financial accountability of party funds.
In theory, Mr Chawora and his ill-fated executive quickly became rebels themselves during an unexpected salvo by their most trusted allies. Perhaps the biggest betrayal Mr Chawora is feeling this week was the boycot by his closest confidente' who also say they have also lost confidence with the former police chief-turned-MDC-UK boss.
While there was bitter exchange of words in the Wallsall meeting there was pomp and splendour few miles away in a "rebel-organised" MDC Oxford fund-raising meeting also attended by Prime Minister Tsvangirai's UK deputy representative Ms Emily Madamombe and vice-chairman of the UK executive Mr Jameson Mashakada .
Our reporter says the Wallsall meeting, organised by Mr Tonderai Samanyanga and attended by Mr Chawora and some few members of his executive resembled a disused and neglected cemetery with less than 30 people present. The district itself failed to constitute a quorum, one of the laid down rules and regulations of the MDC party.
The flopped meeting was designed to try and hoodwink supporters into believing that Chawora was still in control yet it turned out to be a disaster.
Speaker after speaker bombarded Mr Samanyanga with questions most of which were never answered as he could only promise to come back to them later.
Of more significant was an irate member who stood up and said, "Chairman, I am not really clear about what will happen on Saturday the 5th of September, 2009 when the National Chairman Mr Lovemore Moyo attends our provincial rally and 10th Anniversary Celebrations. Are we all going to form a queue to take turns to read and view the Provincial financial report? Or is the provincial treasurer going to print many individual copies for members to look at because people want to know what happened to our money? In any event, Chairman, there are only about 30 of us in this room and it has taken us, so far 2 hours just discussing the Treasurer’s report – how then can we be expected as the full Province to go through the Provincial financial report on the 5th of September, 2009 and still have an Assembly and the 10th Anniversary Celebrations and an address from our National Chairman."
There was a round of applause from party members present. Mr Samanyanga did not respond - all what he could say was that ‘we are writing down everything so that we take all your queries to the Provincial Council.’
Another speaker asked "How much does the District keep in their account?".
The response was that the district remits all funds to the provincial account and does not keep any money in its coffers. Then party members said "So why should we deposit the money into the district account?"
Supporters also questioned Mr Samanyanga about the credibility of the meeting saying the skeletal attendance showed that the party cannot fulfil the quorum system rendering the meeting invalid.
This also prompted Stoke-On-Trent chairman, Mr Tafadzwa Gidi to say: "Party members are angry - and until issues are addressed and resolved then this poor turnout will continue".
There were no MDC songs and the usually dance as compared to the Oxford fund raising one where the "rebels" led by Provincial Vice chairman Mr Jameson Mashakada sang pro-Tsvangirai revolutionary songs, chanted MDC slogans, danced and boasted.
There were four district executives, no representatives from Wolverhampton branch, two representatives from Stoke-On-Trent, one branch executive member from Birmingham and acting as secretary and minute taker for the district, one committee member from Coventry, no representative from Derby, two executive members from Walsall and the few so-called co-opted Committee members for Walsall branch.
District executives present were district chairman, Mr Tonderai Samananya himself, his deputy, Mr Solomon Mashiri, District Vice Organising Secretary Mr Robert Hombiro and District Treasurer Lincoln Makotore. Some shocking absences included Chawora's close ally district Information and Publicity Secretary, Mr Makusha Mugabe, district secretariat and women’s representative. No explanation was ever given on the controversial absence.
The biggest representation was from Leicester branch (about six branch officials) who so far has contributed £2000 to the district since January, 2009.
"The meeting was then presented with the Treasurer’s financial report. This item on its own covered more two hours of the meeting. Interesting questions raised from the floor included the Treasurer being asked to prove the transactions that he had reported in his report." our undercover reporter said.
An angry Leicester branch executive reportedly stood up and dismissed the scant financial report saying: "Ladies and gentlemen, this financial statement is a joke, anyone can type up the amounts shown on the report, what we need is a bank statement and proof of acknowledgement of receipt of funds from the Provincial Treasurer was important".
He said the report was not substantive as there was it did not "add-up at all".
"We need a proper report accompanied by a bank statement detailing financial activities of the province. We also need something clear comparative tables against the other Districts," the speaker from Leicester said.
No supporter has ever seen a bank statement pertaining to the management of the MDC-UK funds, they said.
While many MDC branches have since stopped remitting funds to Chawora's provincial executive, Wallsall, Wolverhampton and Derby Branches were singled out as problematic branches.
While four key members of the Chawora executive defied him and turned up for the "rebel" organised fund-raising meeting in Oxford, the Wallsall provincial meeting failed to take off the ground in line with the MDC rules and regulations.
For starters, there was no clear reason for the absence of the district secretary, Theresa Matope, the district vice secretary Edward Zvavarei, district organising secretary, Miss Nomalanga MacKenzie and the very late arrival of unconstitutionally co-opted district Youth Chairman Nicholas Chawasarira.
THE missing MDC-UK £54 151, 37 haunted Jonathan Chawora's executive on Saturday when tampers flared during a provincial council meeting in Wallsall attended by less than 30 party members loyal to him, our undercover reporter found out.
We can also reveal that the inadequate gathering was told that a party member from Walsall branch admitted misappropriating funds. No disciplinary action was ever taken even though the issue had long been reported to both the district and Chawora's executive.
Our under cover reporter also witnessed a half-baked financial statement being presented to the meeting triggering a barrage of criticism of the MDC-UK financial mismanagement. Our reporter says the statement was immediately dismissed by supporters as a mockery to the integrity of the party.
The skeletally attended meeting was bombarded with questions of financial credibility and even those known to be loyal to Chawora demanded financial accountability of party funds.In theory, Mr Chawora and his ill-fated executive quickly became rebels themselves during an unexpected salvo by their most trusted allies. Perhaps the biggest betrayal Mr Chawora is feeling this week was the boycot by his closest confidente' who also say they have also lost confidence with the former police chief-turned-MDC-UK boss.
While there was bitter exchange of words in the Wallsall meeting there was pomp and splendour few miles away in a "rebel-organised" MDC Oxford fund-raising meeting also attended by Prime Minister Tsvangirai's UK deputy representative Ms Emily Madamombe and vice-chairman of the UK executive Mr Jameson Mashakada .
Our reporter says the Wallsall meeting, organised by Mr Tonderai Samanyanga and attended by Mr Chawora and some few members of his executive resembled a disused and neglected cemetery with less than 30 people present. The district itself failed to constitute a quorum, one of the laid down rules and regulations of the MDC party.
The flopped meeting was designed to try and hoodwink supporters into believing that Chawora was still in control yet it turned out to be a disaster.
Speaker after speaker bombarded Mr Samanyanga with questions most of which were never answered as he could only promise to come back to them later.
Of more significant was an irate member who stood up and said, "Chairman, I am not really clear about what will happen on Saturday the 5th of September, 2009 when the National Chairman Mr Lovemore Moyo attends our provincial rally and 10th Anniversary Celebrations. Are we all going to form a queue to take turns to read and view the Provincial financial report? Or is the provincial treasurer going to print many individual copies for members to look at because people want to know what happened to our money? In any event, Chairman, there are only about 30 of us in this room and it has taken us, so far 2 hours just discussing the Treasurer’s report – how then can we be expected as the full Province to go through the Provincial financial report on the 5th of September, 2009 and still have an Assembly and the 10th Anniversary Celebrations and an address from our National Chairman."There was a round of applause from party members present. Mr Samanyanga did not respond - all what he could say was that ‘we are writing down everything so that we take all your queries to the Provincial Council.’
Another speaker asked "How much does the District keep in their account?".
The response was that the district remits all funds to the provincial account and does not keep any money in its coffers. Then party members said "So why should we deposit the money into the district account?"
Supporters also questioned Mr Samanyanga about the credibility of the meeting saying the skeletal attendance showed that the party cannot fulfil the quorum system rendering the meeting invalid.This also prompted Stoke-On-Trent chairman, Mr Tafadzwa Gidi to say: "Party members are angry - and until issues are addressed and resolved then this poor turnout will continue".
There were no MDC songs and the usually dance as compared to the Oxford fund raising one where the "rebels" led by Provincial Vice chairman Mr Jameson Mashakada sang pro-Tsvangirai revolutionary songs, chanted MDC slogans, danced and boasted.
There were four district executives, no representatives from Wolverhampton branch, two representatives from Stoke-On-Trent, one branch executive member from Birmingham and acting as secretary and minute taker for the district, one committee member from Coventry, no representative from Derby, two executive members from Walsall and the few so-called co-opted Committee members for Walsall branch.
District executives present were district chairman, Mr Tonderai Samananya himself, his deputy, Mr Solomon Mashiri, District Vice Organising Secretary Mr Robert Hombiro and District Treasurer Lincoln Makotore. Some shocking absences included Chawora's close ally district Information and Publicity Secretary, Mr Makusha Mugabe, district secretariat and women’s representative. No explanation was ever given on the controversial absence.
The biggest representation was from Leicester branch (about six branch officials) who so far has contributed £2000 to the district since January, 2009.
"The meeting was then presented with the Treasurer’s financial report. This item on its own covered more two hours of the meeting. Interesting questions raised from the floor included the Treasurer being asked to prove the transactions that he had reported in his report." our undercover reporter said.
An angry Leicester branch executive reportedly stood up and dismissed the scant financial report saying: "Ladies and gentlemen, this financial statement is a joke, anyone can type up the amounts shown on the report, what we need is a bank statement and proof of acknowledgement of receipt of funds from the Provincial Treasurer was important".
He said the report was not substantive as there was it did not "add-up at all".
"We need a proper report accompanied by a bank statement detailing financial activities of the province. We also need something clear comparative tables against the other Districts," the speaker from Leicester said.
No supporter has ever seen a bank statement pertaining to the management of the MDC-UK funds, they said.
While many MDC branches have since stopped remitting funds to Chawora's provincial executive, Wallsall, Wolverhampton and Derby Branches were singled out as problematic branches.
While four key members of the Chawora executive defied him and turned up for the "rebel" organised fund-raising meeting in Oxford, the Wallsall provincial meeting failed to take off the ground in line with the MDC rules and regulations.
For starters, there was no clear reason for the absence of the district secretary, Theresa Matope, the district vice secretary Edward Zvavarei, district organising secretary, Miss Nomalanga MacKenzie and the very late arrival of unconstitutionally co-opted district Youth Chairman Nicholas Chawasarira.
Thursday
Facebook Debate continued.
Noreen Welch posted a link.
Yesterday at 11:33.
AFP: Blair says Mugabe 'should be overthrown'
Source: www.google.com
BERLIN — Tony Blair believes that Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe should be overthrown, a German magazine quoted the former British prime minister as saying in an interview published on Wednesday.
Bobo Jaan : Tick tock tick tock tick tock age is such a wonderful process...its going to be great to see the propagandists, generals , sycophants, criminals, rent-a-crowds, etc etc scramble when the figurehead passes with great pomp to heros acre (or is that the sin bin)....what a wonderful feeling....Hum diddly dee....
Yesterday at 15:52 Ray RockinghamRUFFCUTS, as the November 1997 public letter from Labour Government Secretary of State Claire Short clearly states, the British Government told Mugabe that they would withhold further financial compensation for the purchase of white owned commercial farm land until a new Land Registry was established which verified with complete transparency that ... Read morethe British Taxpayers money (compensation) was buying white owned land which was being given to poor BLACK Zimbabweans for the clear purpose of alleviating BLACK poverty in Zimbabwe. This is what angered Mugabe because Mugabe want the land as a bribe to buy the loyalty of the senior ZANU-PF members who keep Mugabe in power.
The British wanted to help poor BLACK Zimbabweans but Mugabe would not permit the British to do this so Mugabe invented the LIE that the British were practicing neo-colonialism against black peoples' interests. RUFFCUTS, Mugabe is a LIAR and if you repeat Mugabes' LIES then RUFFCUTS you are also a liar equal to Mugabe.
Yesterday at 18:34 RuffcutsWear Marco Machona@Ray..Please read my posting carefully. What your wrote was exactly my points. I said Tony had imprints on the land issues in Zim . I stated exactly the amount then...which was about 47million pounds and the reasons for the conflict ..how to disburse and future usage. Bob saying he didn't want to be told how to spend it and on who..etc...Tony ... Read moreinsisting on what U have expressed. Audit etc. So my friend you can equate me to Bob all you want but the land issues in Zim were to a greater extend Tony's and Bob's staborness...Up to now UK Government feels not obliged to pay any compensation, it was Tony's final stance. Bob capitalised on that.Ruffcuts is not a liar, i just follow Politics. That is why MDC, CFU are on a hard place now and AU, SADC,etc on Bob's side. Facts.
Yesterday at 20:12Conor WalshWe should blame the Brutish government because it did not overthrow Mgaxa at the height of Gukurahundi.
We should not blame the Brutish for not paying money to allow weekend goche goche farmers to tshisa nyama instead of farming as is now the case.
Yesterday at 20:35 Ray RockinghamRuffcuts says ... ''So my friend you can equate me to Bob all you want but the land issues in Zim were to a greater extend Tony's and Bob's staborness...Up to now UK Government feels not obliged to pay any compensation, it was Tony's final stance. Bob capitalised on that.''
By these words above Ruffcuts Machona holds Blair and Mugabe equally ... Read moreresponsible for the land grab and the collapse of commercial agriculture in Zimbabwe. Machona is talking rubbish as Mugabe is alone to blame because the British were defending poor black Zimbabweans against Mugabes' abuse of poor black Zimbabweans by denying them the land which the white British taxpayers wanted to pay for, but Mugabe falsely blames the British because Mugabe is a Liar who abuses poor black people in Zimbabwe and then falsely blames the white British Government. Therefore the British government have zero blame for food insecurity in Zimbabwe and Mugabe is 100% to blame for food insecurity in Zimbabwe.
...continued below...
Yesterday at 21:13 Ray RockinghamRuffcuts Machona falsely states that Mugabe and Blair are equally to blame because Ruffcuts Machona is no less a liar than Mugabe. Above Taff Gidi says to Ruffcuts Machona ... ''To blame Tony Blair for the shambolic, murderous land grab by Mugabe loyalists is just plain silly!''
Taff Gidi is right when he says that Ruffcuts Machona is silly. ... Read moreMachona has no rational opinion which is worth typing on facebook because Machona is an empty-headed mischief maker who plays with is computer and tries to sound intelligent when he is not - Machona is Silly - and he lies just like Mugabe.
