Mr Nakhozwe

Moonlight Funeral Assurance has over the years spread its wings across the length and breadth of Zimbabwe and beyond. Its tentacles now even reach South Africa. One man’s vision and dedication in life assurance today provides service to all and sundry in Zimbabwe and beyond.

To the public, he is an astute, but shrewd, media shy businessman, who has worked hard to build a business empire from nothing.

But to his kids, family members and friends, he is simply a humble, down to earth incredible father, who will always find time to engage with them on different levels.

Mr Grant Beaton Nakhozwe is the owner and founder of Moonlight Provident Associates — the holding company of Moonlight Funeral Assurance.

Humble and unassuming, Mr Nakhozwe has remained in the background, away from media publicity over the years, despite the success of the brand, which he formed 20 years ago.

“I am just a simple man, who thrives on perfection,” he revealed in an interview at his offices in Harare recently.

An astute businessman, Mr Nakhozwe has managed to build a business empire in funeral and life assurance, from a mere insurance agency he got as a token of appreciation after nearly two decades working for an insurance company.

It is as a result of his acumen to sustain a business in a very challenging economic environment that saw him being voted Businessman of the Year 2015 by Megafast (Northern Region) at a ceremony held in the capital recently.

The award was in recognition of his unwavering commitment to sustain his business against a myriad of challenges through the adoption of different strategies.

“I am naturally elated for the recognition. It is not something that I expected, but I guess it is an affirmation of the contribution that I have made in the industry over the years,” he said.

And true to his word, the company he started from mere passion to further his interest in insurance has grown to become a household name in life insurance and now has 39 branches that are sprouted across Zimbabwe.

Its coffin making factory located in Mutare bears testimony to the bullish attitude the organisation has adopted.

The business continues to grow each day and Moonlight Life Assurance will soon open another funeral parlour in Plumtree to serve the growing population of this border town.

With a workforce of more than 300 employees, Mr Nakhozwe has carved his place among the league of businessmen and businesswomen, who are heeding Government’s call to create employment.

“In our small strides, we have been able to consolidate our business model. We shall continue to do more,” he said, without any trace of arrogance.

However, Mr Nakhozwe concedes that the business he owns today did not come on a silver platter, but has been as a result of hard work, commitment, perseverance and a sense of responsibility to create employment.

“When we started 20 years ago, we faced a host of challenges and at one time I thought of giving up, when faced with obstacles in trying to set up the company,” he recalls.

Just setting up the company was no mean feat, he recalls.

Because actuarial services then where not available in Zimbabwe, Mr Nakhozwe had to travel with his team to South Africa to acquire the services, which he badly needed to come up with actuarial rates, needed in life assurance.

When they got to the neighbouring country, Mr Nakhozwe was ordered to return to Zimbabwe and seek the services from competitors who were already in the business and were not likely to make it easy for a novice to enter the highly competitive industry.

Spurred by his passion to continue serving in the insurance company, Mr Nakhozwe did not give up, but went back to South Africa to convince the service providers to certify for him the actuarial rates, a process which took long.

That phenomenal feat gave birth to Moonlight Provident Associate, a holding company of Moonlight Funeral Assurance.

“The first two years were not easy. I entered into the industry at a time when burial societies ruled the roost and most people were not keen on taking up life insurance policies.”

But with a team of dedicated marketing personnel, Moonlight Insurance got a buy-in from nurses and teachers, who had seen the beauty of services the company was offering.

In no time at all and with a robust marketing and sales team — business grew. By the time the company clocked five years, it now had its own fleet of vehicles and had started building funeral parlours in different cities across the country.

“Business was growing and the staff was happy,” he enthused.

However, the economy meltdown in the country around 2007 saw most businesses going under and Moonlight was not spared either.

That era, signalled the end of business for most companies and individuals who up to now have failed to revive their enterprises.

Mr Nakhozwe managed to pick up the pieces and has since remoulded his vision to be what it is today, something he attributes to discipline, good governance and good strategic business plans.

“There is a perception that it is easy to start and run a business in life assurance, working on the assumptions that people will always die one way or the other.

“That is a very wrong assumption that needs to be corrected.

“Life assurance is like any other business that requires a good business model for it to survive. Without that, it will not work,” said Mr Nakhozwe who is already working on his retiring plan, so that he can concentrate on farming — his second passion after insurance.

Despite the success of his business, Mr Nakhozwe says the volatile economic situation remains tricky for those who want to venture into business.

“Individuals will have to be cautious when thinking of venturing into business. One will need a good business model, assess the opportunities and risks involved,” he said.

With all the hard work and dedication, Mr Nakhozwe continues to be a torch that provides light and gives hope to many bereaved Zimbabweans.

 Feedback- ruth.chinhema@zimpapers.co.zw

RESERVE Bank of Zimbabwe Governor Dr John Mangudya this week revealed that illicit financial outflows have this year cost Zimbabwe more than $500 million. What is disheartening is that this figure is more than what Zimbabwe attracted in foreign direct investments last year. Generally, beyond the damaging economic impact of the overall capital outflows, illicit financial flows have a subversive impact on governments and society. They foster corruption, undermine governance and decrease tax revenues.

In a country experiencing liquidity crisis, efforts should be made to curb illegal cross border movement of money. While Government is putting in place efforts to attract foreign direct investment that will in turn help boost liquidity, it is worrying that millions of dollars find their way out of our borders through illicit means.

Dr Mangudya revealed that the funds were moved through an intricate web involving some companies and individuals. Under the web, which is criminal to say the least, the funds are moved from company accounts into individual accounts and then moved out of the country.

We understand challenges the country may encounter in trying to curb the illicit outflows considering we do not control the global financial systems. But we urge authorities to put in place measures within their capacity to curb the illicit activities.

We are pleased to note that the monetary authorities are dealing with it. According to a study, the most effective way to limit illicit financial flows is to increase financial transparency. This includes detecting and deterring cross border tax evasion, strengthening anti-money laundering laws and practices; curtailing trade misinvoicing and improving the transparency of foreign-owned businesses. But while Government is dealing with the cancer, Zimbabweans themselves must change their attitude. At a time when Zimbabwe is in dire need of money, it is unthinkable that some individuals are channelling funds out of the country though illegal means.

Where loopholes are observed, we must close them urgently. More importantly, we need all stakeholders to play an important role in fighting this kind of corruption. It may also be pertinent for us to ensure that banks are not found to be complicit in this illegality. It is high time we improved our foreign exchange management systems.

Zimbabwe is not the only country which has been losing huge sums of money through illicit means, but Africa as a whole. The African Union High Level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows and the UN Economic Commission for Africa presented a report during the 24th African Union Summit, which was adopted by the African Heads of State and government.

According to the panel report, it is estimated that the continent loses between $30 billion to $60 billion in illicit financial flows annually. It is understood that the continent could have lost more than $1 trillion in the last 50 years in illicit financial flows.

That is estimated to be more than foreign direct investment and official development aid combined. According to reports, citing former South African president Thabo Mbeki, Africa could have managed to reduce the deaths of children under five next year, if governments had stepped in at the turn of the millennium and stopped illicit capital outflows from the continent.

That being synonymous with other Africa countries, collaborated efforts at continental level become of paramount importance to curb the illegal transfers of money.

Stanely Mushava Features Correspondent
A bootstrap project has the capacity to advance itself without outsourcing energy. The metaphor is drawn from the imaginary act of lifting oneself by pulling up the lap of one’s shoes. While it works as a computing metaphor, bootstrapping cannot be imported as a method for public debate because in the arena of competing world views no idea has self-propagating capacity.

A world view cannot stand up, or floor another, unless it is corroborated by observable evidence, anchored on sound reasoning, backed by outside disciplines and advanced by competent cross-examination of contrary perspectives.

In public debate, bootstrapping would be attempting to propagate an idea through internal sourcing – selectively referencing those who share your prejudices as universal authorities even in the face of conflicting opinions. This is perhaps the closest metaphor for Shingai Rukwata Ndoro’s pseudo-intellectual crusade against Christianity in his column for The Sunday Mail.

Ndoro keeps making huge claims against Christianity, ostensibly based on his superior sources of knowledge.

In recent weeks, Ndoro has made such far-reaching claims as “Jesus did not die for anyone,” “Zechariah was the biological father of Jesus,” “Jesus had a wife called Mary Magdalene!” “God is just a combination of breath, intelligence and energy!” and, “Whoever worships God is invoking a German ancestor”.

In most instances, my immediate reaction to the articles is “Stop insulting my intelligence”. But I have taken time to examine these claims and to establish what Ndoro has to offer in place of the Bible narrative.

Considering that Ndoro is making these claims against long-standing traditions, one would expect rigorous argument and evidence to invalidate what he brands as myths and constructs.

And this turns out to be the Achilles’ heel of his crusade against Christianity. In place of mainstream scholarship, Ndoro has no qualms presenting polemical quotes from obscure websites, sometimes with issues of attribution.

Ironically, Ndoro writes his articles in self-congratulatory mood, praising his approach with adjectives such as “rational”, “logical” and “scientific”, although these seem to be seldom in evident anywhere in his own work.

In some of the articles, Ndoro altogether dispenses with attribution, possibly to obscure the credentials of his sources, and presents their pseudo-profound quotes as binding dogma in opposition to Christian values and beliefs.

He considers himself on a mission to examine religion so as to forestall, in his own words, “the continued furtherance of ignorance, superstitions, theological immaturity and inaccuracies,” yet his articles often serve to propagate these vices as can be demonstrated by a cursory assessment of some of his claims.

In this instalment, I look at some of Ndoro’s verdicts on God.

In a strongly worded article headed “Stand up against theological ignorance!” Ndoro contests the use of the word “God”. He weaves in etymological references with respect to the word and concludes that “as long as we use the word ‘God’, we are invoking the mythical ancestor of a powerful historical Germanic tribe and theologically perpetuating ignorance!”

The implications are absurd. Ndoro is suggesting that billions who call on God worldwide are communicating with a mythical Germanic figure they have never heard of. Nothing can be closer to superstition.

What becomes immediately apparent is Ndoro’s ability to mine information, without the capacity to process it to knowledge. As a result, he exports information to the public with too much dross, thereby selling himself short.

Ndoro misses the basic fact that the word “God,” in both the uppercase and the lowercase renditions, means different things to different contexts, just like other words for the divine entity such as “deity,” “lord” or “king”.

What one refers to by “God”, unlike names which are language-agnostic and culture-agnostic, depends on whether the word is used in a monotheistic, pagan or a syncretistic setting.

The essence assigns the meaning. It is possible to refer to “a god,” “the God,” or “gods,” in reference to different entities but not possible to do the same with a name like Napoleon or Shakespeare.

Anatoly Liberman, the author of “An Analytic Dictionary of English Etymology: An Introduction” says that any professional dictionary “will inform us that god can be compared with two Sanskrit words: one meaning ‘to invoke,’ the other ‘to pour.’”

The word “God” clearly draws from this quality of being invoked or worshipped as suggested by these definitions. It is, therefore, necessary to make a distinction as to what setting the word is used in.

In the Christian context, God is not a figment of German fantasy as suggested by Ndoro but the Supreme Being, the Intelligent First Cause, the Creator and the Ruler of the universe. Ndoro can only confuse the meaning by failing to distinguish the contexts, but Christians are not under obligation to share his confusion.

A recent article by Ndoro takes aim at the core of Christianity by alleging that Jesus did not die for anyone. Christianity is based on belief in the historical death and resurrection of Jesus Christ to reconcile mankind to God.

Ndoro’s ostensible refutation of this Christian fundamental typically produces more heat than light, to borrow Dr Ravi Zacharias’ metaphor.

“According to Pauline, literalist or mainstream Christianity, Yahoshua is alleged to have offered his own life accepting liability for people’s moral debt owed to the angry humanoid Divine.

‘Such a vengeful and sadistic Divine needed to be appeased by or receive a ransom of human blood as the currency contrary to Ezekiel 18:19-32,” Ndoro says.

In the article, Ndoro attempts to bring Bible verses into conflict with each other. He quotes verses in which Jesus says He came to teach mankind about the kingdom of God and verses which say Jesus came to die for mankind.

Why do these two mandates have to be contradictory rather than complimentary? The Gospels say “grace and truth came by Jesus”. Grace was made available in Jesus’ death and resurrection, truth was made available by His teaching ministry.

Why does Ndoro seem to think that these are mutually exclusive? The Gospels say Jesus came to save people from their sins. Why does Ndoro present this as a Pauline construct?

“Pauline Christianity presents a distorted narrative that Yahoshua painfully died to placate the anger of a humanoid Divine against a degenerate humanity.

“This is the core doctrine of Pauline Christianity,” Ndoro says.

“Central to it is the perspective that humanity is inherently debased and thus requiring redemption by way of absolute submission and unquestioning compliance to the wrathful but benevolent humanoid Divine in return for a favour,” Ndoro says.

He brands Christianity as an attack on human agency and proposes instead a secular humanism by which man is inherently conscious and capable of good. What he misses is the question of God’s existence and authority at the heart of all moral questions.

As Zacharias says all philosophising on life’s purpose is ultimately founded upon two fundamental assumptions, or conclusions.

