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Zimbabwe's churches defy Mugabe by delivering food to starving people
The Independent ^ | 29 November 2001 | Alex Duval Smith and Basildon Peta

Posted on 11/29/2001 1:45:25 PM PST by grimalkin

Faced with increasing reports of deaths from malnutrition in Zimbabwe, churches are openly defying an edict from President Robert Mugabe that only ruling-party officials may distribute food aid.

The churches' defiance comes as an independent newspaper, the Financial Gazette, reveals today that the the 77-year-old leader has ordered bomb-proof underground bunkers to be dug around his home and offices, as well as the delivery of 86 army trucks believed to come from Austria ­ although there is an EU embargo on defence equipment to Zimbabwe.

The underground chambers, to be built of reinforced concrete, are being planned to allow Mr Mugabe to prepare for unrest or civil war, in the event of his losing next year's elections, according to the paper.

In Bulawayo and rural districts in the south of the country, Mr Mugabe's campaign to stay in power has already translated into hunger among thousands of people, according to the prominent Roman Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube.

He said: "The hunger is caused by the government's hypocrisy. It wants to distribute food assistance itself, so as to buy votes. It does not care how many people die as long as it can stay in power."

The looming crisis comes after Mr Mugabe earlier this month banned hundreds of the country's commercial farmers from working their land and told their properties had, in effect, been nationalised.

The regional World Food Programme director, Judith Lewis, said: "What we are seeing is a developing complex emergency.''

In Masase, a village of some 2,000 people in the Midlands, it is the Lutherans who are defying the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF), and covertly supplying food.

It is to people like Reverend Anders Berglund, from the Swedish Church, that Zimbabwe's Information Minister Jonathan Moyo, refers when he claims foreigners "might try to smuggle election monitors into Zimbabwe using the guise of food aid''.

Rev Anders said: "Children are fainting in class and the school day has had to be shortened because kids do not have the energy to concentrate."

Masase is a well-kept village which voted for Zanu-PF in the parliamentary elections.

Despite living in a "privileged'' place, the women struggle to feed their families. Dozens of them congregate every day at the Vashandiri milling co-operative, set up by the church. Here, for a small fee, they mill maize corn and turn a profit from selling the flour, which is the staple food in these parts. But they are unable to grow their own maize due to poor weather conditions. For two years, the south and east of the country, which are drought and flood-prone, have been subject to devastating weather

Michael Ncube, co-ordinator of the Catholic Development Commission in Bulawayo, said: "Matabeleland is mainly a cattle and ranching area. Crops do not do well here at the best of times. Two years of bad weather is too much for people to bear. Now their seeds are depleted. So as well as supplying food aid to children, breast-feeding mothers and the elderly, we are buying maize and sorghum seeds in town and transporting them to rural areas were we sell them for less than we paid."

Food experts explain that Zimbabwe ­ usually a "food-surplus country'' ­ is in normal circumstances capable of assisting its southern and eastern provinces when disaster strikes. But the political turmoil in fertile Mashonaland, in the north, was so intense ahead of last year's parliamentary elections that stocks were never built up.

To the archbishop, a long-time critic of Mr Mugabe, Matabeleland's crisis has a more sinister explanation. "We have always been neglected because we have a history of not supporting Zanu-PF," he said.

The Most Reverend Ncube, who received so many death threats ahead of last year's elections that the Vatican demanded that Mr Mugabe guarantee his safety, said 80 per cent of people in Matabeleland live below the poverty level. He said: "As far as I am concerned Mr Mugabe can take a flying jump into the Zambezi River.

"Last year, Matabeleland voted against the government. Now they are not distributing food here ... So we are having to circumvent rules to help people keep body and soul together. We did not tolerate racism when there was white rule here, and we will not tolerate this."

* Lovemore Madhuku, the 34-year-old law professor who was arrested while trying to organise a demonstration on Tuesday in Harare, was set yesterday to spend a second night in police custody. Pro-democracy campaigners said he had still not been charged or allowed to see a lawyer.


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: africawatch

1 posted on 11/29/2001 1:45:25 PM PST by grimalkin
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Comment #2 Removed by Moderator

To: grimalkin
Next, Mugabe is going to blame the bad weather on the White farmers. To those who get squeamish when they see TV clips of starving Africans, you'd better brace yourselves, 'cos this one's going to be a doozy.

AWA (Africa Wins Again)

3 posted on 11/29/2001 1:51:02 PM PST by Own Drummer
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To: grimalkin
The regional World Food Programme director, Judith Lewis, said: "What we are seeing is a developing complex emergency.''

Now that's a stupid statement.

4 posted on 11/29/2001 1:57:49 PM PST by technochick99
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To: grimalkin
Where is the revolt? Why do these people tolerate this? Three unarmed refugees + surprise disarms a solder. One armed refugee + surprise arms three more. Surely there must be more to the story.
5 posted on 11/29/2001 1:59:36 PM PST by Technocrat
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To: grimalkin
I was at Madame Tassaud's wax museum in London on Monday. I was disugsted to see the figurine of Mugabe there. Since I'm a conservative FReeper very respectful of property rights, I did NOT leap on the figurine and rip its head off. However, it was a serious consideration.
6 posted on 11/29/2001 2:01:34 PM PST by technochick99
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To: grimalkin
The time is coming sooner than I expected of vast quantities of death in Zimbabwe. Please, please, please don't let the US intervene unless the first act of this intervention is to kill Mugabe and replace him with a human. Otherwise, just let happen what is going to happen.

You can always count on one African nation or another to take steps to stabilize population growth in the world. Is that why Africa exists?

I can hardly wait for the someone to say starvation in Zimbabwe is my fault.

7 posted on 11/29/2001 2:16:25 PM PST by stevem
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To: Clive
bump
8 posted on 11/29/2001 2:18:28 PM PST by technochick99
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To: grimalkin
churches are openly defying an edict from President Robert Mugabe that only ruling-party officials may distribute food aid

Starvation is a political tool in Africa and has been for a long, long time.

Americans generously give food to help starving Africans only to find the governments in those countries seizing, controlling and withholding the donated food. Living with the twin horrors of deliberate starvation and AIDS, Africa is, for the most part, hopeless.

9 posted on 11/29/2001 2:23:16 PM PST by NoControllingLegalAuthority
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To: grimalkin
Our church sponsored a project (direct aid, low tech designed to give people skills to earn a living) in Zimbabwe 8-10 years ago and my younger daughter (with a friend) still sponsors a child there in one of those Feed the Children type programs.

It really is sad that the people are suffering so, but under such a government as Mugabe's nothing else can be expected. Man is his own worst enemy.

10 posted on 11/29/2001 2:26:05 PM PST by CatoRenasci
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To: CatoRenasci
The food crisis is due to Mugabe's confiscation of white-owned farmland. Many white farmers and their families have been murdered. As long as the whites were working the land, there was plenty of food for everyone.
11 posted on 11/29/2001 3:52:29 PM PST by WackyKat
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To: Great Dane; Travis McGee; Migraine; jsraggmann; backhoe; *AfricaWatch; sarcasm
bump
12 posted on 11/29/2001 4:10:56 PM PST by technochick99
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To: technochick99
Thanks for indexing this... it's such a shame, the former Rhodesia was once a lovely country ( as was South Africa ) but leftist totalitarian thugs are sacking it.
13 posted on 11/29/2001 4:27:03 PM PST by backhoe
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To: Technocrat
Exactly correct. That's how the Iraqi's got rid of Saddam in 1993, and how the Russians got rid of Stalin in 1937. It's so easy.
14 posted on 11/29/2001 8:26:52 PM PST by Travis McGee
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