Yesterday at 21:14 RuffcutsWear Marco Machona@Ray...all you know its a group of old women who started land invassion. Bob actually arrested them first. Cde Hunzwi hijacked the plot of land invassion. Again Bob was initially against land invassion....the beef between Tony and Bob "much later" fuelled using land invassion ...AND was used as an election and political tool. Like i said your lack ... Read moreof knowledge is what makes u loud for nothing. I would think as a sympathiser for 'so called food security" you would know the history behind the messy. Its wise you read than resort to calling names. You are a victim of your own propaganda my friend. Don't rely on FB for facts.....I rest my case...lack of knowledge is dangerous.
Yesterday at 21:24 Ray Rockingham So now Ruffcutts Machona has abandoned his lie that Tony Blair and Mugabe were equally responsible and now Machona is admitting that the land grab and the collapse of food security in Zimbabwe was 100% Mugabes' responsibility as an election and political tool.
If Mugabe wanted to win the votes of the ordinary black poor people of Zimbabwe then ... Read moreMugabe would have welcomed the British £40+ million to buy commercial farm land to give to poor black Zimbabweans. But Mugabe is an autocratic Dictator who never felt any need to encourage the black peasantry to like him and to vote for him, the only voters Mugabe cared about was the 400,000 black commercial farm workers whom he wanted to punish for voting MDC - just as he had previously used Gukurahundi to punish the Indebele for voting ZAPU and later used Murambatsvina to punish urban workers for voting MDC.
...continued below...
Yesterday at 22:24 Ray Rockingham Mugabe only ever wanted the valuable land in the high rainfall areas for ZANU-PF, so Mugabe printed fake duplicate bank notes at the Reserve Bank as bribes to buy the loyalty of 20,000 junior ZANU-PF (warvets) so they would harass commercial farms with dancing, chanting and a few fights, then Mugabe amended the constitution to seize commercial ... Read morefarms so he could buy the loyalty of senior ZANU-PF members with bribes of free farms. In this way Mugabe caused hyper-inflation and the collapse of food security in Zimbabwe making Zimbabwe today officially the most aid dependent country in the world.
All this suffering which Mugabe has caused to millions of ordinary Zimbabweans, both those living within Zimbabwe and those living in exile in other countries, all because Mugabe is a Psychopath who would happily destroy Zimbabwe rather than lose his power over Zimbabwe.
...continued below...
Yesterday at 22:24 Ray Rockingham And now this idiot called Ruffcuts Machona wants the 3000 friends of Noreen to believe that Mugabe was powerless to control the events which were being instigated by some old women and Hunzwi plus Tony Blair who only angered the Psychopath Mugabe by insisting that British Taxpayers money was only to be use to alleviate the poverty of poor black ... Read moreZimbabweans.
Machona you are disgusting and the way you refer to Hunzwi as ''Cde'' reveals to all of us that Ruffcuts Machona is really a Zaniod who is only on Noreens' friend list to promote ZANU-PF propaganda. Ruffcuts Machona at the end of your last comment you say, ''I rest my case'', but there is no need for you to rest your case because you are a ZANU-PF propagandist and your facts are fictitious so you have no case to explain and therefore no case to rest. Machona you are a ZANU-PF activist and the only reason you are not ashamed of yourself is because you are too stupid to know how stupid you are.
Yesterday at 22:26 Malvin Ndlovuhe has to go
21 hours ago Bobo JaanRay, do you really expect any more from a guy who worked as a propagandist for the mouth piece of Zanu PF the ZBC??
15 hours agoRay RockinghamThank you Bobo Jaan - I didn't know that. From now on every time Marco Machona appears on facebook we should all post a comment exposing his ZBC origins and his ZANU-PF allegiance. Anyone who supports, or avoids criticising Mugabe/ZANU-PF, is someone who is no better than the other human scum who still today sympathise with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party.
Yesterday at 11:33.
AFP: Blair says Mugabe 'should be overthrown'
Source: www.google.com
BERLIN — Tony Blair believes that Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe should be overthrown, a German magazine quoted the former British prime minister as saying in an interview published on Wednesday.
Bobo Jaan : Tick tock tick tock tick tock age is such a wonderful process...its going to be great to see the propagandists, generals , sycophants, criminals, rent-a-crowds, etc etc scramble when the figurehead passes with great pomp to heros acre (or is that the sin bin)....what a wonderful feeling....Hum diddly dee....
Yesterday at 15:52 Ray RockinghamRUFFCUTS, as the November 1997 public letter from Labour Government Secretary of State Claire Short clearly states, the British Government told Mugabe that they would withhold further financial compensation for the purchase of white owned commercial farm land until a new Land Registry was established which verified with complete transparency that ... Read morethe British Taxpayers money (compensation) was buying white owned land which was being given to poor BLACK Zimbabweans for the clear purpose of alleviating BLACK poverty in Zimbabwe. This is what angered Mugabe because Mugabe want the land as a bribe to buy the loyalty of the senior ZANU-PF members who keep Mugabe in power.
The British wanted to help poor BLACK Zimbabweans but Mugabe would not permit the British to do this so Mugabe invented the LIE that the British were practicing neo-colonialism against black peoples' interests. RUFFCUTS, Mugabe is a LIAR and if you repeat Mugabes' LIES then RUFFCUTS you are also a liar equal to Mugabe.
Yesterday at 18:34 RuffcutsWear Marco Machona@Ray..Please read my posting carefully. What your wrote was exactly my points. I said Tony had imprints on the land issues in Zim . I stated exactly the amount then...which was about 47million pounds and the reasons for the conflict ..how to disburse and future usage. Bob saying he didn't want to be told how to spend it and on who..etc...Tony ... Read moreinsisting on what U have expressed. Audit etc. So my friend you can equate me to Bob all you want but the land issues in Zim were to a greater extend Tony's and Bob's staborness...Up to now UK Government feels not obliged to pay any compensation, it was Tony's final stance. Bob capitalised on that.Ruffcuts is not a liar, i just follow Politics. That is why MDC, CFU are on a hard place now and AU, SADC,etc on Bob's side. Facts.
Yesterday at 20:12Conor WalshWe should blame the Brutish government because it did not overthrow Mgaxa at the height of Gukurahundi.
We should not blame the Brutish for not paying money to allow weekend goche goche farmers to tshisa nyama instead of farming as is now the case.
Yesterday at 20:35 Ray RockinghamRuffcuts says ... ''So my friend you can equate me to Bob all you want but the land issues in Zim were to a greater extend Tony's and Bob's staborness...Up to now UK Government feels not obliged to pay any compensation, it was Tony's final stance. Bob capitalised on that.''
By these words above Ruffcuts Machona holds Blair and Mugabe equally ... Read moreresponsible for the land grab and the collapse of commercial agriculture in Zimbabwe. Machona is talking rubbish as Mugabe is alone to blame because the British were defending poor black Zimbabweans against Mugabes' abuse of poor black Zimbabweans by denying them the land which the white British taxpayers wanted to pay for, but Mugabe falsely blames the British because Mugabe is a Liar who abuses poor black people in Zimbabwe and then falsely blames the white British Government. Therefore the British government have zero blame for food insecurity in Zimbabwe and Mugabe is 100% to blame for food insecurity in Zimbabwe.
...continued below...
Yesterday at 21:13 Ray RockinghamRuffcuts Machona falsely states that Mugabe and Blair are equally to blame because Ruffcuts Machona is no less a liar than Mugabe. Above Taff Gidi says to Ruffcuts Machona ... ''To blame Tony Blair for the shambolic, murderous land grab by Mugabe loyalists is just plain silly!''
Taff Gidi is right when he says that Ruffcuts Machona is silly. ... Read moreMachona has no rational opinion which is worth typing on facebook because Machona is an empty-headed mischief maker who plays with is computer and tries to sound intelligent when he is not - Machona is Silly - and he lies just like Mugabe.
Yesterday at 21:14 RuffcutsWear Marco Machona@Ray...all you know its a group of old women who started land invassion. Bob actually arrested them first. Cde Hunzwi hijacked the plot of land invassion. Again Bob was initially against land invassion....the beef between Tony and Bob "much later" fuelled using land invassion ...AND was used as an election and political tool. Like i said your lack ... Read moreof knowledge is what makes u loud for nothing. I would think as a sympathiser for 'so called food security" you would know the history behind the messy. Its wise you read than resort to calling names. You are a victim of your own propaganda my friend. Don't rely on FB for facts.....I rest my case...lack of knowledge is dangerous.
Yesterday at 21:24 Ray Rockingham So now Ruffcutts Machona has abandoned his lie that Tony Blair and Mugabe were equally responsible and now Machona is admitting that the land grab and the collapse of food security in Zimbabwe was 100% Mugabes' responsibility as an election and political tool.
If Mugabe wanted to win the votes of the ordinary black poor people of Zimbabwe then ... Read moreMugabe would have welcomed the British £40+ million to buy commercial farm land to give to poor black Zimbabweans. But Mugabe is an autocratic Dictator who never felt any need to encourage the black peasantry to like him and to vote for him, the only voters Mugabe cared about was the 400,000 black commercial farm workers whom he wanted to punish for voting MDC - just as he had previously used Gukurahundi to punish the Indebele for voting ZAPU and later used Murambatsvina to punish urban workers for voting MDC.
...continued below...
Yesterday at 22:24 Ray Rockingham Mugabe only ever wanted the valuable land in the high rainfall areas for ZANU-PF, so Mugabe printed fake duplicate bank notes at the Reserve Bank as bribes to buy the loyalty of 20,000 junior ZANU-PF (warvets) so they would harass commercial farms with dancing, chanting and a few fights, then Mugabe amended the constitution to seize commercial ... Read morefarms so he could buy the loyalty of senior ZANU-PF members with bribes of free farms. In this way Mugabe caused hyper-inflation and the collapse of food security in Zimbabwe making Zimbabwe today officially the most aid dependent country in the world.
All this suffering which Mugabe has caused to millions of ordinary Zimbabweans, both those living within Zimbabwe and those living in exile in other countries, all because Mugabe is a Psychopath who would happily destroy Zimbabwe rather than lose his power over Zimbabwe.
...continued below...
Yesterday at 22:24 Ray Rockingham And now this idiot called Ruffcuts Machona wants the 3000 friends of Noreen to believe that Mugabe was powerless to control the events which were being instigated by some old women and Hunzwi plus Tony Blair who only angered the Psychopath Mugabe by insisting that British Taxpayers money was only to be use to alleviate the poverty of poor black ... Read moreZimbabweans.
Machona you are disgusting and the way you refer to Hunzwi as ''Cde'' reveals to all of us that Ruffcuts Machona is really a Zaniod who is only on Noreens' friend list to promote ZANU-PF propaganda. Ruffcuts Machona at the end of your last comment you say, ''I rest my case'', but there is no need for you to rest your case because you are a ZANU-PF propagandist and your facts are fictitious so you have no case to explain and therefore no case to rest. Machona you are a ZANU-PF activist and the only reason you are not ashamed of yourself is because you are too stupid to know how stupid you are.
Yesterday at 22:26 Malvin Ndlovuhe has to go
21 hours ago Bobo JaanRay, do you really expect any more from a guy who worked as a propagandist for the mouth piece of Zanu PF the ZBC??
15 hours agoRay RockinghamThank you Bobo Jaan - I didn't know that. From now on every time Marco Machona appears on facebook we should all post a comment exposing his ZBC origins and his ZANU-PF allegiance. Anyone who supports, or avoids criticising Mugabe/ZANU-PF, is someone who is no better than the other human scum who still today sympathise with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party.
Wednesday
Posts from Zimbabweans on Facebook Forums
AFP: Blair says Mugabe 'should be overthrown'
Source: www.google.com
BERLIN — Tony Blair believes that Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe should be overthrown, a German magazine quoted the former British prime minister as saying in an interview published on Wednesday.
Comment · .
Mike Bennett
What an imbecile.
7 hours ago
Gus Nhara
uuuuummmmmmmm.....intresting he says this after he is out of office
6 hours ago
Clement Museka
no wonder tht guy Tambaoga sang tht 'The Blair tht he knows is a toilet...'
6 hours ago
Ed Mungure
With the greatest of respect Tony Blair is partly to blame for our current predicament. Careless unhelpful statements such as this help create the prevailing atmosphere. Gus this is not the first time Blair has preached the gospel of regime change even as Prime minister he said the same. Mugabe would then use such to say Britain wants to recolonise the country and the MDC are their agents. This is a clear case of the heart being in the right place but the mouth and mind in the wrong place.
6 hours ago
Shalton Yotham Ngwenya
Last time I checked he. His job description was peace envoy!!
6 hours ago
Desmond Ian Crystal
But isnt he right ?
6 hours ago
Masimba Biriwasha
In spite of our decay, and ever-lasting doldrums, Mr. Blair should just shut up. He is not helping our cause by his unsought blabber.
6 hours ago
Taff Gidi
Tony is not the enemy here. would everyone stop p***sy footing around bob and just tell it as it is. Speaking out against the evil is not wrong!!!! Tony Blair is to blame for taking Mugabe to task because he was starving his own people? Gimme a break......
6 hours ago
Desmond Ian Crystal
Well put Taff, what Zim needs is strong Men & Women and a lot less politicians, Tony just said what all are too scared to.
6 hours ago
Mota Kuta
Bob is the devil incarnate, that is , the devil in person!!!!!!!!
6 hours ago
Roger Stringer
I wonder who he thinks should do the overthrowing?
6 hours ago
Desmond Ian Crystal
The people who put him there in the first place.
5 hours ago
Roger Stringer
You'll never find anyone who said they voted for him!
5 hours ago
Mabel Laurence
We shall overcome We shall overcome We shall overcome some day CHORUS:... Read moreOh, deep in my heart I do believe We shall overcome some day
5 hours ago
RuffcutsWear Marco Machona
Oh boy...is Tony still around! Tony Tony Tony...Last time he was verbally abused in SA during a UN something...he never recovered from that "belittlement". Help us Tony...how and when??? Tony...i see your prints on the land question in Zim..Wasn't it u who refused land compensation? (40 million pounds for Commercial farmers)... .now u talk Tosh again without a plan!!!!Wrong person to say som' like that!!
5 hours ago
Taff Gidi
Machona, get your fact straight. Tony said to Mugabe show us what you did with the first £40mil+ we already gave you before we can give you anymore. Mugabe knowing that he stole most of that money refused to account for it and instead called blair names. I am surprised you fell for that. To blame Tony Blair for the shambolic, murderous land grab by Mugabe loyalists is just plain silly!