The first is, “Does God exist?” And the second, “If God exists, what is His character or nature?” “Without God, everything is permitted,” as Fyodor Dostoyevsky says. Anyone can be good by their own standards; any community can adapt the truth to its weaknesses; I can define good according to self-interest. It takes God to establish right from wrong.

Secular humanists can fill libraries with literature about the inherent goodness of human beings, but they will still have to triple-lock them to protect the literature from the same human beings.

Christianity is not an empty space where improving humanity is concerned. It establishes the place of God in the affairs of mankind.

The Judaeo-Christian moral law is a timeless basis for determining right from wrong and the enabling agency of the indwelling life of God, accessible through faith in Christ, cannot be honestly said to divert mankind from the quest for good.

In one of his more outrageous articles, Ndoro alleges that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, against the long-held narrative that Jesus was celibate. Again one would expect such a claim to be based on rock-solid scholarship or credible archaeology.

Alas, Ndoro is at it again digging into the gutter web for his “facts,” “science” and “logic”.

According to his article, typically attributed to an amateur websites: “In original Greek, ‘companion’ meant consort and in Aramaic it meant ‘spouse.’ It goes on, ‘And the companion of the Saviour is Mary Magdalene. But Christ loved her more than all the disciples and used to kiss her often on her mouth.’

“The rest of the disciples were offended by it and expressed disapproval. They said to him, ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ The Saviour answered and said to them, ‘Why do I not love you like her?’”

“No matter how much lowly the Literalist Christendom has treated her, she is not a minor character in Yahoshua’s life and teachings. Myriam of Magdala (‘Myriam, the Tower of the Divine’) was both a disciple and wife of Yahoshua the Nazarene Rabbi, a bearer of some arcane knowledge, and knew the importance of the eternal conjunction of the masculine and feminine principles to sustain and advance life (‘ankh’),” Ndoro writes.

Ndoro is entitled to his fascination with Gnostic fiction and amateur websites but these must not demobilise his rational faculty and cloud his better judgment. What he seems to be saying is that scrutiny is only applicable with respect to the Bible but not the Internet.

For all the histories, traditions and scholarship on Christ, one cannot throw lines from a few, obscure conspiracy theorists into a debate of such magnitude and expect to be taken seriously.

Obi Egbuna Jr Simunye
ON December 1st African people at home and abroad were granted the opportunity not only to celebrate an epic moment in our history of struggle, when Sister Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama for refusing to surrender her seat at the height of segregation 60 years ago, we also reaffirmed our commitment to eradicate the deadly pandemic on World Aids Day which ironically falls on the same day Mrs Parks made an indelible mark on our people’s movement.

Because our struggle for liberation and human dignity has always been mass in scope and character, we have accepted the fact that great contributions in our movement will come from not only those among us who genuinely strive to be meek and humble but those who are troubled and scorned, the common ingredients both groups share is their courage and a yearning to be free of all forms of oppression.

As Mrs Parks became a household name in every corner, Africans everywhere must also remember Sisters Claudette Colvin and Mary Louise Smith, who were arrested months before Mrs Parks for resisting segregation. They, however, did not meet the conservative and elitist criteria of the established Civil Rights leadership at that time. The fact that Sister Colvin was a high school student who became pregnant by a married man and Sister Smith’s father was an alcoholic, were the reasons given why our community might have been reluctant to rally around them.

This explains why during Zimbabwe’s Second Chimurenga when the year 1979 was declared the year of the people’s storm, President Mugabe was deliberate in prefacing his words when delivering his New Year’s message.

“Revolutionary Greetings and New Year regards to all you, our brave and courageous, ever-advancing and ever victorious Zanla forces. And to you all whom settler racist rule has rendered homeless and jobless, to you all maimed and physically incapacitated by enemy bombs and napalm, to all you hundreds of thousands forced to flee your homes into the bush or as refugees because of the barbarous rule of the rebel regime, to the thousands of gallant youth and all students who are courageously resisting oppressive military conscription, revolutionary greetings and New Year regards. To you the exploited toiling workers in industries, commerce, on mines and on white settler farms, revolutionary greetings and New Year regards.”

Those powerful words reveal that if Sisters Colvin and Smith were part of the Second Chimurenga instead of the movement in Montgomery, Zanu’s leadership in particular and Zimbabweans in general, would not only have fully embraced them but strategically utilised their defiance and militancy to intensify our genuine resistance.

While the entire human race marvelled at the ability of astronauts to travel from the planet earth to the moon, Mother Africa’s children both on the continent and Diaspora have demonstrated that when it comes to fighting on the battlefield, that we too will never grow weary and are not the least bit deterred by time or distance.

When Dr King and SCLC marched from Selma to Montgomery which is 50 miles, they were invoking the spirit of Sister Harriet Tubman and our ancestors escaped chattel slavery on the Underground Railroad, who escaped to Canada from slave states like Annapolis, Maryland, Columbia, South Carolina and Jackson, Mississippi. The Student Non Violent Coordinating Committee travelled this same route after Dr King due to potential danger decided to turn around on the Edmund Pettus Bridge 48 hours after the Bloody Sunday massacre known as Turn Around Tuesday and took over Montgomery where they were brutally ambushed by the police at the behest of Governor George Wallace. The distance from Selma to Loundes County is 28 miles where SNCC created the Loundes County Freedom Organisation the 1st Black Panther Party.

The Zanu and Zapu membership can certainly relate to this aspect of struggle as they travelled 415 miles to Zambia or 418 miles to Mozambique for guerilla training, in the case of Zanu this included 941 miles to Tanzania and 6 190 miles to China. One of the defining moments in the Second Chimurenga was when President Mugabe and national hero Edgar Tekere, escaped from Harare to Maputo, for the purpose of successfully directing the final phase of the armed struggle. On December 26, 1979, that same route robbed Zimbabwe of its bravest guerilla fighter General Josiah Magama Tongogara.

In the case of President Mugabe and the late National Hero and First Lady Amai Sally Mugabe we have to include the 2 777 miles from Zimbabwe to Ghana, which highlights not only President Mugabe having the opportunity to have his feet firmly planted on independent African soil, but Amai Sally following Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah’s dictum “The independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked up with the total liberation of the entire African continent”.

On a Pan African scale we connect this the 3 176 miles the Osagyefo travelled from UK back to Ghana to establish the Convention People’s Party, The Honourable Marcus Mosiah Garvey’s 1 725 sojourn from Jamaica to the US in search of Booker T. Washington after reading Up from Slavery, or Frantz Fanon traveling 4 096 miles from Martinique to Algeria to join the FLN in liberating Algeria from France.

The Honourable Marcus Mosiah Garvey Dr King visited his grave site while in Jamaica which in the context of freedom riding, is connected to Bob Marley coming to Zimbabwe to dazzle the African world with his dazzling performance on April 18, 1980. Another obstacle that both Africans in Zimbabwe and the Civil Rights Movement can relate to is deceitful and reactionary men of the cloth,the longest serving President Reverend Joseph Jackson came up with the concept Civil Rights through law and order in order to derail Civil Disobedience as practiced by Dr King and SCLC. When Zimbabweans learn of Reverend Jackson the images of Bishop Muzorewa and Reverend Sithole will come to mind due to their efforts to sabotage the Second Chimurenga, after realising the mass of Zimbabweans declared them unfit to lead the liberation struggle.

Since social media appears to be on the verge of surpassing conventional outlets as people’s main source of information, we must remember that due to Frelimo and Zanu’s ability to intercept Rhodesian airwaves, that Voice of the Revolution was created and those broadcasts resulted in thousands of Zimbabweans crossing the border into Mozambique to give their lives for the liberation of their people and country.

There are two extremely interesting historical points of reference that connect the struggle to liberate Zimbabwe from colonial rule and the movement for civil and human rights inside US borders, the first is the accused assassin of Dr King, James Earl Ray wanted to live in colonial Rhodesia where due to the fascist and racist policies of the Smith Regime he felt right at home, the second is that President Mugabe’s initial political influence were the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi.

We wonder of the distinguished alum of SCLC, CORE, SNCC and the NAACP who when it comes to the Zimbabwe question have opted to serve as extended mouthpieces of both the Bush and Obama administration, are aware that President Mugabe has an acute understanding of the man who served as their philosophical guide during their early days in struggle.

These Civil rights alum are well aware that Dr King met with Zambia’s 1st President Dr Kenneth Kaunda in Atlanta in 1960, which clearly demonstrates Dr King saw parallels between the struggle against segregation in the deep south and the struggle against Settler Colonialism in Northern and Southern Rhodesia. During Zimbabwe’s 25th independence celebration Dr Kaunda received the Royal Order of Munhumutapa Zimbabwe’s highest honour.

The warriors who fought in Montgomery, Selma, Birmingham or Harare were no strangers to prison, the discipline that is considered President Mugabe’s best attribute was developed during his incarceration, Dr King fearlessness was tested under these challenging circumstances.

The trail to freedom from Montgomery and Harare reinforce that the fight to lift US-EU sanctions on Zimbabwe and the struggle for human rights and dignity in the diaspora are one.

Obi Egbuna Jr is the US Correspondent to the Herald and the External Relations Officer of the Zimbabwe Cuba Friendship Association his email is obiegbuna15@gmail.com

Ben Morris Correspondent
As the prophetic Orwellian concept of perpetual war is made manifest in Syria and Iraq, and the attention of the planet is understandably diverted towards the apocalyptic scenario currently being played out there, the subjugated and forgotten nation of Palestine limps quietly under the curse of a media blackout. Hebron, about 30km south of Jerusalem, has effectively been under apartheid rule for years. Settlers — under the protection of the Israeli military and thus all but immune to prosecution — frequently throw stones at Palestinian children and break into people’s homes. According to blogger Charlotte Silver, a recent military directive was issued on October 30 “preventing male Palestinian residents between the ages of 15 and 25 from passing all Israeli military checkpoints that surround Jewish settlements in Hebron”. Palestinian-owned shops on Shuhada street, a main artery of the city and formerly its main marketplace, have been welded shut by the IDF since the massacre of 29 Palestinians by a settler in 1994. The entire street was closed to all Palestinians in 2000.

Weekly demonstrations to reopen the street to everyone are held by Youth Against Settlements, a small local group of activists. Last month, Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank city of Hebron raided their offices, demanding that their operations be shut down by the Israeli army.

Yehuda Shaul, a former IDF soldier, wrote last month: ‘The foundation of Israel’s security policy in Hebron. . . is the “principle of separation,” which in practice means restricting freedom of movement for Palestinians in areas near Israeli settlements in the city’. This restriction of movement has long been coupled with the destruction of Palestinian land; a report, for example, last year from stopthewall.org told of the burning and bulldozing of Palestinian farmlands by settlers around Hebron, close to the Ali Zahav settlement.

Aside from providing protection for settlers responsible for violence, Shaul confirmed that the military themselves were under direct instruction to employ bullying tactics. “I regularly went out on missions to ‘make our presence felt,’ which means raiding houses and conducting searches in the middle of the night, or violent patrols throughout the city . . . at any hour of the day or night, soldiers may enter their (Palestinians’)home(s) and search through their belongings.”

The IDF killing in September of an 18-year old Palestinian woman Hadeel al-Hashlamoun (which Amnesty International described as an ‘extrajudicial execution’) demonstrates, in a rather macabre parallel to the police violence that has birthed the Black Lives Matter movement in the USA, the willingness of the military to use deadly force.

This state-sponsored approach is odiously reminiscent of apartheid South Africa. In Refusal,Transition and Post-Apartheid Law, Karin van Marle describes some of the tactics which the ruling National Party employed to govern in South Africa:

“. . . the state had to use the now-familiar tactics of forced-segregation: a night-raid, arrest of the adult members of the community for trespassing and bulldozing of their homes. . . “

There is clearly palpable evidence of these methods in Hebron. And yet here, it’s going unnoticed. The trademark gore of Daesh so prevalent in the Western conscious is choreographed by a powerful and prudent propaganda department, and moreover, is inanely fetishised by a receptive and sensationalist media every-ready to serve as a mouthpiece by pornographising the group’s barbarism. This luridly appeals to the primality of a dehumanised audience, constantly stoking the fires of outrage and in turn sustaining the rationale for a ceaseless campaign of bombing.

Distinctly, in keeping with state-sponsored violence in the globalised age, the infringements and injustices perpetrated by both the Israeli settlers — effectively the proxy of the state’s expansionism — and the IDF lack the artistic panache of the brutal, unfettered terrorist. It is distinctly less dramatised, and as such doesn’t appeal as viscerally to the primordial, bestial cortex of the intellectually immobilised and eternally distracted Westerner .

Thus, the occupation of Palestine only cultivates sporadic Western media attention, such as during the appalling situation in Gaza in the summer of 2014. Yet the anaemic utterances of disapproval are only tentatively articulated by our media when the transgressions of the infinitely superior Israeli aggressor become clearly and sickeningly disproportionate. The anguish of Palestinians in Hebron, for example, is outrightly ignored, as the West Bank is seen by the outside world of being a comparably tolerable and harmonious state of affairs than in Gaza; atrocities here are cloaked more convincingly in pretensions to legality and even-handedness.

