Posted on 12/17/2002 3:42:00 AM PST by backhoe
From The Times (UK), 16 December
Mugabe may seize oil giants' assets
From Jan Raath in Harare
President Mugabe of Zimbabwe has threatened to seize the facilities of leading oil companies operating in the country and use them to distribute fuel. At the annual congress of his ruling Zanu PF party, Mr Mugabe said that the Government could "acquire" service stations and storage facilities, compensate the companies to which they belonged and dispense the fuel. There are five multinational oil firms with a presence in Zimbabwe - BP, Shell, Mobil, Total and Caltex – and their assets there are worth millions of pounds. Lawyers said that such a move would be illegal. One lawyer, who did not wish to be identified, said: "It would be patently unconstitutional. Besides, most of the International oil companies are covered by bilateral treaties from this kind of nationalisation." The President’s remarks came two weeks after the Government said that it was drafting a new policy within its so-called indigenisation programme to allocate fuel supplies to the 24 "independent" companies licensed to retail fuel, nearly all of which are owned by senior Zanu PF officials. Fuel reserves in the country have reached their lowest levels in three years, since leading oil companies cut off supplies to the state-owned National Oil Company of Zimbabwe (Noczim) when the Government failed to pay arrears for imports.
In the past week the queues of drivers have lengthened and more service stations have been putting up "no fuel" signs. Vehicles abandoned at the roadside for lack of fuel have become commonplace. In Chinhoyi, the venue of the conference, fuel was available only for party officials. A journalist was told at a Mobil service station that he could buy petrol only if he could prove that he was a delegate. Mr Mugabe said that the oil companies were making huge profits while the Government made losses from importing fuel via Noczim, which sells it on - for just 3p a litre, making Zimbabwean fuel among the world’s cheapest - to the multinationals to distribute. Economists say that total state control over fuel distribution would condemn the industry to the same failure affecting much of the country’s agriculture, transport, mining, telecommunications, railways and power industries. "Mugabe’s thinking is that taps make water," a Western diplomat said. "If he goes ahead (with the takeover of multinational service stations), the country will dry up far quicker than it is doing already."
From The New York Times, 16 December
Market booms while Zimbabwe prepares for the bust
By Rachel L. Swarns
Harare, Dec 13 – The ministers tending Zimbabwe's ailing economy have proposed a quick-fix remedy of price controls, wage freezes and the creation of collective farms, even though price controls are exacerbating food shortages, and a chaotic land redistribution program has devastated commercial agriculture. Meanwhile, hundreds of companies have gone broke, unemployment is soaring, and the country is teetering at the edge of famine. So, with the economy in shambles, why is business booming at the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange? In recent months, the market has reached record heights. This year, while the economy was contracting by about 12 percent, the stock exchange's market capitalization was doubling, surging to its highest level since it was established in 1896. What's more, sales of middle-income and luxury homes in the country's wealthy suburbs are surging. People with cash are snapping up televisions, luxury cars and stereos. The paradox stems from distortions in the controlled economy. With inflation at more than 144 percent and currency values plummeting, Zimbabweans are putting their money into assets they believe will increase in value - stocks, real estate, foreign currency, even refrigerators - rather than bank accounts. The government has kept interest rates low, so borrowing has been relatively cheap. And these days, many Zimbabweans are buying whatever they can, betting that they can sell the items later at a higher price, often on the black market. "It's unbelievable, absolutely unbelievable," said Emmanuel Munyukwi, the chief executive of the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange. "People think there's no economy in Zimbabwe. It's actually embarrassing when you have to tell them that we're doing very, very well."