4 hours ago
Desmond Ian Crystal
Im outta here guys ! tired of talking in square circles, Let Zim fall where it may.
4 hours ago
RuffcutsWear Marco Machona
@Tafi..I have checked my facts. Am correct. Zim had recieved far more that 40 million pounds pre to Tony Adminitrastion. When he entered the scene, an outstanding balance of 47million pounds was due. A disagreement on the usage of the previous 'funds" and future use of the balance. Disagreements erupted and the rest is in the public domain...of ... Read morename calling but that was the source of frictions through Tony's era. Anything else u want me to explain mr Tafi.....yes like i said Tony had imprints in the land issue in Zim...its no secret. Am not a loyalist but factual as it comes...
4 hours ago
Conor Walsh
Blair may or may not be right but the fact is nobody will overthrow the son of the Father of Lies so he is just wasting his breath.
4 hours ago
Bobo Jaan
So exactly what happened to the 40 million? .....
3 hours ago
Kirth Dube
Tony has just asked the people to get rid of the c...nt! and what do Mugabe worshipers do?...piss on those who have guts to tell it as it is. Mugabe must be shot at point blank including all his prophets of doom.
2 hours ago · Delete
Bobo Jaan
Tick tock tick tock tick tock age is such a wonderful process...its going to be great to see the propagandists, generals , sycophants, criminals, rent-a-crowds, etc etc scramble when the figurehead passes with great pomp to heros acre (or is that the sin bin)....what a wonderful feeling....Hum diddly dee....
2 hours ago
Ray Rockingham
RUFFCUTS, as the November 1997 public letter from Labour Government Secretary of State Claire Short clearly states, the British Government told Mugabe that they would withhold further financial compensation for the purchase of white owned commercial farm land until a new Land Registry was established which verified with complete transparency that ... Read morethe British Taxpayers money (compensation) was buying white owned land which was being given to poor BLACK Zimbabweans for the clear purpose of alleviating BLACK poverty in Zimbabwe. This is what angered Mugabe because Mugabe want the land as a bribe to buy the loyalty of the senior ZANU-PF members who keep Mugabe in power.The British wanted to help poor BLACK Zimbabweans but Mugabe would not permit the British to do this so Mugabe invented the LIE that the British were practicing neo-colonialism against black peoples' interests. RUFFCUTS, Mugabe is a LIAR and if you repeat Mugabes' LIES then RUFFCUTS you are also a liar equal to Mugabe.
9 minutes ago
Source: www.google.com
BERLIN — Tony Blair believes that Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe should be overthrown, a German magazine quoted the former British prime minister as saying in an interview published on Wednesday.
Comment · .
Mike Bennett
What an imbecile.
7 hours ago
Gus Nhara
uuuuummmmmmmm.....intresting he says this after he is out of office
6 hours ago
Clement Museka
no wonder tht guy Tambaoga sang tht 'The Blair tht he knows is a toilet...'
6 hours ago
Ed Mungure
With the greatest of respect Tony Blair is partly to blame for our current predicament. Careless unhelpful statements such as this help create the prevailing atmosphere. Gus this is not the first time Blair has preached the gospel of regime change even as Prime minister he said the same. Mugabe would then use such to say Britain wants to recolonise the country and the MDC are their agents. This is a clear case of the heart being in the right place but the mouth and mind in the wrong place.
6 hours ago
Shalton Yotham Ngwenya
Last time I checked he. His job description was peace envoy!!
6 hours ago
Desmond Ian Crystal
But isnt he right ?
6 hours ago
Masimba Biriwasha
In spite of our decay, and ever-lasting doldrums, Mr. Blair should just shut up. He is not helping our cause by his unsought blabber.
6 hours ago
Taff Gidi
Tony is not the enemy here. would everyone stop p***sy footing around bob and just tell it as it is. Speaking out against the evil is not wrong!!!! Tony Blair is to blame for taking Mugabe to task because he was starving his own people? Gimme a break......
6 hours ago
Desmond Ian Crystal
Well put Taff, what Zim needs is strong Men & Women and a lot less politicians, Tony just said what all are too scared to.
6 hours ago
Mota Kuta
Bob is the devil incarnate, that is , the devil in person!!!!!!!!
6 hours ago
Roger Stringer
I wonder who he thinks should do the overthrowing?
6 hours ago
Desmond Ian Crystal
The people who put him there in the first place.
5 hours ago
Roger Stringer
You'll never find anyone who said they voted for him!
5 hours ago
Mabel Laurence
We shall overcome We shall overcome We shall overcome some day CHORUS:... Read moreOh, deep in my heart I do believe We shall overcome some day
5 hours ago
RuffcutsWear Marco Machona
Oh boy...is Tony still around! Tony Tony Tony...Last time he was verbally abused in SA during a UN something...he never recovered from that "belittlement". Help us Tony...how and when??? Tony...i see your prints on the land question in Zim..Wasn't it u who refused land compensation? (40 million pounds for Commercial farmers)... .now u talk Tosh again without a plan!!!!Wrong person to say som' like that!!
5 hours ago
Taff Gidi
Machona, get your fact straight. Tony said to Mugabe show us what you did with the first £40mil+ we already gave you before we can give you anymore. Mugabe knowing that he stole most of that money refused to account for it and instead called blair names. I am surprised you fell for that. To blame Tony Blair for the shambolic, murderous land grab by Mugabe loyalists is just plain silly!
4 hours ago
Desmond Ian Crystal
Im outta here guys ! tired of talking in square circles, Let Zim fall where it may.
4 hours ago
RuffcutsWear Marco Machona
@Tafi..I have checked my facts. Am correct. Zim had recieved far more that 40 million pounds pre to Tony Adminitrastion. When he entered the scene, an outstanding balance of 47million pounds was due. A disagreement on the usage of the previous 'funds" and future use of the balance. Disagreements erupted and the rest is in the public domain...of ... Read morename calling but that was the source of frictions through Tony's era. Anything else u want me to explain mr Tafi.....yes like i said Tony had imprints in the land issue in Zim...its no secret. Am not a loyalist but factual as it comes...
4 hours ago
Conor Walsh
Blair may or may not be right but the fact is nobody will overthrow the son of the Father of Lies so he is just wasting his breath.
4 hours ago
Bobo Jaan
So exactly what happened to the 40 million? .....
3 hours ago
Kirth Dube
Tony has just asked the people to get rid of the c...nt! and what do Mugabe worshipers do?...piss on those who have guts to tell it as it is. Mugabe must be shot at point blank including all his prophets of doom.
2 hours ago · Delete
Bobo Jaan
Tick tock tick tock tick tock age is such a wonderful process...its going to be great to see the propagandists, generals , sycophants, criminals, rent-a-crowds, etc etc scramble when the figurehead passes with great pomp to heros acre (or is that the sin bin)....what a wonderful feeling....Hum diddly dee....
2 hours ago
Ray Rockingham
RUFFCUTS, as the November 1997 public letter from Labour Government Secretary of State Claire Short clearly states, the British Government told Mugabe that they would withhold further financial compensation for the purchase of white owned commercial farm land until a new Land Registry was established which verified with complete transparency that ... Read morethe British Taxpayers money (compensation) was buying white owned land which was being given to poor BLACK Zimbabweans for the clear purpose of alleviating BLACK poverty in Zimbabwe. This is what angered Mugabe because Mugabe want the land as a bribe to buy the loyalty of the senior ZANU-PF members who keep Mugabe in power.The British wanted to help poor BLACK Zimbabweans but Mugabe would not permit the British to do this so Mugabe invented the LIE that the British were practicing neo-colonialism against black peoples' interests. RUFFCUTS, Mugabe is a LIAR and if you repeat Mugabes' LIES then RUFFCUTS you are also a liar equal to Mugabe.
9 minutes ago
Saturday
Sunday
Organisation To Fight Political Violence
Bulawayo –May 15 2009-
An organization geared at fighting all forms of political violence in Zimbabwe known as the Zimbabwe Smart Politics Campaign (ZSPC) has been launched in the country.
In an interview ZSPC chairperson, Retired Liet. Col. Moses Dendere, who is based in the United Kingdom said the organization was formed by Zimbabweans in the diaspora who escaped political violence before and during the build up to the June 27, 2008 presidential run-off elections.
“After receiving a lot of inquiries from victims of political violence in and out of Zimbabwe we decided to launch an organization that will help in the process of national healing as well as trying to stop political violence in future elections in Zimbabwe,” said Dendere who was Director of elections for the Mavambo Project under Dr Simba Makoni.
Dendere left Zimbabwe on June 27 last year after releasing a 10 page document analyzing the 2008 elections with special focus on violence durinng the build up to the presidential run-off elections. Dendere accompanied a team of retired South African generals to several parts of Zimbabwe who were sent to by President Thabo Mbeki to investigate reports of political violence during the build up to the presidential run-off elections. Dendere had subsequently been placed on the wanted list by the Central Intelligence Organization (CIO).
The organization which has trustees based in Zimbabwe aims among other things to educate citizens of their political rights and how to avoid being manipulated and abused by political parties. Dendere said ZSPC would also raise funds to assist victims of political violence and would work closely with the three ministers of national healing in the inclusive government.
“ZSPC is an apolitical organization that will work with citizens of Zimbabwe from all political formations. Our aim is to promote permanent peace and assist victims of politically motivated violence whenever it resurfaces in Zimbabwe. We are disturbed by the reports of fresh farm invasions which in some cases have resulted in politically motivated violence and we are appealing to the three principals to speedily resolve the matter.”
Scores of victims of politically motivated violence mostly in the rural areas of Zimbabwe who lost their family members, and property and some who were injured have not received any assistance as the national healing process is yet to get off the ground. Cases of people being victimized for their political allegiance are still being reported in some rural areas of Zimbabwe with no meaningful intervention from the authorities.
An organization geared at fighting all forms of political violence in Zimbabwe known as the Zimbabwe Smart Politics Campaign (ZSPC) has been launched in the country.
In an interview ZSPC chairperson, Retired Liet. Col. Moses Dendere, who is based in the United Kingdom said the organization was formed by Zimbabweans in the diaspora who escaped political violence before and during the build up to the June 27, 2008 presidential run-off elections.
“After receiving a lot of inquiries from victims of political violence in and out of Zimbabwe we decided to launch an organization that will help in the process of national healing as well as trying to stop political violence in future elections in Zimbabwe,” said Dendere who was Director of elections for the Mavambo Project under Dr Simba Makoni.
Dendere left Zimbabwe on June 27 last year after releasing a 10 page document analyzing the 2008 elections with special focus on violence durinng the build up to the presidential run-off elections. Dendere accompanied a team of retired South African generals to several parts of Zimbabwe who were sent to by President Thabo Mbeki to investigate reports of political violence during the build up to the presidential run-off elections. Dendere had subsequently been placed on the wanted list by the Central Intelligence Organization (CIO).
The organization which has trustees based in Zimbabwe aims among other things to educate citizens of their political rights and how to avoid being manipulated and abused by political parties. Dendere said ZSPC would also raise funds to assist victims of political violence and would work closely with the three ministers of national healing in the inclusive government.
“ZSPC is an apolitical organization that will work with citizens of Zimbabwe from all political formations. Our aim is to promote permanent peace and assist victims of politically motivated violence whenever it resurfaces in Zimbabwe. We are disturbed by the reports of fresh farm invasions which in some cases have resulted in politically motivated violence and we are appealing to the three principals to speedily resolve the matter.”
Scores of victims of politically motivated violence mostly in the rural areas of Zimbabwe who lost their family members, and property and some who were injured have not received any assistance as the national healing process is yet to get off the ground. Cases of people being victimized for their political allegiance are still being reported in some rural areas of Zimbabwe with no meaningful intervention from the authorities.
Wednesday
Zimbabwe prisons a hell hole
Posted on the web on 1/04/09 by m&g
Zimbabwe's prisons have long been notorious for being dirty, disease-ridden places of despair, where opponents of President Robert Mugabe languish for months, usually on murky charges of plotting against him.
But just how bad conditions have become within prison walls, while the economy collapses without, is only beginning to come to light.
A documentary to be screened on SABC television on Tuesday evening shows emaciated prisoners teetering at death's door for lack of food and medication.
The documentary, which is based on secret footage obtained by officials and prisoners, also tells of how relatives coming to collect their loved ones' remains are forced to rummage through mounds of dead bodies.
The Zimbabwean Association for Crime Prevention and Rehabilitation of the Offender (Zacro) estimates that at least 20 prisoners die each day in the country's 55 prisons.
According to Edison Chiota, Zacro national director, most die of HIV/Aids or associated diseases such as tuberculosis, which thrive in unhygienic conditions.
The incidence of pellagra, a skin disease caused by malnutrition that can cause serious psychological problems and even death, has also soared. Cholera, on the other hand, a diarrhoeal disease that has killed more than 4 000 Zimbabweans since last autumn, had been been brought under control in prisons "to a certain extent", he said.
In the SABC documentary, entitled Hell Hole, 28-year-old Brighton Mudadi's life is shown to to be hanging by a thread.
Mudadi, who is serving an 18-month sentence for robbery in the southern Beitbridge prison, has tuberculosis and is severely malnourished. His rib cage protrudes through his matchstick frame as a fellow prisoner helps him wash himself and the soiled pants he is wearing.
Zimbabwe's prisons have long been notorious for being dirty, disease-ridden places of despair, where opponents of President Robert Mugabe languish for months, usually on murky charges of plotting against him.
But just how bad conditions have become within prison walls, while the economy collapses without, is only beginning to come to light.
A documentary to be screened on SABC television on Tuesday evening shows emaciated prisoners teetering at death's door for lack of food and medication.
The documentary, which is based on secret footage obtained by officials and prisoners, also tells of how relatives coming to collect their loved ones' remains are forced to rummage through mounds of dead bodies.
The Zimbabwean Association for Crime Prevention and Rehabilitation of the Offender (Zacro) estimates that at least 20 prisoners die each day in the country's 55 prisons.
According to Edison Chiota, Zacro national director, most die of HIV/Aids or associated diseases such as tuberculosis, which thrive in unhygienic conditions.
The incidence of pellagra, a skin disease caused by malnutrition that can cause serious psychological problems and even death, has also soared. Cholera, on the other hand, a diarrhoeal disease that has killed more than 4 000 Zimbabweans since last autumn, had been been brought under control in prisons "to a certain extent", he said.
In the SABC documentary, entitled Hell Hole, 28-year-old Brighton Mudadi's life is shown to to be hanging by a thread.