Perhaps “Palestine fatigue” is a another factor — the longevity of the fighting suggests the crisis’s ultimately insolvability and so engenders apathy from foreign quarters. Yet the proclamation of Cabinet Ministers last week that the war to destroy Daesh may ‘take as long as two years’ has ominous implications for The Occupation. So long as the checkmate between Assad, Daesh, Russia and the West ticks on with no signal of a fissure in the impasse, the Israeli settlers’ encroachment upon the rights and land of the increasingly quarantine and beleaguered Palestinians is doomed to be cast aside as a knot so tangled it’s not worth trying to undo.

Hebron serves as a microcosm of the daily humiliation, mistreatment and violence that the Palestinian people are subject to throughout the West Bank and across the occupied territories. But for the intermittent expression of unease, by and large the world is indifferent to Palestine’s elegiac suffering.

They have become so muddy, in fact, that the root of the region’s problem is becoming harder and harder to see. — Counterpunch.

Lovemore Ranga Mataire Senior Writer
THE United Nations Development Programme this week released its 2015 Human Development Report which ranked Zimbabwe as the country with the fastest average growth in human development and one with the most improved quality of life on the continent. The report came as a shock to most Western media pundits used to the constant barraging and maligning of Zimbabwe after failing to effect illegal regime change in the aftermath of the land reform programme.

But to some, the report was no shocker, but a mere vindication of the Government’s initiatives anchored on the 10 Point Plan characterised as the Zim-Asset Made Easy. It was no shocker to all who have been following the country’s trajectory before and after the inclusive Government.

Coincidently, the report came at a time when the ruling Zanu-PF had just had its national indaba where speakers including President Mugabe highlighted various initiatives undertaken by Government to improve the economic fortunes of the country long hamstrung by Western induced economic sanctions.

Although the impact of the initiatives is yet to cascade to ordinary citizens, there is no denying the fact that the country is on a recovery path. In his closing address at the Zanu-PF conference, President Mugabe predicted a new economic dispensation in 2016.

The Minister of Industry and Commerce, Cde Mike Bimha reinforced President Mugabe’s predictions when he said contrary to some negative perceptions from detractors, measures adopted by Government to resuscitate closed and dormant key manufacturing were bearing fruit.

Minister Bimha cited a number of achievements in the manufacturing sector which include the commissioning of a Chibuku plant in Bulawayo at a cost of $17 million, Nestle (Pvt) Ltd also invested $8 million in Egron Plant Upgrade, African Distillers Limited commissioned a new cider plant that improved output by 59 percent, Dairibord Zimbabwe Holdings set up a new sterilised milk plant valued at $4 million with a capacity to produce 24 million litres of sterilised milk per year, Olivine Industries also put in a total of $29 million in September this year and Bata Shoe Company adopted a new strategy of Associate Business Units expected to increase capacity utilisation from 30 percent to 85 percent.

Government through the Distressed Marginalised Areas Fund and the Zimbabwe Economic and Trade Revival Facilities continue to facilitate availability of financing to local companies at concessionary rates. There are other several measures that Government is undertaking that have surely improved the livelihoods of Zimbabwe, a development that has been aptly captured by the UNDP Human Development Report Index.

The 2015 Human Development Report (HDR) Work for Human Development examines the intrinsic relationship between work and human development. It defines work as a broader concept than jobs or employment, can be a means of contributing to the public good, reducing inequality, securing livelihoods and empowering individuals.

In its summarised Zimbabwe report, UNDP states that the “HDI is a summary measure for assessing long-term progress in three basic dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, access to knowledge and a decent standard of living. A long and healthy life is measured by life expectancy.

Knowledge level is measured by mean years of education among the adult population, which is the average number of years of education received in a life-time by people aged 25 years and older and access to learning and knowledge by expected years of schooling for children of school-entry age, which is the total number of years of schooling a child of school-entry can expect to receive if prevailing patterns of age-specific enrolment rates stay the same throughout the child’s life.”

The report derives its credibility from the international standards used in assessing all the African countries, something that even those countries that are averse to Zimbabwe’s good standing cannot contest. The assessment measures standard of living by Gross National Income (GNI) per capita expressed in constant 2011 international dollars converted using purchasing power parity (PPP) rates.

To ensure as much cross-country comparability as possible, the HDI is based primarily on international data from the United Nations Population Division the life expectancy data), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation Institute for Statistics (the mean years of schooling and expected years of schooling data) and the World Bank (the GNI per capita data). The HDI values and ranks in this year’s report are not comparable to those in the past reports because of a number of revisions to the component indicators.

Surely, with the strides Zimbabwe has made in the education sector, who would dispute the UNDP report in as far long years in schooling is concerned. Almost every Zimbabwean is currently undertaking some kind of college or university education and it is no coincidence that the country has the highest literacy rate on the continent.

Between 1980 and 2014, Zimbabwe’s life expectancy at birth decreased by 1,9 years, mean years of schooling increased by 4,1 years and expected years of schooling increased by 4,4 years although the country’s GNI per capita decreased by about 30,2 percent between 1980 and 2014.

The rating by the UNDP is a clear vindication of the Government’s efforts in ensuring that the livelihoods of its citizenry are improved. University of Zimbabwe lecturer Professor Charity Manyeruke said the country’s top ranking by UNDP was not surprising as evidence on the ground confirms several positive developments taking place.

“There is a lot of housing construction going on not just in Harare but in some other towns and cities. That in itself is an indication of people getting decent accommodation, something that has incredibly improved their quality of life. Even the mere congestion experienced in town is also indicative of the disposable income that people have as previously owning a car was a preserve of a few,” said Prof Manyeruke.

On education, Prof Manyeruke said the mere fact that Zimbabwe is ranked the most literate country on the continent was indicative of the strides the Government has made in ensuring that education becomes a basic right to all citizens. She said a lot of Zimbabweans were furthering their education, a development that will consequently improve the quality of their lives.

Indeed, notwithstanding the possibility of a dry season, Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa said Zimbabwe was on course for an economic turnaround because of its policies that are aimed at attaining the vision “Towards an Empowered Society and a Growing Economy,” espoused in Zim-Asset.

Minister Chinamasa said Government had to date attained achievements in areas such as infrastructure projects in energy generation and transmission, transport sector, water and sanitation, education and health facilities: financial sector stabilisation, re-engagement with the international financial community, improved cost of doing business and support for distressed companies.

As the nation enters a new year, hopes are high that the economic gains attained so far will be consolidated and cascade to the ordinary masses.

Analysts say if the fast-paced rate at which Zimbabwe shot to the apex of all African countries in terms of its improved life expectancy, long stay in schooling and the general quality of life is maintained then the country is poised for full economic recovery and stability.

Fanuel Masikati Correspondent
THE National Railways of Zimbabwe has observed with much concern, the disturbing and increasing incidences of rail/road level crossing accidents, as well as suicidal cases along the railway system countrywide in recent weeks and months. It is saddening to note that the accidents continue to occur at rail/road level crossings and undesignated rail level crossings, despite the fact that all drivers of both light and heavy vehicles are aware of the need to exercise extreme caution, whenever they are approaching rail/road level crossings, throughout the country.

It is worrying and highly disturbing that we continue to lose precious human lives almost every month, in Harare, Bulawayo, Gweru, Kwekwe and Masvingo, among other cities and towns in the country.

The increase in the number of rail level crossing accidents continues to evoke sad and heart rending memories of tragic accidents that happened in the past when many people died at level crossings.

The sad loss of precious and irreplaceable human lives at rail/road level crossings, should remind all of us in general, motorists and public transport drivers, in particular, of our obligations to the protection of life and limb.

Furthermore, suicidal cases involving people who throw themselves in front of on-coming trains and those that sit on the railway line are also on the increase, a scenario which is of major concern to the NRZ and the public at large, as people should seek counselling and advice when confronted with challenges and seemingly difficult situations. In many cases this involves women carrying young children, which is very saddening indeed.

It is common knowledge that many people are facing economic hardships and social problems, but it is not an option or solution to commit suicide.

The statistics show trends or occasions in suicidal cases increasing in January, September and December, which could be attributed to the so called January “disease” and school fees dilemma among other social effects.

Rejection, negligence, societal stigma and unemployment are possible contributing factors to these prevalent suicidal cases.

An analysis of recorded statistical figures of people who died after throwing themselves in front of on-coming trains reveals that from January 2010 to July 2015, the country lost 87 people in suicidal cases by throwing themselves in front of trains, which is really sad indeed.

On the other hand, from January 2010 to July 2015, 114 people died and 552 were injured at rail/road level crossings. We, therefore, urge all drivers to put on a human face when driving on our roads, so as to protect and save precious and irreplaceable human lives.

Remember to drive and arrive alive, than being the late. Meanwhile, the NRZ is appealing to all motorists and public transport drivers to exercise extreme care and caution, when approaching rail/road level crossings.

All motorists are reminded that as they are taught during driving lessons, they should always observe and exercise extreme caution, when approaching rail/road level crossings, in order to protect precious human lives.

It is also pertinent to mention that train drivers always hoot from a distance of about 1km and also 20 metres, before approaching all rail level crossings, as a warning to motorists and heavy transport drivers as well as public transport drivers to stop at rail level crossings.

Furthermore, motorists must always observe road signs such as the St. Andrews cross, puffing bill signs, flashing lights and booms, whenever they are driving in cities, towns as well as along the highways, throughout the country.

However, the NRZ is doing everything possible by engaging other stakeholders, which include the local authorities and relevant Government departments to implement short term and medium term plans, aimed at reducing rail level crossing accidents, such as the construction of speed humps and installation of flashing signals in order to warn motorists when approaching rail level crossings, among other measures meant to reduce the number of rail/road level crossing accidents at the affected areas.

As a long term measure, the construction of fly/over roads at rail level crossings, will be considered, depending on the availability of financial resources.

It is also in the same vein that the NRZ participated at the Africa National Road Safety Day Commemorations with the view of supporting the initiatives spearheaded by organisations such as the Traffic Safety Council of Zimbabwe and other stakeholders by conscientising the public on the need to observe road rules and regulations in order to protect life and limb.

There are many people dying or being injured at rail level crossings, as well as those involved in suicidal cases and we cannot sit quietly without acting and changing the behaviour of our drivers on the roads and those people with suicidal tendencies countrywide. Let us all act and be responsible when driving on our roads as responsible citizens of Zimbabwe.

Remember you cannot win an argument with a train.

Let me also hasten to mention that there are some people who were observed digging gold along the railway lines as well as under the railway lines and those ploughing along the railway line, a move which is highly dangerous and risky to the movement of both passenger and freight trains throughout the country, particularly during the rainy season as it causes wash aways that may result in the derailment of trains.

Furthermore, in other disturbing cases some children as well as old people were observed throwing stones at moving trains, especially passenger trains.

This has resulted in some passengers being seriously injured as well as windows of passenger coaches being shuttered. Some children and adults have also been observed lying and sitting on railway lines.

These practices should be discouraged all the time as they may result in people losing precious lives.

We are appealing to the general public to desist from such retrogressive acts and report such cases to the nearest Police or Railway Security Stations.

The NRZ also wishes all travellers a safe and pleasant travel during the festive season.

Fanuel Masikati is NRZ Public Relations Manager

Nicole Hondo Correspondent
Yesterday, an excitable section of the media led with screaming headlines that the opposition MDC-T party and People First —whatever it is — had signed some sort of “elections deal”, another paper’s headline hysterically claimed that the two entities had “joined hands”. A cleric of dubious calling, Bishop Ancelimo Magaya, was beside himself, preening in the same section of the media about how he had almost single-handedly brought about this feat. He was quoted saying “I have been to the offices of the People’s Democratic Party and those for the Renewal Democrats of Zimbabwe. The whole idea behind this effort is to make sure that Zimbabweans put aside their small differences and start to concentrate on the bigger picture.”

MDC-T added to the hysteria, claiming that all other opposition parties were finally seeing the light and taking up their cue blah, blah, blah.

The blubbering celebration by the media and MDC-T begs the questions: what is the fuss all about? Was there some sort of pressure or deadline being put on some individuals to bring about this “oh-so-grand” congregation of spent and stunted opposition parties? Come to think of it, why is Bishop Ancelimo Magaya streaking across the country, robes flying, in a bid to unite opposition parties? What is propelling his supposedly anointed feet?

This hullabaloo about the MDC-T-driven National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) and the rush to hold a thinly disguised platform for attacking Government could only point to the hidden strings being pulled by some puppet master somewhere.

The dollar has been known to propel some individuals to even sell their mothers. It is more than likely that the same dollar that is behind the recent “divine revelation” that has visited upon opposition parties in the country and the People First thing, in the human form of Bishop Ancelimo Magaya. That same dollar has inspired them to join efforts in calling for supposed electoral law reforms.

A close look at these opposition parties shows clearly that they are a fragmented and disoriented lot with no ideology or common cause to talk of, except perhaps the ambitious desire by their leaders to be called “Your Excellency.”

The only thing that has been known to be strong enough to get these minions to sit down and agree even on the colour of the sky is the dollar. Not concern over citizen’s welfare, not a desire to improve the economy, not selfless sacrifice, but the dollar!