The contradictions abound. While supermarkets routinely run out of bread, milk and sugar, the city's most expensive restaurants are packed, offering imported seafood and wines. Mercedes-Benzes cruise on potholed roads with broken street lights. Houses on prosperous tree-lined streets are selling quickly, and real estate brokers are scrambling to keep up with the demand. "People are not necessarily buying houses to live in," said Patson Mtare, a broker whose company has sold about 200 houses this year, compared with 100 houses in a normal year. "People are buying to sell." People with access to foreign currency are buying even more. The government insists that $1 is equivalent to 57 Zimbabwe dollars, even though $1 goes for as much as 1,600 Zimbabwe dollars on the black market these days. So even some government officials ignore the official exchange rate and change money on the street to make huge profits. Callisto Jonkonya, who manufactures and exports refrigerators, has bought a new house and several apartments. Raymond Chamba, who runs an employment agency in the United States, bought one 52-inch television, three 43-inch flat-screen televisions and a DVD player all in one day. He carried his cash in a suitcase. "Serious money you don't keep in the bank in Zimbabwe," said Mr. Chamba, who has spent the last six months with family in Zimbabwe. "My televisions, they're my bank here." Most Zimbabweans, however, are too poor to hoard televisions or cars. Over the last three years, the economy has contracted by more than 20 percent. More than 500 companies have closed. Unemployment stands at 60 percent. Most struggling citizens wait for hours in long lines to buy scarce gasoline or bread.
The combination of drought and land reform has left about 6 million people - roughly half the population - in need of emergency food aid. Foreign donors have contributed food but refuse to offer financial assistance to the government, which has condoned violence and land seizures. President Robert Mugabe insists that his controlled economic policy will fix the problem. He has called on the police to crack down on hoarding and black market sales. But Finance Minister Herbert Murerwa disagreed with this strategy last month when he told Parliament that price controls were leading to "shortages of critical basic necessities on the formal market" because they failed to address the rising costs of production. Mr. Murerwa said black-market dealers were the chief beneficiaries of price controls, while the poor were suffering. The government has acknowledged that corrupt officials are hoarding and then selling price-controlled goods on the black market. There are few indications, how-ever, that Mr. Mugabe plans to change course. So Mr. Munyukwi has decided to delay the celebration for his stock exchange's success. "It's very difficult to celebrate when your country is hungry," he said. "The stock market is supposed to reflect what's happening in the economy. But we know our economy is in shambles."
From The Zimbabwe Standard, 15 December
Health time bomb ticking on farms
By Chengetai Zvauya
A health time bomb is ticking on the former commercial farms where villagers have been dumped on virgin land without adequate water and sanitation facilities, The Standard has established. The situation is reportedly so bad in remote areas that the parliamentary portfolio committee on lands and agriculture is to embark on a national tour to assess the situation. "We are concerned with the situation on the farms and hope that after touring several of them, we will have a clear picture of what exactly is happening,'' said MP Daniel Mackenzie Ncube who is the chairman of the committee. In a fast track resettlement exercise, government resettled over 300 000 families without first putting in place vital infrastructure such as hospitals, classrooms and toilets. Government was hoping to earn political mileage prior to a tough March presidential election which pitted President Robert Mugabe against opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai.
However, fears abound that some of the people who have ventured deep into the forests previously meant for wildlife habitation could succumb to diseases such as cholera, malaria and dysentery this rainy season if health personnel are not urgently deployed to these areas. In the absence of boreholes, desperate villagers are having to drink dirty water sourced from rivers and dams and find themselves at the mercy of mosquitoes and wild animals which infest their land. The nearest clinics are sometimes 40 kilometres away. Two weeks ago, a cholera outbreak at Angus Farm, Dewure Extension and Village 26 in Bikita, resulted in the death of seven people because of lack of health care facilities. The situation is worse for the former farm workers who have been forced off their properties. The departure of the white Zimbabwean farmers has also meant the end of service provision at most of the farms taken over by war veterans and militant Zanu PF supporters. The farms no longer have fresh water as most of the pipes have been vandalised, forcing the occupants to drink untreated water from dams and rivers.