Mudadi, who is serving an 18-month sentence for robbery in the southern Beitbridge prison, has tuberculosis and is severely malnourished. His rib cage protrudes through his matchstick frame as a fellow prisoner helps him wash himself and the soiled pants he is wearing.
Tuesday
The state of Zimbabwean prisons uncovered
This Tuesday Special Assignment takes you into Zimbabwe’s prisons - which have become virtual death traps for prisoners.
This exclusive, never before been seen video images, were captured following an intense three month investigation and brave co-operation of officials within the Zimbabwean prison system.
The officials filmed day to day events inside prison on hidden cameras. The result is a grim picture of a huge humanitarian crisis within the penal system.
Inside we meet Brian Gumbo who is half way through his two year sentence for housebreaking…and it seem unlikely that he will make if out of there. The camera follows him around as he shuffles from his cell to a room where he receives a bowl of sadza-a thick porridge made from maize meal. Like many others he is also suffering from pellagra-a deficiency disease caused by a lack of vitamin B3 and proteins.
According to a report by the Zimbabwean Association for Crime Prevention and Rehabilitation of the offender (ZACRO), at least 20 prisoners are dying each day across the country’s 55 institutions.
Some of the prisoners featured in the programme have already died and others like Brian Gumbo are on the brink of death.
“Hell Hole” was produced by Executive Producer Johann Abrahams and Godknows Nare.
This exclusive, never before been seen video images, were captured following an intense three month investigation and brave co-operation of officials within the Zimbabwean prison system.
The officials filmed day to day events inside prison on hidden cameras. The result is a grim picture of a huge humanitarian crisis within the penal system.
Inside we meet Brian Gumbo who is half way through his two year sentence for housebreaking…and it seem unlikely that he will make if out of there. The camera follows him around as he shuffles from his cell to a room where he receives a bowl of sadza-a thick porridge made from maize meal. Like many others he is also suffering from pellagra-a deficiency disease caused by a lack of vitamin B3 and proteins.
According to a report by the Zimbabwean Association for Crime Prevention and Rehabilitation of the offender (ZACRO), at least 20 prisoners are dying each day across the country’s 55 institutions.
Some of the prisoners featured in the programme have already died and others like Brian Gumbo are on the brink of death.
“Hell Hole” was produced by Executive Producer Johann Abrahams and Godknows Nare.
Friday
Mthwakazi People's Convention (MPC) must Free Mthwakazi from Zimbabwe Campaign
To all the visitors of my blog.
I am currently running a page on Facebook link: http://apps.facebook.com/causes/167368/33707658?m=6d54c0aa
This blog will resume publications in April.
Thank you.
I am currently running a page on Facebook link: http://apps.facebook.com/causes/167368/33707658?m=6d54c0aa
This blog will resume publications in April.
Thank you.
Monday
The Real Truth about The Real Politics
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/mar/16/asylum-seekers-immigration-poverty
Hundreds of thousands of failed asylum seekers are living in the UK in extreme poverty, because they fear torture or death if they return to their home countries, according to a report released today.
The report warns many failed asylum seekers are living in a "twilight zone", with no housing or financial support, and no right to work. Many failed asylum seekers are living on less than "a dollar a day", the global yardstick for extreme poverty, it claims. Recent research by the London School of Economics estimated there are 500,000 failed asylum seekers in the UK.
Christine Majid, from the refugee charity Pafras, who commissioned the Underground Lives report, says the number of destitute asylum seekers the charity dealt with tripled in the past two years and called destitution a "deliberate" policy to force asylum seekers out of the country.
She said: "In the 21st century the fact that the government is trying to starve people out of the country, it is absolutely inhumane and it just isn't working. These people would rather starve on the street here than return to their own countries."
A series of governmental policy decisions including preventing asylum seekers from working in 2002, cutting legal aid in 2004 and an overhaul of the system in 2007 has lead to an "untenable strain" on local charities, she added.
The report found that, on average, failed asylum seekers were surviving on £7.65 per week, but the majority lived on less than £5. Two thirds had experienced torture in their countries. Following the refusal of their asylum claims, 72% have spent time sleeping outside; of these, 38% have experienced physical attacks. More than a third of the women sleeping rough had experienced sexual assault, including rape.
The Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg called the report "a timely reminder of how the government has combined incompetence and inhumanity to create one of Europe's most inefficient and cruel asylum systems". "Responsibility for asylum should be taken away from the cack-handed blunderings of the Home Office and given to an independent agency."
Asylum claims have fallen sharply in recent years and are at a 14-year low, with 23,430 applications for asylum in 2007 - 4% of all immigration applications - compared with 103,080 in 2002. A lack of access to proper legal advice is having a significant impact on the number of valid asylum seekers being refused sanctuary, and returned to countries where they could be tortured, said human rights lawyer Louise Christian. "The government's asylum policies are entirely at odds with its human rights obligation - particularly with regards to children in detention. It is a huge source of scandal and shame to this country."
A UK Border Agency spokesperson said the government provided measures to ensure individuals are not left without basic essentials. But the report says only around 9,000 people receive UKBA support, which provides £35 in supermarket vouchers a week and no-choice accommodation. Many are reluctant to apply for it as they must sign an agreement consenting to be removed from the UK at a later date.
The report is being released in conjunction with a major exposition of photographs of failed asylum seekers, launched in association with the Still Human, Still Here campaign, led by a coalition of human rights organisations including Amnesty International and the Refugee Council.
• The secret world of destitute asylum seekers is captured in pictures in the exhibition Still Human, Still Here, at the Host Gallery, London from March 18. Telephone 020 7253 2770.
Thursday
Tuesday
Mugabe's hatred of the Ndebele continues even at his old age
Dabengwa resigned from Zanu (PF) last March to back Simba Makoni, leader of an opposition splinter group, in last year's presidential elections and a former Zanu (PF) Politburo member and Finance minister in Mugabe's government.
After Makoni came out third in the presidential race on March 29, polling 8,3 percent of the presidential vote, Dabengwa severed ties with Makoni and revived Zapu with war veterans from his Ndebele ethnic group. Dabengwa is now the interim president of Zapu.
Dabengwa still commands lot of respect among the Ndebele - the second largest ethnic group in Zimbabwe after the Shona of Mugabe. The Ndebele make up 20 percent of the 11,9 million population.
Among senior Zanu (PF) officials who resigned is Effort Nkomo, the former Zanu (PF) information chief in Matabeleland and deputy Tryphine Nhliziyo. There is also war veteran Andrew Ndlovu and many others.
Mugabe said: "I don’t know whether Dumiso and others have the right to withdraw from what has been a merger since December 1987 (when) that unity accord was signed.
"He wants leadership which he could not get within Zapu and he thinks it’s now the opportunity. But why has he taken so long to claim it? Why did he not claim it when (Vice President Joseph) Msika was regarded as the successor to (late PF-Zapu leader) Joshua Nkomo? I don’t know."
The Zanu (PF) Politburo which met in Harare Wednesday discussed the revival of Zapu and the threats it poses to Zanu (PF). Chairman John Nkomo was tasked with probing the new party and tabling a report. Mugabe accused Dabengwa of being a tribalist. Dabengwa was not immediately available to respond to the allegations.
Mugabe said: "Now he is forming his own. He thinks he will have support. You cannot in this country succeed on the basis of trying to push the leadership of one tribe. People are refusing.
"You can’t talk of tribe these days. It’s a real shame. It does not matter what guise he is using but we can see through it; that it is the Ndebele tribe (that he wants) to have the dominance."
The Ndebele people have long been hostile to Mugabe. In the early 1980s, shortly after independence, Mugabe sent his notorious Fifth Brigade troops to Matabeleland, where they were accused of killing thousands of civilian supporters of the then-opposition Zapu party.
source: http://www.zimdaily.com/news/dabengwa27.6970.html
After Makoni came out third in the presidential race on March 29, polling 8,3 percent of the presidential vote, Dabengwa severed ties with Makoni and revived Zapu with war veterans from his Ndebele ethnic group. Dabengwa is now the interim president of Zapu.
Dabengwa still commands lot of respect among the Ndebele - the second largest ethnic group in Zimbabwe after the Shona of Mugabe. The Ndebele make up 20 percent of the 11,9 million population.
Among senior Zanu (PF) officials who resigned is Effort Nkomo, the former Zanu (PF) information chief in Matabeleland and deputy Tryphine Nhliziyo. There is also war veteran Andrew Ndlovu and many others.
Mugabe said: "I don’t know whether Dumiso and others have the right to withdraw from what has been a merger since December 1987 (when) that unity accord was signed.
"He wants leadership which he could not get within Zapu and he thinks it’s now the opportunity. But why has he taken so long to claim it? Why did he not claim it when (Vice President Joseph) Msika was regarded as the successor to (late PF-Zapu leader) Joshua Nkomo? I don’t know."
The Zanu (PF) Politburo which met in Harare Wednesday discussed the revival of Zapu and the threats it poses to Zanu (PF). Chairman John Nkomo was tasked with probing the new party and tabling a report. Mugabe accused Dabengwa of being a tribalist. Dabengwa was not immediately available to respond to the allegations.
Mugabe said: "Now he is forming his own. He thinks he will have support. You cannot in this country succeed on the basis of trying to push the leadership of one tribe. People are refusing.
"You can’t talk of tribe these days. It’s a real shame. It does not matter what guise he is using but we can see through it; that it is the Ndebele tribe (that he wants) to have the dominance."
The Ndebele people have long been hostile to Mugabe. In the early 1980s, shortly after independence, Mugabe sent his notorious Fifth Brigade troops to Matabeleland, where they were accused of killing thousands of civilian supporters of the then-opposition Zapu party.
source: http://www.zimdaily.com/news/dabengwa27.6970.html
Sunday
Bennett was a fugitive-Zimbabwe Home Affairs Minister Mohadi says
Bennett was a fugitive-Mohadi
By Delta Ndou
MDC-T national treasurer and Deputy Minister of Agriculture-designate, Mr Roy Bennett, who was arrested at Charles Prince Airport in Harare last Friday as he was preparing to flee the country, was a fugitive, the co-Minister of Home Affairs, Cde Kembo Mohadi said, yesterday.
Bennett fled the country in March 2006 when he was wanted by police in connection with the discovery of an arms cache at Peter Hitschmann’s house in Mutare.
Hitschmann was immediately arrested, charged and later convicted.
Recovered on the property were an AK47 rifle, four FN rifles, seven Uzis, 19 pistols and revolvers, 11 shotguns and an assortment of ammunition — all concealed.
In an interview, Cde Kembo Mohadi said Bennett was a “fugitive’’ who escaped after being granted bail in a bid to avoid justice while his alleged partner in crime, Peter Hitschmann has since been convicted.
“There was a warrant of arrest issued against Bennett by the courts. We are merely upholding the law and putting the court order into effect . . . that is our constitutional mandate. No one is above the law and he (Bennett) sought asylum knowing full well that he was being charged with a crime,’’ Cde Mohadi said.
Bennett — who was released from prison in 2005 after serving a year’s jail term imposed by Parliament for assaulting the Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Cde Patrick Chinamasa, in the legislative chamber in 2004 — allegedly skipped the country via Mozambique en route to South Africa where he sought refuge.
He was subsequently granted political asylum in South Africa.
Investigations into the arms cache led to the arrest of a number of top MDC-T officials and two ex-policemen and the recovery of numerous police and army uniforms and rounds of ammunition.
Cde Mohadi confirmed that Bennett had been apprehended at Charles Prince Airport where he was preparing to leave the country.
According to Mr Ian Makone, Secretary to the Prime Minister, Mr Morgan Tsvangirai, Bennett intended to spend a few days with his family in South Africa before taking up his job as deputy minister.
This was his first time to return to the country since he fled arrest.
“We had been looking for him for one and a half weeks prior to catching him at the airport where he was planning to leave the country. So we apprehended him immediately because his case is pending,’’ explained Cde Mohadi.
By Delta Ndou
MDC-T national treasurer and Deputy Minister of Agriculture-designate, Mr Roy Bennett, who was arrested at Charles Prince Airport in Harare last Friday as he was preparing to flee the country, was a fugitive, the co-Minister of Home Affairs, Cde Kembo Mohadi said, yesterday.
Bennett fled the country in March 2006 when he was wanted by police in connection with the discovery of an arms cache at Peter Hitschmann’s house in Mutare.
Hitschmann was immediately arrested, charged and later convicted.
Recovered on the property were an AK47 rifle, four FN rifles, seven Uzis, 19 pistols and revolvers, 11 shotguns and an assortment of ammunition — all concealed.
In an interview, Cde Kembo Mohadi said Bennett was a “fugitive’’ who escaped after being granted bail in a bid to avoid justice while his alleged partner in crime, Peter Hitschmann has since been convicted.
“There was a warrant of arrest issued against Bennett by the courts. We are merely upholding the law and putting the court order into effect . . . that is our constitutional mandate. No one is above the law and he (Bennett) sought asylum knowing full well that he was being charged with a crime,’’ Cde Mohadi said.
Bennett — who was released from prison in 2005 after serving a year’s jail term imposed by Parliament for assaulting the Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Cde Patrick Chinamasa, in the legislative chamber in 2004 — allegedly skipped the country via Mozambique en route to South Africa where he sought refuge.
He was subsequently granted political asylum in South Africa.
Investigations into the arms cache led to the arrest of a number of top MDC-T officials and two ex-policemen and the recovery of numerous police and army uniforms and rounds of ammunition.
Cde Mohadi confirmed that Bennett had been apprehended at Charles Prince Airport where he was preparing to leave the country.
According to Mr Ian Makone, Secretary to the Prime Minister, Mr Morgan Tsvangirai, Bennett intended to spend a few days with his family in South Africa before taking up his job as deputy minister.
This was his first time to return to the country since he fled arrest.
“We had been looking for him for one and a half weeks prior to catching him at the airport where he was planning to leave the country. So we apprehended him immediately because his case is pending,’’ explained Cde Mohadi.
Wednesday
MPC's Response to a false accusation on newzim.com Forum
MPC STATEMENT
MPC wishes to protest and condemn in the strongest terms a posting made by a New Zimbabwe forumite, Ratidzoo, on the online newspaper’s forum titled: “The face of a terrorist – MPC President!!!” in reference to MPC President, Mr Ndaba Mkwananzi.
We condemn the posting as malicious character assassination, hurtful and harmful of our President’s reputation. The attack is also unfounded and without justification whatsoever. Mr Mkwananzi is well-known in Zimbabwe and elsewhere. There are many who will feel hurt and offended alongside him as a result of this baseless attack. This attack is serious and threatening and MPC receives it with the seriousness it deserves.