Zimbabweans should not be fooled into thinking that the decision by opposition parties, People First being the most celebrated signatory to date, to join forces under this NERA was done with them in mind. The numerous opposition parties, which all have known western ties, were shepherded willingly and unwillingly into the pen and ordered by their master(s) to join forces or else funds would stop being channelled to them.

And it is a proven fact that without these donor funds, the parties would not manage to survive and support the lavish lifestyles preferred by their leaders. And it must have come as a huge relief for the MDC-T to be able to go back and report to their master that they had managed to convince enough dimwits to sign on to their cause.

It is an open secret that the MDC-T finances are permanently stuck in the red, with that party failing to pay workers. Miraculously though, and a true reflection of who the party considers important, they managed to secure a top-of-the -range Mercedes Benz for Morgan Tsvangirai, starving party workers be damned.

The relief was palpable in MDC-T secretary-general Douglas Mwonzora’s remarks to the media. Almost hyperventilating with excitement, Mwonzora told one of the dailies that he had “great news” to tell them — that People First had signed the NERA document.

So much for great news! Someone ought to tell Mr Mwonzora that “great news” would be to announce that Morgan Tsvangirai has come up with a single economically sound suggestion to help the country instead of his bushman calls for demonstrations and sabotage of the economy. The poor opposition parties that were gullible enough to heed the MDC-T’s call to “come into the big tent” should remember that when a thief kisses you, you should count your teeth.

Entering into any venture with the MDC-T can only lead to one thing, loss of integrity and relevance.

Nicole Hondo is a political analyst based in Harare.

Parties such as the MDC-N, Transform Zimbabwe and Progressive Democrats of Zimbabwe should best remember that Morgan Tsvangirai does what’s good for Morgan Tsvangirai.

Even some of his own party members, the likes of Nelson Chamisa are awakening to that fact.

Already, the “big boss” mentality is evident in the manner in which the MDC-T spoke of the signing of the NERA document by other opposition parties.

MDC-T spokesperson, Obert Gutu, told one daily that, “we have now been joined by several other opposition political parties. We are pleased to note that other opposition political parties have associated themselves with our complaint as MDC, in stating that elections in Zimbabwe have always been rigged.”

It is clear in Gutu’s statement that the MDC-T considers itself the godfather and sole owner of any matters pertaining to opposition in Zimbabwe.

All other opposition parties can only join or copy their “brilliant” ideas. What is evident is that this whole NERA fiasco is being driven by the opposition parties, especially the MDC-T’s hunger and greed for the dollars being waved in front of their noses by their western handlers.

He who pays the piper calls the tune.

Let the opposition parties which will gladly sell their mothers for a few pieces of silver not mock Zimbabweans by claiming to be representing their needs. People want bread and butter issues addressed. Bishop Ancelimo Magaya, people want their souls saved.

Marjorie Cohn Correspondent
THE war in Vietnam resulted in the deaths of more than 58 000 Americans and more than 3 million Vietnamese. Twenty years ago, the United States and Vietnam normalised diplomatic relations in an effort to put the terrible legacy of the war behind them. But for the survivors—both Vietnamese and American—the war continues. About 5 million Vietnamese and many US and allied soldiers were exposed to the toxic chemical dioxin from the spraying of Agent Orange. Many of them and their progeny continue to suffer its poisonous effects.

Agent Orange was a chemical, herbicidal weapon sprayed over 12 percent of Vietnam by the US military from 1961 to 1971. The dioxin present in Agent Orange is one of the most toxic chemicals known to humanity.

Those exposed to Agent Orange during the war often have children and grandchildren with serious illnesses and disabilities. The international scientific community has identified an association between exposure to Agent Orange and some forms of cancers, reproductive abnormalities, immune and endocrine deficiencies and nervous system damage. Second— and third-generation victims continue to be born in Vietnam as well as to US veterans and Vietnamese-Americans in this country.

There are 28 “hot spots” in Vietnam still contaminated by dioxin. These hot spots still affect the people who live there and eat the crops, land animals and fish.

On April 29, US Rep. Barbara Lee introduced HR 2114, the Victims of Agent Orange Relief Act of 2015. This bill would go a long way toward remedying the humanitarian crisis among both the Vietnamese and US victims of Agent Orange.

Representatives of the Vietnam Association for the Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin (VAVA) have arrived in the US to mark the official launch of HR 2114 on Thursday. VAVA is an organisation of more than 365 000 Agent Orange victims and activists that works to achieve justice for the victims throughout the world.

One member of the VAVA delegation is Tr’n Th Hoàn. Her mother was exposed to Agent Orange from a barrel of the chemical buried in her land during the war.

Born without legs and with a seriously atrophied hand, Hoàn grew up in Peace Village II, the Agent Orange centre at T? D? Hospital, Ho Chi Minh City. Hoàn is a college graduate and currently works as a computer science professional at the hospital.

In the US, VAVA’s sister organisation, the Vietnam Agent Orange Relief & Responsibility Campaign (VAORRC), is educating the public about the ongoing problems caused by spraying Agent Orange in Vietnam and working to pass legislation to remedy these problems.

VAORRC believes that the US and chemical manufacturers such as Dow and Monsanto must take responsibility for the use of these chemicals to redress the harm they have caused and to heal the wounds of war.

VAVA advocates for and provides assistance to victims in Vietnam, but Agent Orange victims need even more help. Through the work of activists in the US, Vietnam and internationally, the US government has allocated some money for the clean-up of one hot spot, but has done little to alleviate the suffering of Agent Orange victims in Vietnam or to clean up the remaining 27 hot spots.

The use of Agent Orange in Vietnam constituted prohibited chemical warfare, amounting to a war crime. Yet the US is still using chemical weapons, including white phosphorus gas, in its wars abroad.

In addition to taking responsibility for and rendering assistance to Agent Orange victims, the US government must also provide compensation to victims of recent and current wars who suffer from exposure to chemicals used by its military.

HR 2114, which has 14 co-sponsors, would:

l Provide health care and social services for affected Vietnamese, including medical and chronic care services, nursing services, vocational employment training, medicines and medical equipment, custodial and home care, daycare programs, training programs for caregivers, physical and vocational rehabilitation and counselling and reconstructive surgery.

l Provide medical assistance and disability benefits to affected children of US veterans of the Vietnam War. The veterans fought for and won benefits for their Agent-Orange-related health conditions, but only the children of female veterans were covered for most conditions. This bill will equalise benefits to the children of both male and female American veterans.

l Provide health assessment, counselling and treatment for affected Vietnamese-Americans and their offspring through the establishment of health and treatment centres in Vietnamese-American communities.

l Clean up the lands and restore ecosystems contaminated by Agent Orange/dioxin in Vietnam. l Conduct research into the health effects of Agent Orange/dioxin in the U.S. and Vietnam.

l HR 2114 should be enacted into law. The refusal of the US government to compensate the Vietnamese and US victims of its chemical warfare would set a negative precedent for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who need similar help.

Marjorie Cohn is a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law and former president of the National Lawyers Guild. This article is reproduced from Counterpunch.

Lloyd Gumbo Mr Speaker Sir
One of the major threats to Zimbabwe’s quest for economic development is corruption. As such, mega deals that were signed with China will not bring the much-needed economic turnaround if corruption and rent seeking behaviour by those in charge of implementation of the deals is left to thrive. Mr Speaker Sir, there is no need to question whether or not the illegal sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe by the West have had debilitating effects on the economy because that is the reason they were imposed.

There is also no need to ignore the fact that climate change, which coincided with the fast-track land redistribution exercise, has hampered agricultural productivity which is the country’s economic backbone.

But if truth be told without fear or favour, our man-made actions, commissions or omissions have significantly impacted on the country’s economic revival. Government parastatals and enterprises as well as ministries have failed us by sins of commissions and omissions.

For a long time, it has been so glaring that some Government officials and some in charge of parastatals and enterprises were using their positions to loot.

And this was allowed to continue for a long time on the altar of political expediency or lack of vigilance from their superiors.

Mr Speaker Sir, President Mugabe raised a very important point when he officially opened the Zanu-PF 15th Annual National People’s Conference in Victoria Falls last Friday about how corruption threatened development.

“It might be you or a group of people assigned to negotiate with the other side we want to work with, be it in building a bridge or constructing roads, you then go and demand a cut before the construction is even done,” President Mugabe said.

“They say if the actual cost is $10 million, they peg it at $13 million and tell the Chinese that the project cost has risen yet the $3 million will be theirs for sharing. Ndocorruption iri kuitika kunyanya yerudzi irworwo.”

There are allegations that some senior Government officials have used their positions to inflate figures for projects that are carried out here with the intention of pocketing excess.

This is where the problem is, that these things can happen when we have offices that must detect such vices.

Surely, these things cannot happen under the watch of a Central Intelligence Organisation and the police, who are known for their vigilance when it comes to detecting criminal activities.

No action must be too complicated and or beyond the CIO’s eye.

But it is also the responsibility of authorities to ensure that when the organisation report such vices, culprits must face the music and not be protected.

The moment authorities do not display through actions a commitment to fight corruption especially within the top echelons of Government, it takes the zeal away from those mandated with detecting corruption.

Mr Speaker Sir, no official deserves protection when they are found to have abused their positions to steal from the public.

Corruption is the major reason the economy is facing a threatening downward spiral and the earlier we plug the loopholes, the better.

It is incumbent upon every Zimbabwean to ensure that corruption is nipped in the bud.

There are indications that procurement is one of the feeding troughs for corruption within Government ministries, parastatals and enterprises.

Audit reports have over the years exposed how officials in these institutions inflate figures of goods and services that they procure with the intention of fleecing the institutions that they lead.

An example is when an audit report by the Ministry of Health and Child Care in 2013 unearthed a massive scam at Chivhu General Hospital where officials flouted tender procedures, inflated and created fictitious quotations with the sole purpose of looting from the hospital.

However, the only punishment that some culprits faced was to be transferred to other health centres instead of subjecting them to a criminal trial.

Unfortunately, this has become the trend where culprits are only brought before a disciplinary committee where the charge will not be commensurate with the crime committed.

It is therefore important that Government show genuine commitment to fight corruption by letting senior officials accused of corruption to stand before a court of law to defend themselves.

Now that Government is in the process of decentralising procurement of goods and services to ministries, parastatals and enterprises from the State Procurement Board, there are high chances that this good gesture by the Government may come back to haunt it if no mechanisms are put in place to ensure there are no gaps for rent seeking behaviour.

President Mugabe put it in the most understandable context when he said when officials inflate figures for projects it is the generality of Zimbabwe who stand to lose out because the loans would be serviced from public funds.

“It’s a cost to be borne by the people. “It is a loan and it is the Government budget that will pay that. You are making the people pay more on the project which should cost them less and you are doing it for your own benefit. Down with you! Hatidi, patinenge tazvibatisisa chaipo, you will go to prison.

“If you are to be the engineer of the project, do your work objectively, you will be paid for it. Do not seek to cheat. We will discover you this time. Some do it in a clever way, but we will get you,” said President Mugabe.

Mr Speaker Sir, Zimbabwe is endowed with precious minerals that are exploited and sold every second but we have nothing to show for all that is extracted from the ground.

For example, we definitely have nothing to show for the diamonds that were exploited in Chiadzwa since their discovery, neither do we have anything to show for the gold and platinum that continues to be extracted here.

Yet other countries credit their economic growth and performance to the same minerals that we have here.

The question is who is pocketing the rest? Our national budget has been hovering around $4 billion annually since the inclusive Government which shows that there is something wrong with the manner in which we managed the national resource.

Feedback: lloyd.gumbo@zimpapers.co.zw

Few Zimbabweans will be surprised at vehicle imports totalling almost $5 billion since 2009 although the huge surge in imports has died down a bit and are likely to be under $500 million this year. The huge surge in imports, especially during 2010 to 2012, was the direct result of the very hard times experienced during the hyperinflation in the first decade of this century.

Little could be imported and vehicles were no exception. By 2009 there was a large pent-up demand.

This was seen in imports crossing the $1 billion barrier in 2012, although latest figures now show the regular demand to be about half that figure. Imports have declined basically because a lot of people who could afford a car now have one and are keeping it on the road rather than replacing.

We need to look at some of the positive results of this massive increase in the number of vehicles on the road. Many jobs have been created, new businesses supplying spares, services, tyres and the like have grown rapidly and generally there are thousands of people now earning their living in the motor trade in one way or another.

But a great deal more jobs could be created and our industrial base enhanced if there were fewer imports and more assembled locally.

A major cause of the surge in imports was the readily available supply of cheap second-hand Japanese cars in reasonable condition. Due to a quirk in Japanese industrial policy it is almost impossible to drive a car more than five years old in Japan. At the same time the system there requires regular servicing. So cars about half-way through their economic life are readily available at low prices.

New cars were bought by a minority. And even here imports were preferred over locally assembled vehicles. While some quote pricing as a reason, it was likely that the lack of choice and the limited capacity of the local plants was a far more likely spur to imports.