The bush toilet, abandoned some years ago when donors provided assistance to rural communities to build Blair toilets, have made a strong come back. The director of the Farm Community Trust of Zimbabwe, Godfrey Magaramombe, told The Standard that his organisation was concerned at the lack of sanitation on the farms. "Generally, the situation on the farms is bad. People are drinking surface water from dams and this water needs to be treated or boiled to reduce the risk of infection. Since farm occupants are failing to pay their electricity bills they are not able to get the power needed to pump their water. "The situation differs from farm to farm and is being made worse by the fact that there are no Blair toilets on the new farms,'' said Magaramombe. Farm Community Trust assists displaced farm workers. Since the start of the farm invasions in 2000, over 3 000 white Zimbabwean commercial farmers have been forced off their properties. About 900 000 farm workers and their families have been displaced over the same period. Investigations by The Standard have also revealed that generally, all the infrastructure left behind by commercial farmers was under threat as the new farmers lacked the capacity and skills to maintain it. For example, many of the schools that used to operate on the farms have now been closed due to lack of money and other resources.
From News24 (SA), 15 December
Still no word on Mugabe
Stellenbosch - The African National Congress did not know by late on Sunday whether or not Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe would attend its 51st conference in Stellenbosch. At a news conference on the eve of the conference, ANC deputy secretary-general Thenjiwe Mtintso said Mugabe's party - the Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front - had been invited, not the president as such. "We will only know at the end of the day who comes, or when they come." Asked whether any heads of state would attend, she said parties had been invited. None of them had indicated that they would send heads of state.
From The Zimbabwe Standard, 15 December
Middle class hunter-gatherers
Over the top by Brian Latham
A new class of hunter-gatherers has been discovered in a troubled central African nation, eminent anthropologists have announced. The new age hunter-gatherers come mainly from the middle classes, a phenomenon not thought possible outside certain troubled Balkan and eastern European states.
In the past, 21st century hunter-gatherers were thought to be limited largely to the deepest regions of various South American and Central African rainforests. Still, the new-age troubled central African country's hunter-gatherers are, almost uniquely, urban dwellers with large motor cars and dwindling bank balances. But while their rural hunting and gathering counterparts in the rain forest hunt for bush meat and gather fruit, the urban sub-species has a much wider list of necessities to gather and hunt for.
Top of the list is petrol, now a sought-after luxury prized more highly than beluga caviar or Havana cigars. Without petrol, say the troubled hunter-gatherers, no other hunting or gathering can take place. Once found, any price will be paid for the luxury commodity, thus allowing the troubled central African nation's hunter-gatherers to hunt for other desirable luxuries like maize meal, bread and milk. One of the troubled central African country's two tourists (who mysteriously became one of 20 000 in the state-controlled Horrid newspaper) said it was indeed a curious situation for milk to be considered a luxury, let alone bread and sugar. He said it had been several hundred years since these items were considered luxuries in the imperialist west, but there was no accounting for politics or taste.
Meanwhile, the most equal of all comrades said it was quite obvious that commodity shortages were the work of avaricious businessmen, dispelling colonialist-inspired rumours that the economy had somehow been mismanaged by his government. Just as it was untrue to say that the shortage of food was due to the fact that all the farmers had been chased away with extreme prejudice, it was untrue to say that the lack of bread in the shops had anything to do with forcing bakers to sell their bread at a loss. "These are rumours spread by the running dogs of imperialism and other enemies of the state," said a government spin-doctor who then asked Over The Top for a loaf of bread, saying he hadn't eaten in a week. When OTT said that he himself had no bread (or sugar, cooking oil, mealie meal, butter, beef, milk or petrol) the government spokesman looked troubled and said that he had heard such items were available to economic saboteurs and the party elite. He then added, hastily, that economic saboteurs and the party elite were two separate entities and should not be confused, which OTT said was arguably the biggest lie he had uttered all day.
Meanwhile, it was reported that corpulent gentlemen from the ruling Zany Party met in a central stronghold to discuss the food crisis and ways to resolve the country's economic decline. It was resolved that the best way to resolve the troubled central African country's economic problems was to blame white people, British people, the inherent weaknesses of capitalism, the Asian community, multinational companies, colonial history, farmers, businesses with no connection to the Zany party and anyone else who came to mind. Above all, it was decided blame should be spread wide while responsibility for the economic meltdown should not be laid at the feet of the Zany Party which was, as always, in full control of everything - especially the police who would deal harshly with anyone who suggested poor economic planning and corruption had anything to do with the fact that cigarettes are unavailable in a country that was just last year the world's second largest tobacco producer.
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