MPC wishes to put it on record that no one has killed in the name of our President or MPC nor will anyone in the future. The speaking record is different and well-known. We re-state it here, just in case others have a short memory.Matebeleland and the Midlands bled in the name of a supposed superior tribe. That genocide remains unacknowledged and unaddressed. The MDC, too, has had casualties to the system. We also don’t fail to put it on record that the MDC has not been entirely blameless in this regard to some bad things that have happened in its name since 2000. We also state that to this day, the system uses starvation, water and other insidious means as political weapons against uMthwakazi. When people such as Ratidzoo are conveniently blind to such speaking facts or twist the truth, it is the reason MPC has risen as a political movement.
Our cause, which is in the public domain, including all the faces of MPC officials and that of our President, can never, even remotely, be associated with activities of terrorists or a terrorist organization. In his launch message for our new website, Mr Mkwananzi, spoke of the assassination of truth in Zimbabwe and the need to recover it as a political cause for any new political dispensation. This latest and unfounded attack on our President underlines the urgency for the MPC agenda to succeed, and succeed soon.There are also serious political and personal ramifications for this malicious attack which in our peculiar experience as Mthwakazi under Zimbabwe rule, we can never be blind to. For the moment we leave aside the legal implications of this attack.It is now well-known that labelling (de-humanization and de-personalization), incitement and other insidious acts, are the precursor to genocide and other serious human rights violations such as crimes against humanity, broadly defined.
In Mthwakazi’s own experience, which forumite Ratidzo knows full well about, the precursor to Gukurahundi was the labelling of uMthwakazi as ‘dissidents, ‘cockroaches’, ‘chuff’ (where the name ‘Gukurahundi was coined from), ‘snakes’ (cobra in the house) etc. Overnight, Joshua Nkomo became known, insultingly, as ‘Dumbuzenene’. Across the world where genocide has happened labelling has been an essential ingredient of that crime. We therefore wish to make it clear from the onset that if this is the beginning of an orchestrated campaign to place harm in our President’s way, or any of its officials or uMthwakazi society at large, MPC will fight that by all means it has at its disposal. We are also aware that for the most part the system will not act directly but will do so through surrogates or proxies they manipulate from the shadows and afford anonymity in various ways. Further, MPC will not leave threats, veiled as this one was or otherwise, unchallenged. We will always draw the line between free, robust debate and threats and incitement. MPC challenges all our political adversaries to come out of anonymity, as we have done, and engage us in open political combat. Here, belong the skills of debate and persuasion that MPC believes in.
Our political position is simple and publicly stated: the issue of the constitutional and political position of Mthwakazi under Zimbabwe will no longer be swept under carpet, as will the issue of the Gukurahundi genocide. These are the emerging and growing topics of our time.Finally, to their credit, we note that the publishers of New Zimbabwe, on realizing the gross nature of the original posting took immediate steps to change and tone down the title of the posting, from “Face of a terrorist” to “The face of the MPC President!!!” We commend them for their quick action. We can only hope that the publishers of New Zimbabwe, a platform we also wish to use in the future to articulate MPC’s position, will be more vigilant to ensure that a similar thing will not happen to anyone in the future and that its online publication will continue to conform to the applicable laws and good practices operative in their industry. We of course leave it to our President, Mr Mkwananzi, to consider all the options available to him arising from this unprovoked and malicious attack on him.
Thank you.
K. Dube
MPC Director of Communications
MPC wishes to protest and condemn in the strongest terms a posting made by a New Zimbabwe forumite, Ratidzoo, on the online newspaper’s forum titled: “The face of a terrorist – MPC President!!!” in reference to MPC President, Mr Ndaba Mkwananzi.
We condemn the posting as malicious character assassination, hurtful and harmful of our President’s reputation. The attack is also unfounded and without justification whatsoever. Mr Mkwananzi is well-known in Zimbabwe and elsewhere. There are many who will feel hurt and offended alongside him as a result of this baseless attack. This attack is serious and threatening and MPC receives it with the seriousness it deserves.
MPC wishes to put it on record that no one has killed in the name of our President or MPC nor will anyone in the future. The speaking record is different and well-known. We re-state it here, just in case others have a short memory.Matebeleland and the Midlands bled in the name of a supposed superior tribe. That genocide remains unacknowledged and unaddressed. The MDC, too, has had casualties to the system. We also don’t fail to put it on record that the MDC has not been entirely blameless in this regard to some bad things that have happened in its name since 2000. We also state that to this day, the system uses starvation, water and other insidious means as political weapons against uMthwakazi. When people such as Ratidzoo are conveniently blind to such speaking facts or twist the truth, it is the reason MPC has risen as a political movement.
Our cause, which is in the public domain, including all the faces of MPC officials and that of our President, can never, even remotely, be associated with activities of terrorists or a terrorist organization. In his launch message for our new website, Mr Mkwananzi, spoke of the assassination of truth in Zimbabwe and the need to recover it as a political cause for any new political dispensation. This latest and unfounded attack on our President underlines the urgency for the MPC agenda to succeed, and succeed soon.There are also serious political and personal ramifications for this malicious attack which in our peculiar experience as Mthwakazi under Zimbabwe rule, we can never be blind to. For the moment we leave aside the legal implications of this attack.It is now well-known that labelling (de-humanization and de-personalization), incitement and other insidious acts, are the precursor to genocide and other serious human rights violations such as crimes against humanity, broadly defined.
In Mthwakazi’s own experience, which forumite Ratidzo knows full well about, the precursor to Gukurahundi was the labelling of uMthwakazi as ‘dissidents, ‘cockroaches’, ‘chuff’ (where the name ‘Gukurahundi was coined from), ‘snakes’ (cobra in the house) etc. Overnight, Joshua Nkomo became known, insultingly, as ‘Dumbuzenene’. Across the world where genocide has happened labelling has been an essential ingredient of that crime. We therefore wish to make it clear from the onset that if this is the beginning of an orchestrated campaign to place harm in our President’s way, or any of its officials or uMthwakazi society at large, MPC will fight that by all means it has at its disposal. We are also aware that for the most part the system will not act directly but will do so through surrogates or proxies they manipulate from the shadows and afford anonymity in various ways. Further, MPC will not leave threats, veiled as this one was or otherwise, unchallenged. We will always draw the line between free, robust debate and threats and incitement. MPC challenges all our political adversaries to come out of anonymity, as we have done, and engage us in open political combat. Here, belong the skills of debate and persuasion that MPC believes in.
Our political position is simple and publicly stated: the issue of the constitutional and political position of Mthwakazi under Zimbabwe will no longer be swept under carpet, as will the issue of the Gukurahundi genocide. These are the emerging and growing topics of our time.Finally, to their credit, we note that the publishers of New Zimbabwe, on realizing the gross nature of the original posting took immediate steps to change and tone down the title of the posting, from “Face of a terrorist” to “The face of the MPC President!!!” We commend them for their quick action. We can only hope that the publishers of New Zimbabwe, a platform we also wish to use in the future to articulate MPC’s position, will be more vigilant to ensure that a similar thing will not happen to anyone in the future and that its online publication will continue to conform to the applicable laws and good practices operative in their industry. We of course leave it to our President, Mr Mkwananzi, to consider all the options available to him arising from this unprovoked and malicious attack on him.
Thank you.
K. Dube
MPC Director of Communications
Monday
MPC Speaks out on latest ZANU-MDC Marriage of 11th February
"We are grateful to a forumite at New Zimbabwe warning MPC and Zapu to be wary of the merger between MDC and Zanu-PF."MPC wishes to make it clear that it saw and warned of this danger as early as September 2008 when the so-called agreement between Zanu-PF and MDC was announced. Please re-visit the attached Statement MPC released at the time of the so-called agreement in September 2008.Please pay particular attention to paragraphs 9, 10, 11 and 13.
Thank you.
K Dube
MPC Director of Communications
M P CMthwakazi People’s Convention
STATEMENT ON THE POWER-SHARING AGREEMENT BETWEEN ZANU-PF AND MDC MADE IN HARARE ON THE 11th SEPTEMBER 2008
1. MPC learns and receives with regret the power-sharing agreement made between Zanu-PF and MDC on the 11th September 2008, which is to be officially signed on Monday, 15th September 2008. But this is hardly surprising. Once again we see the people of present-day Zimbabwe betrayed on the altar of political convenience, opportunism and self-serving political interests. We ask; what have all those who died in the just-ended election period, and before, die for?
2. We learn with further regret that the agreement is about power-sharing not good governance or the political future of present-day Zimbabwe. MPC has long said that both Zanu-PF and the MDC are fixated with power and not governance or the political future of present-day Zimbabwe. This agreement puts paid to any doubts whatsoever about that.
3. This agreement is also a political fraud designed to pull a rug over the world’s face and conceal the real motives behind the agreement. The agreement fools no one. It is not difficult for the world to know that this agreement is about enabling Zanu-PF and Mr Mugabe to access international finance support and dig themselves out of the present economic mire, while at the same time enabling Mr Tsvangirai to access power, with which he is so intoxicated, and to secure a State Residence.
4. MPC wants to point out that this is not a political agreement of the people of present-day Zimbabwe. It is, as it says, a power-sharing agreement between Zanu-PF and the MDC. It is once again a cynical move to privatise a political process that should be owned by the people.
5. MPC will not attempt to apportion blame for the violence that has characterised Zimbabwean politics since the advent and entry into the political arena of the MDC. What we know and is now public knowledge is that both Zanu-PF and the MDC-T faction have been involved in inter and intra-party violence that has killed and maimed innocent people. The death of one person for political reasons is one death too many. We thought the lessons of Gukurahundi had been learnt. Clearly they have not. Clearly, both Mr Mugabe and Mr Tsvangirai are not fit and proper persons for high office, whether it be as President or Prime Minister. They are dangerous people.
6. MPC condemns this agreement as cynical, mischievous and destined to achieve nothing politically. In a short while, Zanu-PF and the MDC must face each other in another round of elections. The political implications are too grave to contemplate. The implications are even worse if the two parties are on the same side, against others.
7. MPC also condemns Zanu-PF and MDC’s preoccupation with a so-called Government of National Unity (GNU), something both parties have achieved through violence. We also condemn their rejection, for obvious political reason, of a Transitional Government (TG).
8. MPC has long called for the establishment of an all-inclusive political process, recently supported by civic groups in Zimbabwe, to discuss, openly, the political problems of present-day Zimbabwe. We have called for the Convention on a Democratic Alternative for present-day Zimbabwe (Codaz). We re-affirm our call for Codaz. Out of Codaz MPC calls for a new political and constitutional order which must be captured in a New Constitution. MPC stands by its view that a New Constitution cannot usher in a new political and constitutional order. Rather, a new political and constitutional order must give birth to a new constitution.
9. This so-called agreement reverses this basic tenet of democratic construction. We therefore regret that the mistakes of Lancaster are being repeated in 2008, this time with the help of our own brothers and sisters in the continent who should know better. But this time uMthwakazi will not stand idly by. Through MPC, uMthwakazi has and is putting its case to the world. The time when political leaders and parties rode roughshod over the true aspirations of the people are gone.
10. As MPC, and talking on behalf of Mthwakazi, we reiterate the point we have made many times before, that MDC and Zanu-PF are two sides of the same coin. By this agreement both parties have put paid to any doubts about that. Both parties have today confirmed that they are parties built and designed to eliminate uMthwakazi as a people and political force. By embracing and going to bed with Zanu-PF the MDC has today confirmed that it is part of and shares in Zanu-PF’s so-called Grand Plan and the Zimbabwe Project, shadowy plans targeted at and designed to erase uMthwakazi politically and permanently. We know that despite public posturing by Mr Tsvangirai, this deal was easy to make because it completes the political dominance of the Shona over uMthwakazi. MPC long predicted such an agreement. Despite the political goodwill and generosity of the world in relation to Mr Tsvangirai, what draws him to Mr Mugabe and Mr Mugabe to him, and those of similar mind within those two parties, is ominous for uMthwakazi.
11. We restate it here. Zanu-PF and the MDC have never been divided politically. Rather, and clearly, they have merely disagreed on how to share power between themselves. Today, through this so-called agreement, they have put that question to rest. The truth is now out there for everybody to see.
12. MPC remains of the considered view that it is never too late to correct this political error. We call on both parties to reconsider the far-reaching implications of their so-called agreement. We also call on the mediators and the world to reaffirm and uphold the fundamental principle on which democracy is founded, namely; full, informed and free participation of the citizenry in political processes that affect them. The charade of elections ever held in Zimbabwe under Zanu-PF rule, and the sham presidential elections recently concluded, are matters of international knowledge. The world cannot and must not endorse and legitimise this political fraud.
13. Finally, Mthwakazi, this is not a time for dithering. The political implications of this so-called agreement are far worse and far tragic for Mthwakazi than the so-called Unity Accord could ever be. Let us all say, as Mthwakazians and as a people and proud nation, we will not be politically finished off while we draw breath. We owe it to our children and children’s children to say so.
MPC - Department of Communications
Thank you.
K Dube
MPC Director of Communications
M P CMthwakazi People’s Convention
STATEMENT ON THE POWER-SHARING AGREEMENT BETWEEN ZANU-PF AND MDC MADE IN HARARE ON THE 11th SEPTEMBER 2008
1. MPC learns and receives with regret the power-sharing agreement made between Zanu-PF and MDC on the 11th September 2008, which is to be officially signed on Monday, 15th September 2008. But this is hardly surprising. Once again we see the people of present-day Zimbabwe betrayed on the altar of political convenience, opportunism and self-serving political interests. We ask; what have all those who died in the just-ended election period, and before, die for?
2. We learn with further regret that the agreement is about power-sharing not good governance or the political future of present-day Zimbabwe. MPC has long said that both Zanu-PF and the MDC are fixated with power and not governance or the political future of present-day Zimbabwe. This agreement puts paid to any doubts whatsoever about that.
3. This agreement is also a political fraud designed to pull a rug over the world’s face and conceal the real motives behind the agreement. The agreement fools no one. It is not difficult for the world to know that this agreement is about enabling Zanu-PF and Mr Mugabe to access international finance support and dig themselves out of the present economic mire, while at the same time enabling Mr Tsvangirai to access power, with which he is so intoxicated, and to secure a State Residence.
4. MPC wants to point out that this is not a political agreement of the people of present-day Zimbabwe. It is, as it says, a power-sharing agreement between Zanu-PF and the MDC. It is once again a cynical move to privatise a political process that should be owned by the people.