The most popular makes were not assembled locally and one plant, Willowvale Mazda, only assembled vehicles from one manufacturer, and one not in the top tier globally. Quest in Mutare, operating as a contract assembler, did better commercially because it could offer a wider range, but even here we think there was a lack of imagination and an over-concentration on producing fewer high-margin large vehicles rather than more lower-margin and cheaper vehicles.

Even now only a small fraction of what looks like the sustainable expenditure of $500 million a year on new cars or at least good second-hand imported additions to the national fleet is going to the two assemblers.

We think that both need to rethink their strategies, especially Willowvale with its reliance on a single brand. If the assemblers could manage to produce a reasonable, if not luxurious, vehicle with a drive-away retail price under $10 000 they could start making some serious inroads into the market, competing not only against new car imports, but also against second-hand imports.

Such a model cannot be impossible to find. Other countries manage it. A new car can be sold with guarantees and if sellers can be truly innovative with financing then a lot more of the market opens up.

The ultimate goal must be to do what happens in much of the world. People pay a fixed sum each month, say $300, for four or five years. For that they get a new car, servicing, insurance and finance costs. They do not have to worry about sudden large bills. Everything works automatically. A modern car is normally not heavy on spares for its first few years and the odd glitch is only a small percentage of all cars sold, so the costs can be calculated in.

We think a large part of the problems faced by local assemblers is of their own making. They need to find ways of competing successfully and then use the odd fiscal measure on customs duties and the like to lock in the competitive advantages they find, rather than create them. Business in Zimbabwe is no longer a gift.

It requires innovation and hard work. But some have succeeded well in many areas. Car assemblers need to join that group.

Joyce Jenje- Makwenda Inside Out
While there has been enough awareness and information on HIV and Aids, it is amazing that people are still dying of Aids-related illnesses and living miserable lives after realising that they are HIV positive or when it has reached levels of Aids. What has also been shocking is that they would want to go with as many people as they can, apparently because in their home they are not prepared to use protective clothing. One wonders what really influences that mindset.

If people understood their ancestors and were in harmony with them, then we would not be having all this, as I have mentioned in my previous articles about how important it is to understand ancestors as they define who we are.

You are a woman or man because you carry a particular ancestor, so we need to synchronise the whole body with our ancestor.

We will avoid a lot of problems. I have buried relatives and friends who denied that they were HIV positive and had Aids-related illnesses even if it was so visible. What is also painful is how some go with their eyes open to get this condition.

We buried a husband of a friend last year who went on a self-destruction spree because he was diagnosed with HIV.

He eventually died.

Before he died I had met him, drunk failing to stand. I had been hearing from family members and friends how he was drinking himself to death and sometimes failing to report for work.

I asked my friend (his wife) what was happening in his life and if he could go for therapy or any other help he could be given. She asked me to talk to him.

I asked if there were days he was sober so that I could talk to him but she said, “Angova magariro ake” (It’s now his way of life). I realised I could not even talk to him as he was always drunk.

After talking to my friend whom I shall call Noma for a long time, she opened up. She said paakangoudzwa kuti anechakapedza mbudzi dzakabva dzatenderera, (when he was told that he was HIV positive, he lost his mind)

Noma told me that since he was diagnosed with HIV he went on a destructive path. She broke down and told me that she was also diagnosed with HIV but was on treatment.

She said the problem with her husband was that he refused to go on treatment and to have a positive mind.

He was not only killing himself but spreading it apparently “kuti aende nevakawanda”(So that he could go [die] with as many people by infecting them)

This was really destructive, yes his life finally came to an end and he died and yet if he had not gone into denial, he would be with us right now.

After his burial, we visited her with a friend I shall call Lisa. Our friend said “murume wako ibenzi chairo, akabva apengeswa nechirwere ichi mukore uno (your husband was such a fool, how could he get confused by Aids in this day and age?). I am so angry with him, his friend (meaning Lisa’s husband) has HIV but we are managing it.”

The husband of our friend who had accompanied me had also tried to talk to him, but all was in vain.

Our friend told us how she has had a fulfilling recreation life with her husband despite that she is negative and the husband is positive.

How someone gets to have this condition at the end does not become an issue but how they manage it and live a positive life which has been said over and over again.

I am just repeating what has been said over the years. However, what has not been said is how the two people with this condition or if one has the condition and the other does not, have can still enjoy playing in a safe way and enjoy themselves to the maximum. How can they have as many ways of having fun in the leisure room and feel good afterwards.

Yes, protective clothing will be needed but are these couples going for such therapy where they will be advised on how they can find absolute pleasure and being creative in the recreation room.

When Lisa’s husband learnt that he had HIV, he decided to live a positive life. When he broke the news to his wife, she lost it but when she went for testing, she tested negative.

She was very angry and wanted to end the marriage but the husband did all he could to win her back.

He decided to renew their love by doing whatever he could.

He went for all sorts of therapy to understand himself.

There are times he would ask Lisa to accompany him but she says she was too bitter to do that.

One day she accompanied him and realised that when we look at men, we only see the macho side but they also have their weak side which needs to be dealt with and sometimes showing it to their partners is important as it reminds them that they are just human beings. But what they end up doing is that they conceal these feelings and they manifest in a wrong way.

She realised how important it was to seek therapy if one has unfinished business in their lives, both men and women, as it will manifest in how they relate especially to their partners.

Dr Barnaby B Barratt of the Midwest Institute of Sexology, Michigan puts it as follows: “Sexuality is the source of all creative, spirituality, emotional and relational growth. Yet too often, sexual pleasure becomes the focus of shame and guilt, the centre of our most deeply hurt and wounded.

“Since overcoming the pain of my own childhood, I have been committed to helping others achieve their potential for sexual health, healing and happiness. It is my intention that those who seek my expertise find me available, helpful and caring. (Page 18. no. 6. Van de Velde Th. H, 1926, 1954 Ideal Marriage. London: Heinemann Medical Books.p.xxi.) (Between and Beyond the Poles – Johann Lemmer Page 6)

Lisa told us how the first day she was persuaded by her husband went.

She said her husband assured her that she would be safe.

“Because of how his character had changed, I believed him when he assured me that I would be safe. He said we were not going to work with the male overcoat as it was designed in a way that it follows the body it is a little bit tight and it was not going to stand the heat that day.

“He decided that we use the female overcoat as it was a little bit loose. She said when she was being dressed with the overcoat, she felt so good. She said that she had never been treated so well in the years they have spent together.

He touched all corners to make sure that all of it fitted well. He was communicating with me all the way and when he arrived at some spot and he told me a story of how one of the spot got its name after a doctor had touched that spot and a woman went wild.

“He was so relaxed and communicating with me whatever part he touched while dressing me with the overcoat.

“This took almost forever and for me that was enough but it is amazing that when the time for us to do the real work came, he brought me back from where I had gone. It was great! When he removed the overcoat it was intact. Yes he looked after me all the way. Since then it has been amazing. He is creative and I realise that there are so many ways to find joy and not what we are used to.

“I said to myself did it have to take him to have HIV to know how to treat me. He comes up with all sorts of ways to make the environment safe and enjoyable when we are working.”

The overcoat becomes one of the pleasurable toys if you have a positive mind and you can absolutely live a fulfilled life.

Please do not wait for some fatality to happen in order to please or to show your partner that you love them, be creative and create a safe environment in that recreation room. You can take advantage of the festive season to renew your love.

Joyce Jenje-Makwenda can be contacted on joycejenje@gmail.com

I WILL share with you a key today on the power of realising what you have to get what you do not have. The way you see yourself affects everything about your life. It has a bearing on your financial status, your performance at work, grades in academics, relations with family, relatives, spouse, people in general and even with God. Read on and discover how you can tap into this revelation of God and change your life!

Exodus 14:11-16 is our text. The children of Israel have just left Egypt the land of oppression in great joy, but upon seeing Pharaoh following them, the joy dried and fear came in, “and they said unto Moses, Because there were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderness? Whereof hast thou dealt thus with us, to carry us forth out of Egypt? Is not this the word that we did tell thee in Egypt saying, Let us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians? For it had been better to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness.” What then would Moses have to do, facing such a challenge?

Number one thing in winning in life is be careful of what you see. The Israelites once saw themselves as a people loved and remembered by their great God, but upon seeing the army of Pharaoh they began to see themselves as slaves again and as dead already! Before they were even head-on with Pharaoh they saw themselves as graves already and wished they had died in Egypt rather than in the wilderness. No-matter what you are going through right now at your workplace or whether you are being pursued by creditors from everywhere, friend! You are not yet dead. It’s not over until it’s over. Shake yourself and say to yourself, “I am still there!” Don’t talk death, don’t talk failure, neither talk sickness! Talk faith, talk the Word of the most High God; I will not die but live to declare the goodness of the Lord! O I like the Word of God!

I remember many years ago when we would sleep in our hut with cow dung as floor, but as I grew up I said no, no, no I am going somewhere. I am not limited or defined with where I was born, the huts we slept in, No — the Word of God defines me! O hallelujah! Never think or see yourself as hopeless and an impossible case, no. With men it is impossible, but not with God, for with God all things are possible, O hallelujah!

Don’t waste time thinking and wishing what you do not have, ignoring what you have or where you are! Can I tell you a secret? The door to what you want in life lies in what you have! One poor widow of Zerephath was saved from a huge debt by a little jar of oil that she had in her house? What do you have? What is in your hand? It is the key to what you want to have. Believe God! Believe in yourself!

Surrounded by murmuring and angry people around him, what then did Moses have to do? “And Moses said unto the people, Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will shew to ye today: for the Egyptians that ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more for ever. The Lord shall fight for you and ye shall hold your peace.” These are the powerful faith-filled words that Moses spoke to encourage the Israelites.

When things get hot, speak words of faith. Don’t talk fear or death or wallow in self-pity No, No, No, you can still do something. Believe in God and believe in yourself! Believe in what you have. What did Moses have and what did God say to him? Listen; “And the Lord said unto Moses, Wherefore criest thou unto me? Speak unto the children of Israel that they go forward. Lift up thou up thy rod, and stretch out thine hand over the sea, and divide it: and the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.” All the while Moses and all Israel where wondering how God would intervene and help them God himself was just looking at the rod! He challenged Moses, why are the people crying, what is the problem? You have the rod in your hand, use it! Stretch it over the sea and divide it! Reader the answer to your problem is already with you. It’s in what you have.

Here is the challenge of many, after discovering what they have; the problem comes in making sense of how it can be of use in changing their circumstance. Elisha told the widow what sounded to be very foolish guidance. She was suffering because of her husband’s borrowing and here comes the man of God and tells her to go borrow again, vessels this time, 2 Kings 4:3. She obeyed and acted on God’s foolish guidance. It was foolish for a man to stretch just a log over the sea to divide it! But obedience is better than sacrifice. Interestingly another poor widow was left with food for a meal and her son before the call of death by hunger. Elijah comes with an instruction, asks the widow to feed him first then later herself and her son. It was hard but she obeyed and the little flour and oil she had sustained her till the drought ended in Israel, 1 Kings 17:13-16. Friend, the point is this; you use what you have to have what you do not have.

With the rod in his hand Moses, did wonders and powerfully delivered the Israelites from the oppressive Egyptians. How did he do it? It was accomplished with what he had, a rod. Moses despite the word God had given him; had to forget his past limitations and weaknesses and believe in himself as a deliverer. Greater is the Lord Jesus Christ inside you, you can do it! You can do the impossible! Believe in God’s word and promise over your life and believe in yourself. You can do it, you can have it. For with God all things are possible, Mark 10:27.

Garikai Chengu Correspondent
FRIDAY (December 18, 2015) marked the 150th anniversary of the abolition of slavery in America and contrary to popular belief, slavery is not a product of Western capitalism; Western capitalism is a product of slavery. The expansion of slavery in the first eight decades after American Independence drove the evolution and modernisation of the United States.

Historian Edward Baptist illustrates how in the span of a single lifetime, the South grew from a narrow coastal strip of worn-out tobacco plantations to a continental cotton empire, and the United States grew into a modern, industrial, and capitalist economy.

Through torture and punishment slave owners extracted greater efficiencies from slaves which allowed the United States to seize control of the world market for cotton, the key raw material of the Industrial Revolution, and become a prosperous and powerful nation.

Cotton was to the early 19th century what oil was to the 20th century: the commodity that determined the wealth of nations. Cotton accounted for a staggering 50 percent of US exports and ignited the economic boom that America experienced. America owes its very existence as a first world nation to slavery.

In the abstract, capitalism and slavery are fundamentally counterposed systems. One is based on free labour, and the other, on forced labour. However, in practice, capitalism itself would have been impossible without slavery.

In the United States, scholars have demonstrated that profit wasn’t made just from Southerners selling the cotton that slaves picked or the cane they cut. Slavery was central to the establishment of the industries that today dominate the US economy: real estate, insurance and finance.

Wall Street was founded on slavery. African slaves built the physical wall that gives Wall Street its name, forming the northern boundary of the Dutch colony designed to ward off resisting natives who wanted their land back. To formalise the colossal trade in human beings, in 1711, New York officials established a slave market on Wall Street.