5. MPC will not attempt to apportion blame for the violence that has characterised Zimbabwean politics since the advent and entry into the political arena of the MDC. What we know and is now public knowledge is that both Zanu-PF and the MDC-T faction have been involved in inter and intra-party violence that has killed and maimed innocent people. The death of one person for political reasons is one death too many. We thought the lessons of Gukurahundi had been learnt. Clearly they have not. Clearly, both Mr Mugabe and Mr Tsvangirai are not fit and proper persons for high office, whether it be as President or Prime Minister. They are dangerous people.
6. MPC condemns this agreement as cynical, mischievous and destined to achieve nothing politically. In a short while, Zanu-PF and the MDC must face each other in another round of elections. The political implications are too grave to contemplate. The implications are even worse if the two parties are on the same side, against others.
7. MPC also condemns Zanu-PF and MDC’s preoccupation with a so-called Government of National Unity (GNU), something both parties have achieved through violence. We also condemn their rejection, for obvious political reason, of a Transitional Government (TG).
8. MPC has long called for the establishment of an all-inclusive political process, recently supported by civic groups in Zimbabwe, to discuss, openly, the political problems of present-day Zimbabwe. We have called for the Convention on a Democratic Alternative for present-day Zimbabwe (Codaz). We re-affirm our call for Codaz. Out of Codaz MPC calls for a new political and constitutional order which must be captured in a New Constitution. MPC stands by its view that a New Constitution cannot usher in a new political and constitutional order. Rather, a new political and constitutional order must give birth to a new constitution.
9. This so-called agreement reverses this basic tenet of democratic construction. We therefore regret that the mistakes of Lancaster are being repeated in 2008, this time with the help of our own brothers and sisters in the continent who should know better. But this time uMthwakazi will not stand idly by. Through MPC, uMthwakazi has and is putting its case to the world. The time when political leaders and parties rode roughshod over the true aspirations of the people are gone.
10. As MPC, and talking on behalf of Mthwakazi, we reiterate the point we have made many times before, that MDC and Zanu-PF are two sides of the same coin. By this agreement both parties have put paid to any doubts about that. Both parties have today confirmed that they are parties built and designed to eliminate uMthwakazi as a people and political force. By embracing and going to bed with Zanu-PF the MDC has today confirmed that it is part of and shares in Zanu-PF’s so-called Grand Plan and the Zimbabwe Project, shadowy plans targeted at and designed to erase uMthwakazi politically and permanently. We know that despite public posturing by Mr Tsvangirai, this deal was easy to make because it completes the political dominance of the Shona over uMthwakazi. MPC long predicted such an agreement. Despite the political goodwill and generosity of the world in relation to Mr Tsvangirai, what draws him to Mr Mugabe and Mr Mugabe to him, and those of similar mind within those two parties, is ominous for uMthwakazi.
11. We restate it here. Zanu-PF and the MDC have never been divided politically. Rather, and clearly, they have merely disagreed on how to share power between themselves. Today, through this so-called agreement, they have put that question to rest. The truth is now out there for everybody to see.
12. MPC remains of the considered view that it is never too late to correct this political error. We call on both parties to reconsider the far-reaching implications of their so-called agreement. We also call on the mediators and the world to reaffirm and uphold the fundamental principle on which democracy is founded, namely; full, informed and free participation of the citizenry in political processes that affect them. The charade of elections ever held in Zimbabwe under Zanu-PF rule, and the sham presidential elections recently concluded, are matters of international knowledge. The world cannot and must not endorse and legitimise this political fraud.
13. Finally, Mthwakazi, this is not a time for dithering. The political implications of this so-called agreement are far worse and far tragic for Mthwakazi than the so-called Unity Accord could ever be. Let us all say, as Mthwakazians and as a people and proud nation, we will not be politically finished off while we draw breath. We owe it to our children and children’s children to say so.
MPC - Department of Communications
Saturday
Strategic thinking dictates that from now on we must fight our political fight as Mthwakazi
By Ndabezinhle Edwin Mkwananzi
Today, I want to make the point that, as Mthwakazi, we must begin to think strategically. I also want to make the point that, that strategy demands that we fight our political fight as Mthwakazi.
The reason for this is that the Zimbabwe Project oppresses and dominates us as Mthwakazi. Our political strategy must take stock of the effects of the Zimbabwe Project in the past 30 years as well as its present and lingering effects. We therefore need to remove it completely from uMthwakazi’s psyche and body politic. That is a long-term task that requires us to think strategically and to execute it in terms of a clear strategy.
In response to the Zimbabwe Project, as a starting point and as a critical first step of our strategy, uMthwakazi must seek to disengage with present-day Zimbabwe. As I say in my last message, we are saying, post-Mugabe, present-day Zimbabwe cannot continue to be governed as it has, as this project of domination of one people by another, of one system by another or one culture by another, and a project of suppressing and under-developing a specific population of present-day Zimbabwe society.
We therefore have a real political struggle in our hands.
Disabusing our people from the mentality that uMthwakazi’s independence is impossible to that which says, to quote Barack Obama, “yes we can”, is going to take some doing. Obama provides a useful anecdote for Mthwakazi. Only a few years ago, he was distant outsider, and even at recent elections, that he could become US first Black President, was to mainstream American politics a laughable joke. It has not been a honeymoon for him; it has been hard, sometimes, frustrating work. Unless there is something special about us, we have no right to expect the task before us to be a honeymoon.
Being a strategic project, our agenda is not short-term. It does not therefore carry the promise of immediate political reward. Nor does it offer the present excitement of joining the new gravy train of Zanu-PF and the MDC. For these reasons, we will admit, it is an unattractive agenda to many but the most brave and committed. It is this committed few who see the vision who we want to help transform that vision into an attainable goal.
Because our agenda is defining, it is long-term and hard. Because it is young, it is wobbly. But we struggle up, trudge on, and ferret, fully reminded that we will grow and become stronger with time. We have one advantage our oppressors do not have; and that is the justness of our cause. In it, is the political capital and political fire that will see us confront and cross every obstacle we will encounter.
We have already shown we can stand even the toughest tests thrown at us. We emerged from the Gukurahundi experience intact and more united. We have rejected Zimbabwe rule since, over and over. We have made our political point. It is time to make that point count for Mthwakazi, propel us to what we want and to be who we want.
It is no longer the time for protest voting. Protest voting achieves nothing. Protest voting translates to a political mandate to whoever you express your protest votes through, even a protégé of your political enemy. Today, the MDC through whom you have registered your protest against Zimbabwe rule has taken your votes and gone back home.
Which party did Mr Tsvangirai belong to before he became MDC?
Now that Mr Tsvangirai and his MDC are back home, where are you Mthwakazi? What reason do we have to condemn any Mthwakazian in Zanu-PF today while glorifying any Mthwakazina in the MDC today?
Betrayed and deceived once again, you are now left to leak your political wounds. How many times do you want to be betrayed and what do you want to happen before you open your eyes?
The facts are as crude and simple as that.
We know there are some, inside and outside the MDC, who would rather we did not say these well-known facts. In an environment of political justice we would have been persuaded not to but ours is a political environment of crude tribalism, matched only by the crudeness of the methods used.
Look, Mthwakazi! When Zanu-PF and MDC quarrelled in a domestic incident, MDC got a slap on the hand. When uMthwakazi rejected tyranny ever taking root in today’s Zimbabwe, uMthwakazi had a sledge hammer dropped on them; some 30 000 of our citizens paid the ultimate price and today lie in unmarked graves.
Mthwakazi, ever stopped to think why this is so?
With the so-called GNU now confirmed, the Zimbabwe Project is on the roll once again.
Mthwakazi, this is therefore the truth in our hands many of us would wish it was not. But it is the raw truth!
While celebrations to welcome Mr Tsvangirai back home in Harare were beamed across the world uMthwakazi was conspicuous by their absence. Yet, we have heard over and over again that Matebeleland is Mr Tsvangirai’s stronghold. Of course, in a few days Mr Tsvangirai will be going to Matebeleland to explain the GNU to his ‘supporters’ or ‘people’.
But Mthwakazi, do you matter to anyone now? And where has Mr Tsvangirai taken the MDC?
And is that not where the recently revived Zapu has recently come from, complaining that their own version of ‘unity’ has not worked? And did you not condemn Zapu when it went there in the first place? So, where do you stand now Mthwakazi?
There is a fundamental difference with the MDC, though. The MDC and the bulk of its supporters were Zanu-PF before. For them, their return to Zanu-PF is a political homecoming. There is therefore a probability things might work. Only time will tell. In the meantime, Mthwakazi will bewhere you have been in the last 30 years and will be for a long time unless you woke up: in the political freezer!
So for those who have supported the MDC, against all objective truth, it is back to square one. Here, at square one you will find MPC waiting, and here, MPC has been inviting our people for a long time now. We think it is time we all responded and took up and fought a political cause which is Mthwakazi’s.
You see Mthwakazi; the Zimbabwe Project used a simple strategy against uMthwakazi. It scattered us. Since then it has sowed seeds of distrust and planted mutual suspicion among us. In some cases, it buys or bribes us, all as part of a state-sponsored operation designed to finish uMthwakazi off politically once and for all.
We must regroup. This latest betrayal, this time by the MDC, adds urgency to that.
Our overriding and continuing task must therefore be to beat back of the tools of repression: mistrust and mutual suspicion and the vulnerability to be bribed or bought. We must learn to work together again even if, for the time being, that may mean we will be infiltrated. Infiltration must not worry us overly for once our struggle takes a life of its own, as we want it to, it will not matter which enemy is in our midst. Like all revolutions, we will carry the system’s spies and informers together with us to Mthwakazi’s freedom.
With Mr Tsvangirai and those he had taken away with him from Zanu-PF now back home, the system can now focus on the real political enemy: uMthwakazi, now defined through the prism of the revived Zapu and MPC. Don’t say you were not warned!
We must now chart a new course.
This is therefore no longer a political fight we can fight just as ‘something’. It is a fight we can only and truly execute as Mthwakazi because we are oppressed and dominated as Mthwakazi.
Such a political fight can also no longer be fought ‘somehow’ or in terms of self-deluding notions of some imagined apolitical arbitrator who sees the reasonableness of our acquiescence in our own oppression under Zimbabwe rule. It is a political fight we can only fight in a structured way and in terms of a framework designed to be effective and responsive to our unique political experience under Zimbabwe rule.
Such a political fight can no longer be fought through chance or the comforts offered by political ‘mainstreamism’. Nor is it a political fight we can fight through ‘incrementalism’, the sorry view that we should start small and claim bigger and bigger as we go along, a view which is often a convenient excuse for cowardice and inaction. It is no longer a political fight which can be fought in a piecemeal, disjointed, contradictory, and duplicating way. It is a fight that must be co-ordinated, deliberate, and focused.
This is also no longer a political fight that can be left to be led by people who ambrace ambiguity about who we are or who obfuscate a cause as clear as Mthwakazi’s by fashionable political-speak and political correctness. It is a political fight which must be fought through the crude application of good old fashioned truth and ‘speaking’ facts.
It is also no longer the time for political blur or imagined choices. It is an imagined choice that there is a struggle between rejecting the oppression and domination of Mthwakazi and not being seen as having embraced Mthwakazi’s independence altogether. There is no such choice; it exists only in the minds of the ‘learned’. For the rest of our people, nothing has been clearer since Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980. For them, and some of us, there is a clear duty, not just to reject this oppression and domination but also the obligation to stand up and do something about it.
MPC has long answered this call to political arms. We believe it is time for all Mthwakazians to get up and get their hands dirty as Mthwakazi.
We regret that those of us who believe we should go through political detours or rest camps, whether they are christened Government of National Unity (GNU) or Coalition Government (CG), or any other intermediate station, are mistaken. Our route must be direct and straight.
Another thing; let us not take our eyes off the ball. While it is commendable to help a village or community with fertilizer or seed or some other such hand of benevolence and charity, we are sure, ultimately, this is not helpful to Mthwakazi’s political circumstance.
Our problem is not want. Want is only a consequence of our political circumstance created for us by the Zimbabwe Project. What uMthwakazi wants is political freedom that will release its creative energies. It also wants opportunities of life created by a supportive and facilitative state of their own.
In the long-term these acts of charity are abetting the system that is oppressing and dominating us rather than helping to dismantle it.
This is why.
The Zimbabwe Project was built as this overarching system of Mthwakazi’s oppression and domination in terms of which everything uMthwakazi does must be micro-level. UMthwakazi is therefore designed to operate below a certain political sub-system where uMthwakazi must be kept. Manifestations of this are everywhere. Meanwhile, the system operates a different, facilitative system for its people that prepares them to take over the levers of power and economic advantage, while at the same time extending opportunity and political credit to its people.
You only need to look at who has senior experience in government and in the private sector in today’s Zimbabwe. You also need to look at the profile of Zimbabweans currently employed in international organizations, inter-government and non-governmental organizations across the world. Mthwakazians are conspicuous by their absence.
Here, therefore, is the critical point.
It is therefore the framework or edifice of domination that uMthwakazi needs to dismantle, not the detail or manifestations of it. Mentally, we also need to destroy micro thinking and replace it with strategic thinking. This is MPC’s message today.
The late ZAPU President, Joshua Nkomo, once said: “Think big!” He was lampooned and caricatured, with some Mthwakazians joining in in laughing at him but I believe Nkomo was sending a clear message to us because he knew the inside story.
The political system built by the Zimbabwe Project also operates a ruthless system of using uMthwakazi politically. It is at the level of politics that uMthwakazi’s sad political situation is most telling.
In terms of this political system anything started or led by a Shona person is ‘national’ purely on the strength that it is led by a Shona and something started or led by an Ndebele is ‘tribal’ purely because it is started or led by an Ndebele. This is Zanu-PF’s Zimbabwe, long endorsed by many of our Shona citizenry across all class divide but many of whom put on a show of pretending otherwise. The acceptability of this system among many of our Shona citizenry is best illustrated by the deafening silence from all but Mthwakazians about this joke of our time we have had as governance.
Here is the sad political irony of it all.
The more politicians from Mthwakazi try to appear ‘national’ (a notion which should be repudiated completely in the context of present-day Zimbabwe) the more the system makes them look and ‘proves’ they are ‘tribal’. Thus, Mthwakazians earn the ‘national’ tag not in terms of the views and the values they hold but by being wrapped in ‘Shonanostra’ by a Shona person placed above them to lead them. It is the crudest system founded on tribalism to have disgraced the political landscape of Africa anywhere!
Is it only MPC, then, who understand very well what ‘national’ means in the context of present-day Zimbabwe?
Mthwakazi, have you ever stopped to think why Zanu-PF chose ‘national’ for its name as against ‘people’ when it left Zapu in 1963? What did they mean and what do they mean by ‘national’? Thirty years into Zimbabwe’s independence, and after thousands of Mthwakazian kinsman lost their lives to the system to drive the point home, are you still blind to what ‘national’ means in today’s Zimbabwe? We think it is time to think long and hard.
So, as MPC we are aware that our agenda is not immediately demonstrable or implementable as that of the MDC and other parties. We are not front-runners, nor do we aspire to be. We are not afraid to say we are political underdogs. We are only happy to be doing what we can to put together a political framework through which we will prosecute our political struggle strategically and effectively.
So, where does uMthwakazi go from here, and how does uMthwakazi break this vicious cycle of political strangulation?
There are no easy answers. But one thing is clear; we can no longer afford to approach our political situation in the way we have so far, by hiding and ‘waiting’ inside Zanu-PF and the MDC. We fool no one. In any event, who is fooling who? From where MPC stands, we have no doubt in our minds, who is being a fool.
It is time to change our political toolkit.
As a start, we must now refuse to hanker to a glorious past that never was. We must learn from our mistakes. We must move on. We too must face the dangers and anxieties of liberating ourselves and celebrate the thrills and excitement of having achieved our liberation by our hard work and sacrifice. We want it easy, as many of us seem to, then we have hit the last nail on our political coffin. While we draw breath, many of us undertake never to.
This is no longer the time for political soothsaying, wish lists, or private fiefdoms of personal or quasi-political influence, or the time to harp on stories of our past glory and heroism. This is the time to staff our political toolkit with political tools necessary to fight the political battles of our time effectively and successfully.
There is not a better time to do that than now when we face the sure end of Mugabe’s rule. This is the time for men and women of Mthwakazi who cannot be bought or coerced into betraying uMthwakazi, to be found or to present themselves for service to our people.
There are those of us who say we must work inside political groups in today’s Zimbabwe. With these people, we completely disagree. There are those of us, MPC included, who say we must work together with other political groups in today’s Zimbabwe. With these people we are in total agreement.
The former group comprises Mthwakazians inside Zanu-PF and perhaps both factions of the MDC, and those that support them. Our history under Zimbabwe rule and inside Zanu-PF and the MDC dictates that working inside these formations is no longer an option. We don’t wish any Mthwakazian, thirty years from now, walking out of an MDC or some such other government having seen that things have not worked. In any event, the MDC is now back in Zanu-PF.
Mthwakazi; you don’t want to go there! In any event, the revived Zapu has shown the way and come out of there. Some of those from Zapu who remained have only recently been politely shown the door to make way for the true occupants of those warm seats.
We cannot accept guarantees either. Ours is not a political experience of political guarantees. Minus 30 000 of our loved ones, expect we have learnt the hard way. Nothing short of total control of our political destiny will do.
As noted above, MPC agrees with those people who say we must work with other political groups. To this end, MPC has placed its agenda in the public domain so that anyone who wishes to engage us politically is clear what we stand for and want. We are an open and public political movement. We will engage anyone, anytime with regard to our agenda.
We are therefore delighted that the revived Zapu is offering itself as a choice available to the people of present-day Zimbabwe. We also look to welcoming Mavambo/Kusile Movement when it transforms itself into a political party. We extend a similar welcome to disgruntled members of Zanu-PF and the MDC and other groups, when they join the political fray. This fluidity in the political market presents prospects for working with, not inside, other parties to advance uMthwakazi’s cause.
This is an opportunity we should never allow to slip through our fingers.
It is therefore tragic that at precisely the time when the Zanu-PF’s system is collapsing, in jumps Mr Tsvangirai and Mutambara to rescue it. The so-called Government of National Unity (GNU) throws a political life-line to Zanu-PF and Mugabe at precisely the time when the system is coming virtually unstuck. So, Mthwakazi and Zimbabwe, there you have it.
It seems clear, the lure of gravy seats has proved too strong for the MDC to resist. Forget the shriek denials!
A GNU in Zimbabwe at this stage is simply a crazy idea. It is crazy not only because of its grotesque size; three Presidents, three Prime Ministers, a shared ministry and a total cabinet of nearly sixty persons, including their usual coterie of political hangers-on. It is also crazy in terms of its very concept.
We ask: What are Zanu-PF and the MDC uniting?
A GNU is also gross because it includes Mr Mugabe, and as President for that matter. If press reports about the split between Mr Tendai Biti and Mr Tsvangirai are correct, then Mr Biti is spot-on on the point this time. (the other reason suggested is incredulous). We believe Mr Biti and those that support him are opposed to the GNU on a point of principle and strategy.
Now that the MDC has joined Zanu-PF in government, it has prevented the country getting where it should be – a formal transitional position.
For a long time, MPC has been a lonely voice in calling for a Transitional Government (TG) and transitional arrangements under such a government. There is now a growing consensus that a TG is the only authentic way forward. That is to be welcome.
Present-day Zimbabwe does not need a GNU.
A TG is the only way to ensure that no topic, no issue, and no matter is too hot to engage; that no topic, issue or matter is blocked or swept under carpet. The mentality of suppressing opinion must end with the demise of Zanu-PF rule and the system it has built to support it.
MPC’s view is that the TG must be composed of eminent persons from present-day Zimbabwe who will not be contesting elections under the new constitution, not a judge or Roman Catholic priest, as suggested by some people (We don’t understand the reasons for ‘a Roman Catholic priest’).
The TG must, as soon as it is constituted, convene a political conference on Zimbabwe similar to South Africa’s CODESA which will discuss and identify all political and other issues to be included in the New Constitution. It is envisaged that such a conference will be convened under the auspices of the UN. The constitution-writing process must only follow after such a political conference.
A transitional government also has the benefit of removing Mugabe, not just as a regime change agenda but also as a wider effort to get to the bottom of the political problems of present-day Zimbabwe. In the process, the whole political architecture built by Zanu-PF, which needs and must be destroyed, will begin the slow but sure process of political death. It is a terrible legacy that must not have even the remotest chance to connect to posterity. A transitional government also has the benefit of resolving the Matebeleland Question and any other issues, constitutionally, once and for all.
MPC believes that this so-called GNU illustrates the urgency with which the political foundation of present-day Zimbabwe must be dismantled and all traces of it permanently confined to the political grave. Instead of raising the spectre of Zanu-PF’s political death, the so-called GNU has rescued Zanu-PF from the clutches of political death.
There is also an overriding matter of principle inside this latest version of the ‘Unity Accord’ which should be stopped on its tracks.
With the so-called GNU almost political fact it now means that the next political party to unleash its own violence can expect to have a high seat in the next round of power-sharing talks. At that stage, and logically, we must expect to have is a second tier of Vice-Vice Presidents and Vice-Vice Prime Ministers, Deputy-Deputy Ministers, multiplied by the number of ruthless and vicious parties who have trampled the citizenry on their way to the cabinet posts-sharing table.
This is lust for power gone mad! Some people seem to have taken leave of their senses!
In my previous message I condemned the regime change agenda. I do not wish to be misunderstood as now saying that I support regime change because I say Mr Mugabe must not be part of any new government in present-day Zimbabwe. There is no conflict between my previous position and the present. MPC is still opposed to regime change as a political agenda.
We are opposed to regime change because it does not get rid of the terrible system Zanu-PF has built. We are also opposed to regime change agenda because it does not even begin to tinker with the outer edges of what needs to be done in present-day Zimbabwe. Present-day Zimbabwe is a political and constitutional black hole that needs sorting now.
Further, because the regime change agenda has come as an outside imposition and with its ugly face of Iraq and Afghanistan intact, it has jettisoned Africa’s goodwill in confronting the Zimbabwean crisis, which seemed to hold promise not so long ago. The principle around which Africa has galvanized, which Mugabe has taken full advantage of, seems to be that it should no longer be the prerogative of powerful states to appoint and fire African presidents.
Unfortunately, we think there has been a clumsiness about the regime change agenda as it has been applied even to Zimbabwe which has only served to prolong Mugabe rule and to give us totally ridiculous solutions such as we are now facing with the so-called GNU which retains Mugabe in government as President. We doubt that Africa has rallied to Zimbabwe’s side to support Mugabe himself, as is sometimes erroneously assumed. We think Africa has decided to stand up to what it perceives as the political bullying of the past by powerful states.
There is now an opportunity to correct these errors of the past.
The new US administration led by new US President, President Barack Obama, presents an opportunity for a new approach. Within the region, the impending presidency of Jacob Zuma, now bolstered by Presidents of the region who now want nothing short of good governance, must complement these fresh approaches. All these factors present a rare opportunity for Mthwakazians and Zimbabweans to get things right this time around.
Ultimately, however, the solution must rest with Mthwakazians and Zimbabweans assisted by the international community. A Transitional Government and transitional arrangements offers the best political environment for Mthwakazians and Zimbabweans to do exactly that.
Now that the MDC has agreed to join Zanu-PF in the so-called GNU, no one should be left in doubt about what has happened. It has been long in coming but many will also say they long saw it coming.
I thank you.
Ndaba E Mkwananzi
MPC President
Today, I want to make the point that, as Mthwakazi, we must begin to think strategically. I also want to make the point that, that strategy demands that we fight our political fight as Mthwakazi.
The reason for this is that the Zimbabwe Project oppresses and dominates us as Mthwakazi. Our political strategy must take stock of the effects of the Zimbabwe Project in the past 30 years as well as its present and lingering effects. We therefore need to remove it completely from uMthwakazi’s psyche and body politic. That is a long-term task that requires us to think strategically and to execute it in terms of a clear strategy.
In response to the Zimbabwe Project, as a starting point and as a critical first step of our strategy, uMthwakazi must seek to disengage with present-day Zimbabwe. As I say in my last message, we are saying, post-Mugabe, present-day Zimbabwe cannot continue to be governed as it has, as this project of domination of one people by another, of one system by another or one culture by another, and a project of suppressing and under-developing a specific population of present-day Zimbabwe society.
We therefore have a real political struggle in our hands.
Disabusing our people from the mentality that uMthwakazi’s independence is impossible to that which says, to quote Barack Obama, “yes we can”, is going to take some doing. Obama provides a useful anecdote for Mthwakazi. Only a few years ago, he was distant outsider, and even at recent elections, that he could become US first Black President, was to mainstream American politics a laughable joke. It has not been a honeymoon for him; it has been hard, sometimes, frustrating work. Unless there is something special about us, we have no right to expect the task before us to be a honeymoon.
Being a strategic project, our agenda is not short-term. It does not therefore carry the promise of immediate political reward. Nor does it offer the present excitement of joining the new gravy train of Zanu-PF and the MDC. For these reasons, we will admit, it is an unattractive agenda to many but the most brave and committed. It is this committed few who see the vision who we want to help transform that vision into an attainable goal.
Because our agenda is defining, it is long-term and hard. Because it is young, it is wobbly. But we struggle up, trudge on, and ferret, fully reminded that we will grow and become stronger with time. We have one advantage our oppressors do not have; and that is the justness of our cause. In it, is the political capital and political fire that will see us confront and cross every obstacle we will encounter.
We have already shown we can stand even the toughest tests thrown at us. We emerged from the Gukurahundi experience intact and more united. We have rejected Zimbabwe rule since, over and over. We have made our political point. It is time to make that point count for Mthwakazi, propel us to what we want and to be who we want.
It is no longer the time for protest voting. Protest voting achieves nothing. Protest voting translates to a political mandate to whoever you express your protest votes through, even a protégé of your political enemy. Today, the MDC through whom you have registered your protest against Zimbabwe rule has taken your votes and gone back home.
Which party did Mr Tsvangirai belong to before he became MDC?
Now that Mr Tsvangirai and his MDC are back home, where are you Mthwakazi? What reason do we have to condemn any Mthwakazian in Zanu-PF today while glorifying any Mthwakazina in the MDC today?
Betrayed and deceived once again, you are now left to leak your political wounds. How many times do you want to be betrayed and what do you want to happen before you open your eyes?
The facts are as crude and simple as that.
We know there are some, inside and outside the MDC, who would rather we did not say these well-known facts. In an environment of political justice we would have been persuaded not to but ours is a political environment of crude tribalism, matched only by the crudeness of the methods used.
Look, Mthwakazi! When Zanu-PF and MDC quarrelled in a domestic incident, MDC got a slap on the hand. When uMthwakazi rejected tyranny ever taking root in today’s Zimbabwe, uMthwakazi had a sledge hammer dropped on them; some 30 000 of our citizens paid the ultimate price and today lie in unmarked graves.
Mthwakazi, ever stopped to think why this is so?
With the so-called GNU now confirmed, the Zimbabwe Project is on the roll once again.
Mthwakazi, this is therefore the truth in our hands many of us would wish it was not. But it is the raw truth!
While celebrations to welcome Mr Tsvangirai back home in Harare were beamed across the world uMthwakazi was conspicuous by their absence. Yet, we have heard over and over again that Matebeleland is Mr Tsvangirai’s stronghold. Of course, in a few days Mr Tsvangirai will be going to Matebeleland to explain the GNU to his ‘supporters’ or ‘people’.
But Mthwakazi, do you matter to anyone now? And where has Mr Tsvangirai taken the MDC?
And is that not where the recently revived Zapu has recently come from, complaining that their own version of ‘unity’ has not worked? And did you not condemn Zapu when it went there in the first place? So, where do you stand now Mthwakazi?
There is a fundamental difference with the MDC, though. The MDC and the bulk of its supporters were Zanu-PF before. For them, their return to Zanu-PF is a political homecoming. There is therefore a probability things might work. Only time will tell. In the meantime, Mthwakazi will bewhere you have been in the last 30 years and will be for a long time unless you woke up: in the political freezer!
So for those who have supported the MDC, against all objective truth, it is back to square one. Here, at square one you will find MPC waiting, and here, MPC has been inviting our people for a long time now. We think it is time we all responded and took up and fought a political cause which is Mthwakazi’s.
You see Mthwakazi; the Zimbabwe Project used a simple strategy against uMthwakazi. It scattered us. Since then it has sowed seeds of distrust and planted mutual suspicion among us. In some cases, it buys or bribes us, all as part of a state-sponsored operation designed to finish uMthwakazi off politically once and for all.
We must regroup. This latest betrayal, this time by the MDC, adds urgency to that.