Many prominent American banks including JP Morgan and Wachovia Corp made fortunes from slavery and accepted slaves as “collateral”. JP Morgan recently admitted that it “accepted approximately 13 000 enslaved individuals as collateral on loans and took possession of approximately 1 250 enslaved individuals”.

The story that American schoolbooks tell of slavery is regional, rather than national, it portrays slavery as a brutal aberration to the American rule of democracy and freedom. Slavery is recounted as an unfortunate detour from the nation’s march to modernity, and certainly not the engine that drove American economic prosperity. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In order to fully appreciate the importance of slavery to American capitalism, one need only look at the torrid history of an antebellum Alabama dry-goods outfit called Lehman Brothers. Warren Buffet is the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway and the richest billionaire in America. Berkshire Hathaway’s antecedent firm was a Rhode Island textile manufacturer and slavery profiteer.

In the north, New England was the home of America’s cotton textile industry and the hotbed of American abolitionism, which grew rich on the backs of the enslaved people forced to pick cotton in the south. The architects of New England’s industrial revolution constantly monitored the price of cotton, for their textile mills would have been silent without the labour of slaves on distant plantations.

The book “Complicity: How the North Promoted, Prolonged and Profited from Slavery” by Anne Farrow illustrates how the Northern bourgeoisie were connected to the slave system by a million threads: they bought molasses, which was made with slave labour, and sold rum as part of the Triangle Trade; they lent money to Southern planters; and most of the cotton that was sold to Britain was shipped through New England ports.

Despite being turned into a civil rights hero, Abraham Lincoln did not think blacks were the equals of whites. Lincoln’s plan was to send the blacks in America back to Africa, and if he had not been assassinated, returning blacks to Africa would likely have been his post-war policy. Lincoln even admitted that the emancipation proclamation, in his own words, was merely “a practical war measure” to convince Britain, that the North was driven by “something more than ambition”.

For Blacks, the end of slavery, 150 years ago, was just the beginning of the as yet unachieved quest for democratic and economic racial equality.

In the era before WWII, the American elite consensus viewed capitalist civilisation as a racial and colonial project. To this day, capitalism in America can only be described as “racial capitalism”: the legacy of slavery marked by the simultaneous, and intertwined emergence of white supremacy and capitalism in modern America.

Black people in America live in a racial capitalist system. Racial capitalism exercises its authority over the Black minority through an oppressive array of modern day lynching by the police, increasing for-profit mass incarceration and institutionally driven racial economic inequality. Racial capitalism is unquestionably a modern day crime against humanity.

Seeing an African American at the pinnacle of power in the land of slavery would be exciting if only black equality indicators were not tumbling. In fact, during Obama’s tenure the black-white median household wealth gap is down to seven black cents on the white dollar. The spread between black unemployment and white unemployment has also widened by four points since President Obama took office.

The nation’s police historically enforced racial capitalism. The first modern police forces in America were slave patrols and night watches, which were both designed to control the behaviours of African Americans.

Historical literature is clear that prior to the Civil War a legally sanctioned police force existed for the sole purpose of oppressing the slave population and protecting the property and interests of white slave owners. The glaring similarities between the 18th century slave patrols and modern American police brutality in the Black community are too salient to dismiss or ignore.

Ever since the first police forces were established in America, lynchings have been the linchpin of racial capitalist law and order. Days after the abolition of slavery, the worst terrorist organisation in American history was formed with the US government’s blessing: The Klu Klux Klan.

The majority of Americans believe that lynchings are an outdated form of racial terrorism, which blighted American society up until the end of the era of Jim Crow laws; however, America’s proclivity towards the unbridled slaughter of African Americans has only worsened over time. The Guardian newspaper recently noted that historians believe that during the late 19th and early 20th century on average two African Americans were lynched every week.

Compare this with incomplete data compiled by the FBI that shows that a Black person is killed by a white police officer more than twice a week, and it’s clear that police brutality in Black communities is getting worse, not better.

Lynching does not necessarily mean hanging. It often included humiliation, torture, burning, dismemberment and castration. A lynching was a quintessential American public ritual that often took place in front of large crowds that sometimes numbered in the thousands and children played during the festivities.

Shortly after the abolition of slavery in 1899 the Springfield Weekly newspaper described a lynching by the KKK chronicling how, “the Negro was deprived of his ears, fingers and genital parts of his body. He pleaded pitifully for his life while the mutilation was going on . . . before the body was cool, it was cut to pieces, the bones crushed into small bits . . . the Negro’s heart was cut into several pieces, as was also his liver . . . small pieces of bones went for 25 cents . . .”

Central to the perpetuation of racial capitalism is racial terrorism, which is why to this day, the US government refuses to designate the KKK as a domestic terrorist organisation.

Racially terrorising Black communities goes hand in hand with the systematic containment and imprisonment of Blacks. Thanks in large part to the racially motivated War on Drugs, the United States right now incarcerates more African-Americans as a percentage than South Africa did at the height of apartheid.

Private prisons were designed by the rich and for the rich. The for-profit prison system depends on imprisoning Blacks for its survival. Much in the same way the United States was designed. After all, more Black men are in prison or jail, on probation or parole than were enslaved in 1850 before the Civil War began.

America’s “take-off” in the 19th century wasn’t in spite of slavery; it was largely thanks to it. Capitalism was created by slavery and slavery in turn created the enduring legacy of racial capitalism that persists in America today.

There has historically been a sharp contrast between America’s lofty ideals, on the one hand, and the seemingly permanent second-class status of African Americas, on the other. The late 19th century irony of a statue named Liberty overseeing the arrival in New York’s harbour of millions of foreigners, even as black Southern peasants, not alien, just profoundly alienated, were kept enslaved at the social margins. The hypocrisy of a racist ideology that openly questioned the Negro’s human worth surviving America’s defeat of the Nazis. To this day, far from being a “post-racial” nation, American racial equality indicators and race relations are at a new low.

The race problem is America’s great national dilemma that continues to pose the greatest threat to America’s democratic experiment. Simmering discontent in Black communities will continue to rise towards a dangerous boiling point unless and until slavery’s greatest legacy of ongoing racial capitalism is exposed and completely dismantled.

The original source of this article is Global Research. Copyright © Garikai Chengu, Global Research, 2015.

Yes, and we mean it!
But before we go into the details of just how this could ever be, a historical context of Rugare the man would suffice, the essential truth being that here is a man who got thrown out of the Zanu-PF train last year following a needless regression into an old rebellious streak. We all remember that in the run-up to last year’s congress, Cde Gumbo had become so bold in confrontation with the party leadership and other cadres as he threw his weight behind the nefarious plot to unconstitutionally unseat President Mugabe, the ruling party leader.

He sought to do that for the benefit of Joice Mujuru and had a close ally in Didymus Mutasa, who was the Secretary for Administration then. Together with few others, they formed a cabal that they imagined to be so strong that they would usurp the powers of President Mugabe – force a palace coup.

And assassination was said to be one of the ways they thought they could deal with the President with a member of the cabal being recorded as telling a girlfriend, one of many, that President Mugabe risked a Kabila-style ouster.

That is, having a gun disemboweling him by a close security bodyguard.
We all gaped at that suggestion.

It triggered the memory in some among us of some time during the liberation struggle when Gumbo and a few others mounted such a spirited, murderous rebellion which would easily have turned the whole liberation upside down.

That is, apart from the shedding of fraternal blood, some decorated soldier by the name of Josiah Magama Tongogara had threatened to quit following clashes and taunts by none other than Rugare, who had mastered an education in the United States and sought leadership of the liberation movement.

Luckily, the rebellion, in 1978 was arrested, and Rugare and his treasonous cohorts were contained right until Independence in 1980.

Not that he took revolutionary chastisement.

He was bitter and when he returned home actually was held as a bargaining chip by the British and was housed and clothed by the British-Rhodesian authorities.

But time was to heal – on the surface at least – as Rugare got somewhat reintegrated into society with leadership of some big company and eventually Government and ruling party.

A fine old man
You see, if you are not quite familiar with this history and more, for we are sure we only said less than half of it, you would take Rugare as a fine gentleman. He is soft spoken and has a way of explaining things in a patient manner.

These things are his convictions, which sadly become clouded by his hunger for power which has not quite dissipated since those days he used to hound poor barely educated Tongogara.

President Mugabe knows this dark side of this gentleman and we are told at one meeting he gave him a stern warning that, “Madyira mave kuda kutengesa zvakare here?” or some such strong reprimand to a man who once had the dark punishment of being imprisoned in a dungeon for a couple of years.

But Rugare has his softer, more vulnerable side, too, we understand.

It is said he is a disappointed man for the treatment he has received from the media, especially The Herald, which was his favourite read and he could not understand why, in his view, it turned against him and in particular went on to fish out his dark past.

And he was bitter too about some individuals there he used to like not knowing, in his words, that they were “mamparas” (devils) something he rues to this day as we continue writing about him.

Rugare, Mutasa First
It is now known that for their troubles in seeking to push President Mugabe out unconstitutionally, Rugare Gumbo, Mutasa, Mujuru and a host of others got their silly butts kicked out of the ruling party, some more deserving than others.

The whole conspiracy came crashing down.

Where there were speculations that something big was going to come out of the cabal, with the disgraced Mujuru leading from the front.

A good number looked up to her for guidance at a critical juncture when the momentum was in favour for drastic action like forming a breakaway party and condemning the outcomes of the congress.

She did nothing.

There are many bitter followers of hers that were expecting her to do something, from protecting them from the crushing foot of Zanu-PF to her throwing her hat into the ring.

Temba Mliswa is particularly bitter at this, and wastes no opportunity to say so to everyone that cares to listen.

We suspect that even Rugare Gumbo, on that fateful day in November 2014 when he was told to gather his papers and leave the Politburo to no whimper or cry or shuffling feet, felt the same way.

Mutasa and Mujuru lost Central Committee seats without any fight, did not show their sad faces at Congress with the former with more pathos being taken ill together with his wife and occasioning a letter of excuse to that effect – but to no effect, really!

Interestingly, when these fallen guys rallied around a creature called People First, Mujuru did not come to the party.

Again.
She gives an impression she is being forced; she is unwilling, her hand being twisted into signing documents and declarations that her heart does not have anything to do with.
Meanwhile, Rugare Gumbo and Didymus Mutasa are in the private media everyday trying to prop up People First as a political force.

It is known that the project is all hot air and doomed.
We have seen how desperate the private media have tried to prop up the project to no avail.

A reporter from one of these stables was recently heard admitting that People First was a dud, despairing even that he had tried his best.
President Mugabe was right: it’s just a myth.
Or more accurately, the “People” it refers to are only Rugare Gumbo and Didymus Mutasa who are coming first at this outcast project because of their enduring desperation.

Rugare is right
But we have digressed, albeit filling a good number of memory spaces.

Now, Gumbo came up with a brilliant riposte this week.

The same private media, with the help of the opposition, had sought to bundle him into endorsing a not so hopeful pact of a coalition led by some unknown quantity of a cleric going by the name of Magaya, obviously not the popular Walter, of PHD Ministries.

The paper in question wanted him to confirm whether People First had signed some anti-elections document.

To which the veteran politician responded: “I would need to check with Mutasa, but as a party we agreed in principle that we will support the call for reforms by other opposition parties. But for the avoidance of doubt, People First will not be boycotting any elections because there are no reforms.

“It would be ideal if we are to go to elections in 2018 in a democratic political environment characterised by a level playing field. But we would be doing Zimbabweans a disservice if we are to fold our hands and expect Zanu-PF to commit political suicide by instituting reforms that it knows will precipitate its demise. We are not naïve, but also alive to the fact that these reforms are constitutional that every Zimbabwean must demand.”

Apart from confirming that the Rugare/Mutasa First project had its left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing, Gumbo had sound and practical political ideas.
First, he dismissed the whole idea of boycotting elections, which the main opposition MDC-T has been propagating without depth or rationality.
Secondly, he noted that the so-called level playing field is so Utopian and idealistic.

Thirdly and most importantly, he does not expect “Zanu-PF to commit political suicide by instituting reforms that it knows will precipitate its demise”.

That’s the reality!
That’s politics!
This is a reality that the opposition, if they are serious political players, should internalise thanks to a free lesson from Rugare Gumbo.

It’s the quintessential politics.
You cannot use the power of incumbency to undo the same incumbency.
That will be naivety – much like that which afflicted the MDCs when they went into power sharing not so many years ago.

For once we have to say Rugare Gumbo is right.

The report in which the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has ranked Zimbabwe as having the fastest average growth in human development and the most improved quality of life in Africa is instructive in more ways than one. It is explained that the critical instrument to assess this is the Human Development Index (HDI), which is a “measure for assessing long-term progress in three basic dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, access to knowledge and a decent standard of living.”

Experts explain that a long and healthy life is measured by life expectancy; knowledge level is measured by mean years of education among the adult population, which is the average number of years of education received in a life-time by people aged 25 years and older, while standard of living is measured by Gross National Income (GNI) per capita expressed in constant 2011 international dollars converted using purchasing power parity (PPP) rates.

Before naysayers, largely out of ignorance, can raise their opposition, it has to be pointed out that this is a scientific report based on credible methodology and comparable data on all countries under review, undertaken by a reputable organisation that is an agency of the United Nations.