Our overriding and continuing task must therefore be to beat back of the tools of repression: mistrust and mutual suspicion and the vulnerability to be bribed or bought. We must learn to work together again even if, for the time being, that may mean we will be infiltrated. Infiltration must not worry us overly for once our struggle takes a life of its own, as we want it to, it will not matter which enemy is in our midst. Like all revolutions, we will carry the system’s spies and informers together with us to Mthwakazi’s freedom.
With Mr Tsvangirai and those he had taken away with him from Zanu-PF now back home, the system can now focus on the real political enemy: uMthwakazi, now defined through the prism of the revived Zapu and MPC. Don’t say you were not warned!
We must now chart a new course.
This is therefore no longer a political fight we can fight just as ‘something’. It is a fight we can only and truly execute as Mthwakazi because we are oppressed and dominated as Mthwakazi.
Such a political fight can also no longer be fought ‘somehow’ or in terms of self-deluding notions of some imagined apolitical arbitrator who sees the reasonableness of our acquiescence in our own oppression under Zimbabwe rule. It is a political fight we can only fight in a structured way and in terms of a framework designed to be effective and responsive to our unique political experience under Zimbabwe rule.
Such a political fight can no longer be fought through chance or the comforts offered by political ‘mainstreamism’. Nor is it a political fight we can fight through ‘incrementalism’, the sorry view that we should start small and claim bigger and bigger as we go along, a view which is often a convenient excuse for cowardice and inaction. It is no longer a political fight which can be fought in a piecemeal, disjointed, contradictory, and duplicating way. It is a fight that must be co-ordinated, deliberate, and focused.
This is also no longer a political fight that can be left to be led by people who ambrace ambiguity about who we are or who obfuscate a cause as clear as Mthwakazi’s by fashionable political-speak and political correctness. It is a political fight which must be fought through the crude application of good old fashioned truth and ‘speaking’ facts.
It is also no longer the time for political blur or imagined choices. It is an imagined choice that there is a struggle between rejecting the oppression and domination of Mthwakazi and not being seen as having embraced Mthwakazi’s independence altogether. There is no such choice; it exists only in the minds of the ‘learned’. For the rest of our people, nothing has been clearer since Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980. For them, and some of us, there is a clear duty, not just to reject this oppression and domination but also the obligation to stand up and do something about it.
MPC has long answered this call to political arms. We believe it is time for all Mthwakazians to get up and get their hands dirty as Mthwakazi.
We regret that those of us who believe we should go through political detours or rest camps, whether they are christened Government of National Unity (GNU) or Coalition Government (CG), or any other intermediate station, are mistaken. Our route must be direct and straight.
Another thing; let us not take our eyes off the ball. While it is commendable to help a village or community with fertilizer or seed or some other such hand of benevolence and charity, we are sure, ultimately, this is not helpful to Mthwakazi’s political circumstance.
Our problem is not want. Want is only a consequence of our political circumstance created for us by the Zimbabwe Project. What uMthwakazi wants is political freedom that will release its creative energies. It also wants opportunities of life created by a supportive and facilitative state of their own.
In the long-term these acts of charity are abetting the system that is oppressing and dominating us rather than helping to dismantle it.
This is why.
The Zimbabwe Project was built as this overarching system of Mthwakazi’s oppression and domination in terms of which everything uMthwakazi does must be micro-level. UMthwakazi is therefore designed to operate below a certain political sub-system where uMthwakazi must be kept. Manifestations of this are everywhere. Meanwhile, the system operates a different, facilitative system for its people that prepares them to take over the levers of power and economic advantage, while at the same time extending opportunity and political credit to its people.
You only need to look at who has senior experience in government and in the private sector in today’s Zimbabwe. You also need to look at the profile of Zimbabweans currently employed in international organizations, inter-government and non-governmental organizations across the world. Mthwakazians are conspicuous by their absence.
Here, therefore, is the critical point.
It is therefore the framework or edifice of domination that uMthwakazi needs to dismantle, not the detail or manifestations of it. Mentally, we also need to destroy micro thinking and replace it with strategic thinking. This is MPC’s message today.
The late ZAPU President, Joshua Nkomo, once said: “Think big!” He was lampooned and caricatured, with some Mthwakazians joining in in laughing at him but I believe Nkomo was sending a clear message to us because he knew the inside story.
The political system built by the Zimbabwe Project also operates a ruthless system of using uMthwakazi politically. It is at the level of politics that uMthwakazi’s sad political situation is most telling.
In terms of this political system anything started or led by a Shona person is ‘national’ purely on the strength that it is led by a Shona and something started or led by an Ndebele is ‘tribal’ purely because it is started or led by an Ndebele. This is Zanu-PF’s Zimbabwe, long endorsed by many of our Shona citizenry across all class divide but many of whom put on a show of pretending otherwise. The acceptability of this system among many of our Shona citizenry is best illustrated by the deafening silence from all but Mthwakazians about this joke of our time we have had as governance.
Here is the sad political irony of it all.
The more politicians from Mthwakazi try to appear ‘national’ (a notion which should be repudiated completely in the context of present-day Zimbabwe) the more the system makes them look and ‘proves’ they are ‘tribal’. Thus, Mthwakazians earn the ‘national’ tag not in terms of the views and the values they hold but by being wrapped in ‘Shonanostra’ by a Shona person placed above them to lead them. It is the crudest system founded on tribalism to have disgraced the political landscape of Africa anywhere!
Is it only MPC, then, who understand very well what ‘national’ means in the context of present-day Zimbabwe?
Mthwakazi, have you ever stopped to think why Zanu-PF chose ‘national’ for its name as against ‘people’ when it left Zapu in 1963? What did they mean and what do they mean by ‘national’? Thirty years into Zimbabwe’s independence, and after thousands of Mthwakazian kinsman lost their lives to the system to drive the point home, are you still blind to what ‘national’ means in today’s Zimbabwe? We think it is time to think long and hard.
So, as MPC we are aware that our agenda is not immediately demonstrable or implementable as that of the MDC and other parties. We are not front-runners, nor do we aspire to be. We are not afraid to say we are political underdogs. We are only happy to be doing what we can to put together a political framework through which we will prosecute our political struggle strategically and effectively.
So, where does uMthwakazi go from here, and how does uMthwakazi break this vicious cycle of political strangulation?
There are no easy answers. But one thing is clear; we can no longer afford to approach our political situation in the way we have so far, by hiding and ‘waiting’ inside Zanu-PF and the MDC. We fool no one. In any event, who is fooling who? From where MPC stands, we have no doubt in our minds, who is being a fool.
It is time to change our political toolkit.
As a start, we must now refuse to hanker to a glorious past that never was. We must learn from our mistakes. We must move on. We too must face the dangers and anxieties of liberating ourselves and celebrate the thrills and excitement of having achieved our liberation by our hard work and sacrifice. We want it easy, as many of us seem to, then we have hit the last nail on our political coffin. While we draw breath, many of us undertake never to.
This is no longer the time for political soothsaying, wish lists, or private fiefdoms of personal or quasi-political influence, or the time to harp on stories of our past glory and heroism. This is the time to staff our political toolkit with political tools necessary to fight the political battles of our time effectively and successfully.
There is not a better time to do that than now when we face the sure end of Mugabe’s rule. This is the time for men and women of Mthwakazi who cannot be bought or coerced into betraying uMthwakazi, to be found or to present themselves for service to our people.
There are those of us who say we must work inside political groups in today’s Zimbabwe. With these people, we completely disagree. There are those of us, MPC included, who say we must work together with other political groups in today’s Zimbabwe. With these people we are in total agreement.
The former group comprises Mthwakazians inside Zanu-PF and perhaps both factions of the MDC, and those that support them. Our history under Zimbabwe rule and inside Zanu-PF and the MDC dictates that working inside these formations is no longer an option. We don’t wish any Mthwakazian, thirty years from now, walking out of an MDC or some such other government having seen that things have not worked. In any event, the MDC is now back in Zanu-PF.
Mthwakazi; you don’t want to go there! In any event, the revived Zapu has shown the way and come out of there. Some of those from Zapu who remained have only recently been politely shown the door to make way for the true occupants of those warm seats.
We cannot accept guarantees either. Ours is not a political experience of political guarantees. Minus 30 000 of our loved ones, expect we have learnt the hard way. Nothing short of total control of our political destiny will do.
As noted above, MPC agrees with those people who say we must work with other political groups. To this end, MPC has placed its agenda in the public domain so that anyone who wishes to engage us politically is clear what we stand for and want. We are an open and public political movement. We will engage anyone, anytime with regard to our agenda.
We are therefore delighted that the revived Zapu is offering itself as a choice available to the people of present-day Zimbabwe. We also look to welcoming Mavambo/Kusile Movement when it transforms itself into a political party. We extend a similar welcome to disgruntled members of Zanu-PF and the MDC and other groups, when they join the political fray. This fluidity in the political market presents prospects for working with, not inside, other parties to advance uMthwakazi’s cause.
This is an opportunity we should never allow to slip through our fingers.
It is therefore tragic that at precisely the time when the Zanu-PF’s system is collapsing, in jumps Mr Tsvangirai and Mutambara to rescue it. The so-called Government of National Unity (GNU) throws a political life-line to Zanu-PF and Mugabe at precisely the time when the system is coming virtually unstuck. So, Mthwakazi and Zimbabwe, there you have it.
It seems clear, the lure of gravy seats has proved too strong for the MDC to resist. Forget the shriek denials!
A GNU in Zimbabwe at this stage is simply a crazy idea. It is crazy not only because of its grotesque size; three Presidents, three Prime Ministers, a shared ministry and a total cabinet of nearly sixty persons, including their usual coterie of political hangers-on. It is also crazy in terms of its very concept.
We ask: What are Zanu-PF and the MDC uniting?
A GNU is also gross because it includes Mr Mugabe, and as President for that matter. If press reports about the split between Mr Tendai Biti and Mr Tsvangirai are correct, then Mr Biti is spot-on on the point this time. (the other reason suggested is incredulous). We believe Mr Biti and those that support him are opposed to the GNU on a point of principle and strategy.
Now that the MDC has joined Zanu-PF in government, it has prevented the country getting where it should be – a formal transitional position.
For a long time, MPC has been a lonely voice in calling for a Transitional Government (TG) and transitional arrangements under such a government. There is now a growing consensus that a TG is the only authentic way forward. That is to be welcome.
Present-day Zimbabwe does not need a GNU.
A TG is the only way to ensure that no topic, no issue, and no matter is too hot to engage; that no topic, issue or matter is blocked or swept under carpet. The mentality of suppressing opinion must end with the demise of Zanu-PF rule and the system it has built to support it.
MPC’s view is that the TG must be composed of eminent persons from present-day Zimbabwe who will not be contesting elections under the new constitution, not a judge or Roman Catholic priest, as suggested by some people (We don’t understand the reasons for ‘a Roman Catholic priest’).
The TG must, as soon as it is constituted, convene a political conference on Zimbabwe similar to South Africa’s CODESA which will discuss and identify all political and other issues to be included in the New Constitution. It is envisaged that such a conference will be convened under the auspices of the UN. The constitution-writing process must only follow after such a political conference.
A transitional government also has the benefit of removing Mugabe, not just as a regime change agenda but also as a wider effort to get to the bottom of the political problems of present-day Zimbabwe. In the process, the whole political architecture built by Zanu-PF, which needs and must be destroyed, will begin the slow but sure process of political death. It is a terrible legacy that must not have even the remotest chance to connect to posterity. A transitional government also has the benefit of resolving the Matebeleland Question and any other issues, constitutionally, once and for all.
MPC believes that this so-called GNU illustrates the urgency with which the political foundation of present-day Zimbabwe must be dismantled and all traces of it permanently confined to the political grave. Instead of raising the spectre of Zanu-PF’s political death, the so-called GNU has rescued Zanu-PF from the clutches of political death.
There is also an overriding matter of principle inside this latest version of the ‘Unity Accord’ which should be stopped on its tracks.
With the so-called GNU almost political fact it now means that the next political party to unleash its own violence can expect to have a high seat in the next round of power-sharing talks. At that stage, and logically, we must expect to have is a second tier of Vice-Vice Presidents and Vice-Vice Prime Ministers, Deputy-Deputy Ministers, multiplied by the number of ruthless and vicious parties who have trampled the citizenry on their way to the cabinet posts-sharing table.
This is lust for power gone mad! Some people seem to have taken leave of their senses!
In my previous message I condemned the regime change agenda. I do not wish to be misunderstood as now saying that I support regime change because I say Mr Mugabe must not be part of any new government in present-day Zimbabwe. There is no conflict between my previous position and the present. MPC is still opposed to regime change as a political agenda.
We are opposed to regime change because it does not get rid of the terrible system Zanu-PF has built. We are also opposed to regime change agenda because it does not even begin to tinker with the outer edges of what needs to be done in present-day Zimbabwe. Present-day Zimbabwe is a political and constitutional black hole that needs sorting now.
Further, because the regime change agenda has come as an outside imposition and with its ugly face of Iraq and Afghanistan intact, it has jettisoned Africa’s goodwill in confronting the Zimbabwean crisis, which seemed to hold promise not so long ago. The principle around which Africa has galvanized, which Mugabe has taken full advantage of, seems to be that it should no longer be the prerogative of powerful states to appoint and fire African presidents.
Unfortunately, we think there has been a clumsiness about the regime change agenda as it has been applied even to Zimbabwe which has only served to prolong Mugabe rule and to give us totally ridiculous solutions such as we are now facing with the so-called GNU which retains Mugabe in government as President. We doubt that Africa has rallied to Zimbabwe’s side to support Mugabe himself, as is sometimes erroneously assumed. We think Africa has decided to stand up to what it perceives as the political bullying of the past by powerful states.
There is now an opportunity to correct these errors of the past.
The new US administration led by new US President, President Barack Obama, presents an opportunity for a new approach. Within the region, the impending presidency of Jacob Zuma, now bolstered by Presidents of the region who now want nothing short of good governance, must complement these fresh approaches. All these factors present a rare opportunity for Mthwakazians and Zimbabweans to get things right this time around.
Ultimately, however, the solution must rest with Mthwakazians and Zimbabweans assisted by the international community. A Transitional Government and transitional arrangements offers the best political environment for Mthwakazians and Zimbabweans to do exactly that.
Now that the MDC has agreed to join Zanu-PF in the so-called GNU, no one should be left in doubt about what has happened. It has been long in coming but many will also say they long saw it coming.
I thank you.
Ndaba E Mkwananzi
MPC President
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