The UNDP does not have, conceivably, any interest in misleading the world but use such like data for the benefit of individual countries, global leaders and other stakeholders to formulate and craft relevant policies and responses.

We know Zimbabwe’s detractors revel in dubious reports that put the country in bad light — like saying Zimbabwe is the worst place to live on earth — that seek to justify regime change in the country.

A look at the report and its encouraging conclusion must actually not come out as a huge surprise.

Zimbabwe has since 1980 been forward-looking in the provision of a good life for its citizens.

This is why the country has invested heavily in social services such as health and education.

In education for example, according to the latest statistics, the number of primary schools have increased from 2 401 in 1980, with an enrolment of 1 235 994 to 5 905 with an enrolment of 3 176 365 in 2015.

For secondary education, in 1980 there were only 177 secondary schools (Yes!) with an enrolment of 74 321 but as we speak there are 2 482 and a record 1 026 984 student enrolment.

All this has translated to the highest literacy rate in Africa that Zimbabwe boasts of and shall continue to enjoy as plans are afoot to have at least 2 000 more schools.

Tertiary education in Zimbabwe has also massively improved. Zimbabwe had only one national university at Independence but now has over 10 public and private with plans underway to have each of the country’s administrative provinces to have its own university and polytechnic.

In the health sector, whose services can be classified as primary, secondary, tertiary and quaternary, Zimbabwe has again made strides from people having a clinic within five kilometres to specialised healthcare.

Most importantly, Zimbabwe has managed to contain the deadly HIV and AIDS from infection rates of up to 29 percent in the 1990s to about 15 percent to date.

Government has provided an environment in which the ordinary man and woman can thrive by providing basic services as well as means and access to resources such as land, mines and business.

This is not to mask the challenges that the country is facing.

Which essentially is the interpretation that should be given to the report.

Zimbabwe is not Africa’s heaven. No!

The report, and reality, is that it is in the right direction and given all the optimum conditions can shoot its way to the top considering, for example that its growth is almost four times the sub-Saharan average, and an increase in expected years of schooling.

As the report notes, the country’s gross national income per capita increased four percentage points faster than the sub-Saharan average, from $1,442 to $1,662, or a 12 percent jump.

Zimbabwe’s growth has in these past years been impeded by the illegal sanctions that were imposed on the country by the West following the implementation of the land reform programme.

This is the single most threat to the livelihoods of the Zimbabwean people and Government.
Take away the hideous and growth slowing sanctions, Zimbabwe can be a world beater.

But Zimbabweans are a resilient people and the fact that they are thriving even under the odious yoke of sanctions is testimony to this.

The new climate agreement adopted in early December has laid a firm foundation for the global community to combat the impacts of climate change although there is little joy for Africa as some key expectations were not met.

African climate change experts highlighted that the Paris Agreement adopted by the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) held on November 30 to December 11 in France failed to give the issue of agriculture the attention it deserves.

“Throughout the negotiations, we have been trying to introduce agriculture so that it is main-streamed in the negotiation text,” said Estherine Fotabong, the Director of Programme Implementation and Coordination for the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD).

The lack of attention given to agriculture in the agreement is a worrisome development considering the important role of agriculture in the developmental agenda of Africa.

The agricultural sector is regarded as an engine for socio-economic development in most African countries.

According to the African Union (AU), agriculture accounts for about one-third of the continent’s gross domestic product, and more than two-thirds of its citizens rely directly on the sector for their livelihood.

A related item that Africa had on the list for COP 21 was the need for clarity on financing for losses and damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change.

Apart from recognising the importance of averting, minimising and addressing losses and damage and recommending for the continuation of the Warsaw International Mechanism (WIM), the agreement lacks clarity on how this would be financed.

The WIM for loss and damage was established at COP19 in Warsaw, Poland to address impacts of climate change, including extreme events and slow onset events, in developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of the changing climate.

Washington Zhakata, Director of the Climate Change department in the Ministry of Environment, Water and Climate in Zimbabwe, said “developed countries refused to accept liability for compensation, thus resulting in lack of clarity on financing for losses and damage.”

Article 8.1 of the agreement only states that WIM for losses and damage “may be enhanced and strengthened as determined by the COP,” leaving Africa at a disadvantage as there is no guarantee that the mechanism will in future be transformed to benefit the continent.

The agreement only gives reference to small island states and developing countries without specifically mentioning Africa, a continent that has a large proportion of its population severely affected by the impacts of climate change.

This is despite the fact that Africa is the least contributor to greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change, yet the continent is the hardest hit due to limited financial resources to adapt to such changes. Zhakata said Africa preferred to be particularly mentioned in the Finance Article and vulnerability section. This was, however, not the case.

On provision of finance, Article 9 of the agreement states that “developed country Parties shall provide financial resources to assist developing country Parties with respect to both mitigation and adaptation in continuation of their existing obligations under the Convention and that other Parties are encouraged to provide such support voluntarily.”

This clause has left the continent doubtful of the commitment of developed countries to provide funding for adaptation and mitigation as it is on a voluntary basis and the commitment is non-binding.

The agreement states that parties resolved to “enhance the provision of urgent and adequate finance, technology and capacity-building support by developed country Parties in order to enhance the level of ambition of pre-2020 action.”

The agreement strongly urged developed countries to scale up their level of financial support, with a concrete roadmap to achieve the goal of jointly providing US$100 billion annually by 2020 for climate change mitigation and adaptation.

However, past experience has shown that developed countries have failed to live up to this commitment and the pace at which developed countries are contributing to climate financing is very slow. African countries think that the major and historic polluters must take a fair share of responsibility not only to cut their emissions but help the victims to adapt to climate impacts.

So far accessing money from the Green Climate Fund has been a challenge since it was created due to the stringent conditions imposed by developed countries.

Although Article 9.9 of the agreement aims to ensure efficient access to financial resources through simplified approval procedures and enhanced support for developing countries, it still remains to be seen if this will be the case.

With regard to temperature increases, the agreement emphasises the need to keep global average well below 2°C in the context of sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty.

Article 4 of the agreement states that in order to achieve the long-term temperature goal, parties should aim to reach a peak of greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible, while recognising that developing countries will take longer to reach peak on greenhouse gas emissions before cutting to accepted levels.

In this regard, the parties acknowledged that countries are at different levels of development. Equally important is the recognition of resilience to climate change as a global challenge faced by all at local, sub-national, national, regional and international levels.

The agreement highlights that adaptation is a “key component of and makes a contribution to the long-term global response to climate change to protect people, livelihoods and ecosystems.”

The Paris pact emphasises that “adaptation action should follow a country-driven, gender-responsive, participatory and fully transparent approach, taking into consideration vulnerable groups, communities and ecosystems.”

This should be based on and guided by “the best available science and, as appropriate, traditional, indigenous and local knowledge systems, with a view to integrate adaptation into relevant socio-economic and environmental policies and actions, where appropriate.”

For Africa, recognition of Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) in resilience is crucial considering that communities on the continent use IKS to adapt to floods and drought, and other climate challenges.

Parties agreed that the agreement shall be open for signature and subject to ratification from 22 April 2016 to 21 April 2017.

The agreement will enter into force after at least 55 UNFCCC parties have deposited their instruments of ratification, acceptance, approval or accession. — sardc.net.

VP Mnangagwa

Zimbabwe marks 28 years tomorrow since the signing of the historic Unity Accord between Zanu and PF Zapu whose armies Zanla and Zipra respectively waged a protracted war against the Smith regime. The Unity Accord was a negotiated settlement following the disturbances that rocked the Midlands and Matabeleland provinces after independence. Our senior Reporter, Lloyd Gumbo (LG) speaks to one of the lead negotiators who represented Zanu during the talks, Zanu-PF Second Secretary and Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa (VP Mnangagwa) on unity then and unity now and the threat to unity in the party now.

LG: Zimbabwe will on Tuesday (tomorrow) celebrate 28 years since the singing of the Unity Accord. May you give us a general context in which the historical milestone came about between Zanu and PF-Zapu.

VP Mnangagwa: Well, I should say that the culmination of unity in 1987 has a historical background as you are aware, that initially it was just Zapu. It was the major nationalist party in the country but in 1963 there was that split when Zanu was then formed. But both parties then decided to wage an armed struggle both Zapu and Zanu. On the Zapu side we had Zipra and on the Zanu side we had Zanla. If you remember that the first time we worked together on resolving the Rhodesian issue at the time in 1976 in Geneva again the two parties came together to present a united front. After that, several attempts were made both at the military level when we created Zipa and at the political level when we created the Patriotic Front. Yes, of course after the Lancaster House conference in London in 1979, our leaders decided to contest the 1980 general elections separately, which resulted in Zanu-PF having a majority and Zapu having a minority in terms of numbers in Parliament.

But then, the spirit of uniting was not lost. We continued to have it, to share it and every attempt was being done quietly to consolidate and have this unity. This was then achieved in 1987 on December 22 when ultimately, the two parties as leaders and also as Central Committees of the two parties endorsed the decisions of the leaders to merge the two parties Zanu and Zapu creating Zanu-PF. That generally is the brief background of this unity because our leaders felt that we are a unitary country and for purposes of development, we needed the ideologies of Zanu and the ideologies were the same. It was a question of personalities in leadership and perhaps questions of approach in terms of the military. But then that we were now independent, it was now necessary that we unite the major political parties to have peace in the country, to have development in the country and to work together to unite our people so that as a unitary State, a united revolutionary party, Zanu-PF, would march forward.

LG: It’s now 28 years since the Unity Accord was signed and the unity has sustained itself under Zanu-PF. What would you attribute this unity?

VP Mnangagwa: Well, let me say, first and foremost there was commitment by the leadership. On the Zanu side, we had President Mugabe and the late Vice President Muzenda, the late (Maurice) Nyagumbo. Of course the discussions were generally led by Nyagumbo, myself and sometimes VaMuzenda at the lower level. On the Zapu side, it was the late Joseph Msika, the late John Nkomo were the principal negotiators. But at the core of the negotiations was to implement the will of our leaders to work out unity that is equal, a unity that Zanu would accept, a unity that Zapu would accept in terms of the leadership focus and direction.

Then the same background and principles for unity were then taken to the Central Committees of the two parties, they were debated and agreed on the basis and criteria for that unity, so you can see that there was a buy-in not only by the top leadership, but by the Central Committees that represented the highest organs of the two political parties. There was that acceptance so the foundation of the unity are the people themselves. The leadership of the two political parties accepted the unity, so this is the commitment we have to this unity. So I believe that as long as that spirit of unity, the spirit of development, the spirit of a focused revolution, we shall remain united. Yes in every revolution, we have elements, which fall by the wayside but the main thrust or the correct line of the revolution will continue as we go on. We believe that this legacy will remain among you, the young generation to continue to cherish the need for unity because with unity and peace, the country can develop.

LG: Some people would ask why Government under the leadership of Zanu-PF has maintained such nomenclature such as Mashonaland and Matabeleland. Some people would consider them divisive that is if someone is said to come from Mashonaland and the other one is said to come from Matabeleland that could be point of division?

VP Mnangagwa: I suppose such school of thought may have some legitimacy among some people. But I don’t think we have either directed ourselves or focused on the issue that if you say, Manicaland, you are saying Manicaland is for the Manicaland people, if you say Mashonaland, you are saying Mashonaland is for Mashonaland people, Matabeleland, that is not the philosophy. The naming of these provinces was the geographic situation of the country. We have a school of thought among the comrades who think that we should rename these provinces. This is not a question in my view of leadership. It’s a question for the people of Zimbabwe, if they desire that the names be changed, I don’t see anybody standing against such a will. But as you say, some people expressed that concept that perhaps we should rename because as you say, Matabeleland North, or Bulawayo or Mat South or Midlands, you are already saying these people are from the middle of the country, Mashonaland you are saying these people are from Mashonaland, the northern provinces of the country, Manicaland for the eastern people. Perhaps time might come when we can agree on naming these provinces in a neutral manner, I don’t think anybody would work against that.

LG: Looking back at the last 28 years, would you say the united Zanu-PF has achieved all the objectives that were set out when the Unity Accord was signed?

VP Mnangagwa: Yes, I believe so. First and foremost, when we came together in 1987 to sign the Unity Accord, total peace was ushered in the country. At the time, there were elements of dissidentry in the country. It came to an end. Since then, nothing has ever happened again on those lines, so we are happy as a party, as Zanu-PF that our leaders actually worked for that unity and agreed. They are leaving behind a legacy of unity, which I believe that, the generations that are going to follow after us will continue to cherish that unity. Then as a result of the unity by Zanu-PF, today in the Army, you cannot distinguish a former Zipra from a former Zanla. All are comrades of the Zimbabwe National Army, all are comrades of the Zimbabwe Air Force, and all are comrades in the Zimbabwe Republic Police, the same with the Presidential department (Central Intelligence Organisation). I remember when I was chairman of the Joint High Command during the integration of the three armies. We had the Zipra army, the Rhodesian army and the Zanla army, at some stages we had difficulties putting these people together but at the end of the day, we succeeded putting these people together and formed one Zimbabwe National Army and today that is gone. No one remembers about Zipra, Zanla or the Rhodesian Army. Everybody now recognise themselves as Zimbabwe National Army or Zimbabwe Defence Forces. Full stop! The same in Government you will not go into a ministry or any Government department and say who is PF Zapu or who is Zanu? It’s all gone and this now 28 years down the line which means if a child was born in 1987, he is now 28 years and they don’t know about that division they only read about that in the books. So it’s a very good decision in my view which our leaders did to unite these people.

As we go on, the generation which knows about that history is getting smaller and smaller and the generation which knows only about unity is getting bigger and bigger and this is an advantage and a solid foundation to build our Zimbabwe.

LG: But at the political level in Zanu-PF, you still have people who want to identify with Zanu others who want to identify with PF Zapu in terms of their history?

VP Mnangagwa: There may be such perceptions. I know that in the Unity Accord as it stands now, whoever is President of Zanu-PF shall appoint two Vice Presidents, one from former Zapu and one from former Zanu, that is still in the Unity Accord. I think at the time, it was necessary to make sure that you see, all former political parties are represented. That was the concept at the time, to make sure everybody is represented at that level. But as we go down the line, I don’t know whether that shall continue to be the same. We leave this to the future generation as to how they look at it. But the concept at the beginning was to make sure that no one, if we are to go to elections, you might find that all might come from Zanu or all in the leadership might come from Zapu or the majority might come from Zapu. You would find that the President is former Zapu and the two Vice Presidents are former Zapu or the President is former Zanu and two Vice Presidents are also former Zanu. But then, they made that provision that whoever is President of Zanu-PF must appoint two Vice Presidents, one from former Zapu and one from former Zanu. That was to make sure that the former political parties are represented at the highest level. But in my view, down the line this might fade away.

LG: Just a quick clarification VP, so it means that we could in the future have someone as President from former PF Zapu because some people may think that it was only meant to be Zanu as President and then VPs one from former Zanu and the other from former Zapu?

VP Mnangagwa: No, no, no, the Presidency is open. Anybody can be President from former Zanu or former Zapu. It’s in the agreement. You must read the agreement. Whoever becomes President, his two Vice Presidents must come from the two former political parties. That is what is in the Unity agreement.

LG: When the Unity Accord was signed, the objective was not only to achieve political settlement but to also look at the development aspect. There are some quarters who claim that Matabeleland regions are marginalised. What is your take?

VP Mnangagwa: Well, these are political malcontents, which we are always going to have and throughout. Take any ministry you can think of in Government because Government works through ministries. The mandates of development are through ministries. Take my Ministry of Justice (for example), you cannot tell me that judges in Bulawayo in the Ministry of Justice are less important than judges who are in Chinhoyi, who are in Mutare, who are in Masvingo or where ever you might think. They are the same judges, they are appointed by the Chief Justice, he deploys them. The same facilities you find in the High Court in Bulawayo are the same facilities you find in the High Court in Mutare, or in the High Court in Harare or in the High Court in Chinhoyi. So such things are not correct.

Lets take the Ministry of Agriculture. In Matabeleland there is less agriculture, there is more animal husbandry and cattle and so on. But the treatment is the same. The Presidential inputs cover everybody. We have a ministry which assesses the people who need that support and it is done through the structures of Government. Local government structures, we have the minister, the provincial minister, we have the PA (Provincial Administrator), we have the DA (District Administrator) and we have the councillor at the ward level. So the councillor at the Ward level is responsible for seeing a need at that level and reports come up and those people are covered.

That’s what happens. Look at any ministry and see whether there is a ministry, which is heavily represented in one region or in one province than in another. But you still find people talking about what you are saying. Yes, for instance during the Rhodesian government, there was more development here in Harare, then Salisbury as a capital city than you could see say in Chipinge, or Beitbridge or in Kariba. But now as a revolutionary Government of Zanu-PF there is no area in this country, which should remain behind. Every area must receive the attention it deserves equally. We are a unitary State.

LG: And that message is mainly parroted by secessionists. What are your views about that?

VP Mnangagwa: Yes I sometimes read about things that you people write that there are elements of secessionists, Mthwakazi, something like that, that fringe. You always have people of that nature in every society and that does not stop the revolutionary train to continue its journey. They will shout and bark, the train of development and unity will continue to go.

LG: And the Constitution says Zimbabwe is a unitary state?

VP Mnangagwa: Absolutely! That is one of the fundamentals of the Constitution.

LG: Looking at Zanu-PF now, some people could say Zanu-PF is at the crossroads because there seems to be disunity in the party and the President alluded to this when he addressed the Central Committee during the 15th Annual National People’s conference when he said that the things happening now threaten to split the party. What would you say are the origins or the reasons for this disunity?

VP Mnangagwa: I don’t believe that there is any split in the party at all. The President was giving a warning that we must continue cherishing and advocating for unity. If we do not do that, we will lead ourselves to divisions that will split the party. So he is saying that those people who are in leadership who cherish unity, who cherish development, must always speak, breath, work for unity. Don’t ever work for division for that will split the country. Let us all at whatever level, lowest level, middle level, high level work and promote unity. Of course you people in the press can twist but the context in which the President was saying is that every leader must promote unity, speak unity, dream unity, walk unity, day in and day out.

LG: Unity is one of the founding principles in Zanu-PF, yet you still have people in leadership who are seen to be pushing or parroting that message of creating disunity. Would you say the party leadership is still in control of its elements?

VP Mnangagwa: I am not aware of any leaders in Zanu-PF who preach disunity. All members of Zanu-PF, be it in the politburo or in the Central Committee, we all preach the need, the necessity and value of unity in Zanu-PF. This is a principle we would want to be a culture in the party to be united, to be peaceful and to love each other. That is what we preach. We have elements who may speak other things but they do not represent the core values of Zanu-PF.

LG: Going forward, in your view what is it that the revolutionary party must do to ensure that the unity within the party and the country at large is maintained?

VP Mnangagwa: We, as the leaders in the party, wherever we are, in public or in private, we must speak with one voice, we must read from the same page and sing one hymn and the hymn is unity, unity and unity. As the Late Vice president John Nkomo said, unity begins with me, unity begins with you and unity begins with all of us. That’s what we must continue to preach so that as the younger generation comes up, it is inculcated with the vision for unity, they should know that development of the country and people is anchored on unity. So the question of unity is not questionable.

LG: Lastly would you say the party leadership is in control of the party?

VP Mnangagwa: Obviously! You should have seen how united we were in Victoria Falls (at 15th Annual National People’s Conference). We had the most beautiful, most successful, most constructive conference we have ever had.

So Zanu-PF despite what we hear, when you write and say reliable sources meaning what yourself is thinking and call it reliable sources, all that nonsense, it’s not coming from us. It comes from people who want to peddle their own agendas.

But as Zanu-PF, we are united. We shall continue to march and march. Those who do not want to follow that march, will fall by the wayside.

LG: But we understand that there are people within the party like the President said who are feeding the private press with information that may be happening in the party ….

VP Mnangagwa: I do not want to speculate. You are the press, if you have people feeding you say them, I have never fed you with disunity messages. So if you have people who feed you, expose them.

Cde Oppah Muchinguri

There was a mixed bag of measures last week from Minister of Environment, Water and Climate Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri to prevent litter and unsightly dumping, some very good and some, we think, a bit hasty.

Some of the measures are long overdue. Expanded polystyrene containers for takeaways are a proven nuisance, causing not only unsightly litter that does not decompose, but also blocking drains. The minister’s proposal to ban these and we hope all other plastic containers for takeaways, in six months is therefore worthy of support.

Of course, people selling takeaways will switch to paper and cardboard, as some have done already. And people buying takeaways will continue to throw them into the streets. But at least these materials do decompose in time. The immediate litter problem will not be solved by the switch, but the longer term environmental damage will be far less.

The second proposal, to insist on a deposit on all beverage containers, is again something that makes sense. This can be set at a realistic level, not too high as to deter sales, but high enough to make it worthwhile for someone to collect empty bottles and cans and cash them in.

For decades most beverages came in reusable glass bottles with a deposit that was roughly the same as the contents. Most people took these empties back when buying new bottles. The system worked well.

Over the last 15 years, and especially since 2009, canned drinks and drinks in PET bottles dominate sales, to the extent that some supermarkets and shops no longer sell the glass bottles. And the cans and PET bottles are just dumped everywhere. With a modest deposit, 5c even might be enough, some will return their containers, but even if people still throw them into the streets there will be those willing to collect them and collect the deposits.

Countries, even rich countries like Japan, that have tried the scheme find that it does work. There is a commercial market for empty cans, scrap aluminium having a decent value, and scrap polyethylene terephthalate (usually abbreviated PRT) being the raw material for not just new bottles and containers, but also for terylene and dralon fabrics. So those setting up the deposit and collection systems will not lose out and may possibly pick up some loose change.

Banning recharge cards for mobile phones we think is grossly overreacting. These small cards are made of card, so they do rot, that is biodegrade, eventually, and are the source of income for tens of thousands of Zimbabweans wanting to earn a living legally.

Considering that we want people to switch to cardboard and paper takeaway boxes and paper bags instead of plastic bags, it seems odd to zoom in on a product that is already biodegradable. We urge the minister to rethink this one. If she wishes to go after a small environmentally polluting item, there are better targets, starting with the chemically-sodden plastic fibres of cigarette butts that smokers should carry home and dispose of properly.

Disposable nappies are a difficult subject. To give almost all parents their due these are rarely dumped as litter, but do form a significant part of landfill at dump-sites. Every country has to deal with the problem, as the old cloth nappies have disappeared in less than a generation.

As the technology and usually the nappies, are imported it seems unfair to penalise the Zimbabwean suppliers. But the ministry must make it clear that it expects these same Zimbabwean suppliers to use the latest technologies that are already cutting back on the environmental impact of this ultimate convenience item, and the ministry itself needs to keep abreast of international trends and to ensure our suppliers follow them.

This is something where Zimbabwe is too small a market to take the lead, but it needs to be right behind the leaders as they force the major manufacturers to devise ways of minimising environmental damage.

Finally, we agree with the minister that enforcing the quite adequate laws we already have on littering and dumping would help. These are not being enforced, and have never been enforced, but if even 10 percent of litterbugs were fined the $20 we expect the litter problem would die down very fast. Gaining the co-operation of the police will be hard, since most officers do not consider littering a major crime and prefer to concentrate on other areas, but even a low-level assault on littering would produce good results.

Dr David Okello Correspondent
Last week, Zimbabwe joined the world to celebrate the International Human Rights Day under the theme “Our Human Rights, Our Freedoms, Always”. The commemoration took place a few days after December 10 – the date set aside by the international community for all to take time to reflect

and examine our roles and contributions.

This year’s commemoration was especially significant as it coincided with the launch of a year-long campaign for the 50th anniversary of two International Covenants on Human Rights: The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

This development is timely and will no doubt accord opportunity for everyone to examine and reflect on the various multi-sectoral efforts towards the enjoyment of rights and freedoms since endorsement of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights more than 50 years ago.

Since that time, member states of the UN, including Zimbabwe, recognise the crucial contributions of international human rights and freedoms to building peaceful, secure, inclusive and tolerant societies.

Zimbabwe has made tremendous strides in living the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I am aware that Zimbabwe submitted a Universal Periodic Review Mid-term Report to the UN Human Rights Council in compliance with the country’s reporting obligations. This is noteworthy, and will assist the nation to examine successes and challenges on the ground.

Zimbabwe has done tremendously well.

Further, positive developments in the country, in particular the establishment of the Gender Commission and the National Peace and Reconciliation Commission will all contribute to the overall human rights discourse in the country.

Zimbabwe, with the support of the UN and development partners, has also achieved some noteworthy gains.

One of the important developments on universal human rights was the promulgation of a people-centred and progressive constitution which provides the highest potential to promote the rule of law and the respect for human rights and equitable access to justice for all Zimbabweans.

In addition, Zimbabwe is signatory to many key international treaty bodies and has consistently been reporting on progress.

These treaty bodies are: Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women; Convention on the Rights of the Child; International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Challenges remain and cannot be ignored. However, these are by no means insurmountable and are surpassed by the gains recorded over the past 50 years.

The gains to date should encourage all of us to continue working tirelessly to ensure that respect for all human rights and freedoms remain at the core of our values, standards, cultures and humanity.

Human rights only make sense if they are a lived reality.

The right to health care, food and nutrition, education, water and sanitation, social security, to political participation and the fair administration of justice are all fulfilled for all members of society.

As such, human rights must be evident as outcomes in our national development programmes and they should influence the social contract between citizens and the state.

We, as United Nations, therefore reiterate our continued commitment to work with the national stakeholders in ensuring the realisation of all rights. In line with our commitment under the Zimbabwe United Nations Development Assistance Framework, we will support the country to achieve its national development priorities and international obligations.

As we celebrate Our Rights and Freedoms, always, through dance, song, drama, and poetry let us take note that rights come with responsibilities – to ensure that no one is left behind.

Dr David Okello is the World Health Organisation representative to Zimbabwe and Acting UN Resident Co-ordinator.