NEWS
Soldiers and police clash with protesters in Harare
Published
4 years agoon
Soldiers have joined police in running clashes with hundreds of protesters in Harare, Zimbabwe who say the country’s presidential election is being rigged.
Police fired water cannon and tear gas to disperse protesters as military helicopters flew overhead.
Three people have been killed in Harare, Zimbabwe as soldiers and police fought running battles with hundreds of protesters, firing live ammunition, tear gas and water cannon amid rising tension following the presidential elections.
Some of the clashes took place outside the headquarters of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) in Harare, which opposition supporters say is biased.
There has been growing impatience at delays in releasing the results of, the first since Robert Mugabe was ousted after four decades in charge.
“We support [opposition leader Nelson] Chamisa and we want him to be our president. The electoral commission is not fair. Our election is being stolen,” said a 19-year-old student among the protesters.
Heavily armed soldiers jumped out of armoured vehicles in Harare city centre and spread through narrow streets after initial clashes between police and protesters.
Rocks flew through the air and terrified commuters scrambled for cover.
“This is all the government’s fault,” said Abigail Nganlo, a 29-year-old nurse from Harare. “We are on our knees with the economic situation.
People are so angry. The [election] figures they are producing are fake. Where there are 500 people at a polling station, they are saying 5,000.”
Soldiers were seen beating people with sticks as much of the centre of Harare– an opposition stronghold – was shut down during the afternoon.
Alex Kamasa, 30, an unemployed graduate, said: “They are desperate.
They have rigged the election. It is a big robbery.”
On Wednesday morning election monitors called for votes to be counted in an open and timely way, as the opposition stepped up complaints that it would be denied victory by fraud.
Zimbabwe’s ruling Zanu-PF party has already won the majority of seats in parliament after sweeping rural constituencies by significant margins, official results show.
The parliamentary outcome does not necessarily indicate voters’ choice of president.
The result in the presidential vote – contested by the Zanu-PF president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, and Chamisa of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change – is due by 4 August, but expected sooner.
Monitors have been warning of possible violence if the results are contested. Elmar Brok, the head of the first EU monitors to be allowed into Harare, Zimbabwe for 16 years, said the elections were a critical test of the country’s ability to reform.
Brok praised an “opening up of political space” but said the government had failed to ensure a level playing field, accusing the ZEC of being biased.
He called on the ZEC to make detailed results public to ensure the credibility of the election given earlier shortcomings. Other monitors also expressed concerns as the count went into the third day.
“Election day is only a snapshot of a long electoral process,” said the US congresswoman Karen Bass, one of the monitors deployed jointly by the US International Republican Institute and National Democratic Institute.
“It is vital to see the electoral process to its conclusion, and it is still too early to make an assessment on the nature of these elections.”
The latest results announced by the ZEC in Harare showed Zanu-PF had won a two-thirds majority in the 210-seat lower house, which would allow it to change the constitution at will.
Chamisa’s MDC won 60 seats. Analysts blamed divisions within the opposition for the low tally.
Chamisa said in a tweet on Wednesday morning that the ZEC “seeks to release results to buy time & reverse the people’s presidential election victory”.
He added: “The strategy is meant to prepare [Zimbabwe] mentally to accept fake presidential results. We’ve more votes than ED [Mnangagwa]. We won the popular vote & will defend it!”
The election pitted Chamisa, 40, a lawyer and pastor whose only experience of power was a stint as a minister in a coalition government several years ago, against Mnangagwa, 75, a longtime Mugabe aide.
Chamisa said on Tuesday that he was “winning resoundingly”, a claim repeated by senior officials over the course of the day.
The interior minister, Obert Mpofu, said the government was concerned by “high levels of incitement to violence by certain individuals and some political leaders who have declared themselves winners”.
If no candidate wins more than half of the votes in the presidential election, there will be a runoff in five weeks. Negotiations to form a coalition government are another possibility.
The two presidential candidates represent dramatically different ideologies and political styles, as well as generations. Pre-election opinion polls gave Mnangagwa, a dour former spy chief known as “the Crocodile” due to his reputation for ruthless cunning, a slim lead over Chamisa, a brilliant if sometimes wayward orator.
Support for Zanu-PF has historically been deepest in rural areas, particularly the party’s Mashonaland heartland, where more than two-thirds of Zimbabwe’s 17 million people live.
The campaign has been free of the systematic violence that marred previous polls, but the MDC has repeatedly claimed it was hindered by a flawed electoral roll, ballot paper malpractice, voter intimidation and handouts to voters from the ruling party. Many of its complaints have now been backed by monitors.
Zimbabwe’s rulers know, however, that a fraudulent election would block the country’s reintegration into the international community and deny it the huge bailout package needed to avoid economic meltdown.
Almost four decades of rule by Mugabe has left Zimbabwe with a shattered economy, soaring unemployment and crumbling infrastructure.
Supporters said the president had won “a landslide victory”.
“The MDC are just extremely bad losers,” said Bright Matonga, a businessman and former Zanu-PF minister.
The Guardian
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Zimbabwe Vice President Kembo Mohadi resigned on Monday following local media reports he had engaged in improper conduct.
Kembo Mohadi, along with Constantino Chiwenga, was a deputy to President Emmerson Mnangagwa since 2018, but without a political power base, he was not seen as a potential successor to the president.
In a rare move by a public official in Zimbabwe, Kembo Mohadi said he had taken the decision to step down “not as a matter of cowardice but as a sign of demonstrating great respect to the office of the President”.
“I have been going through a soul-searching pilgrimage and realised that I need the space to deal with my problem outside the governance chair,” he said in a statement released by the Ministry of Information.
Local online media service ZimLive has in the past two weeks carried reports that Kembo Mohadi had improper sexual liaisons with married women, including one of his subordinates.
Mohadi, 70, denied the accusations last week saying this was part of a political plot against him. On Monday he continued to deny the accusations saying he would seek legal recourse.
BUSINESS
Zimbabwe agrees to pay $3.5 billion compensation to white farmers
Published
2 years agoon
29/07/2020
Zimbabwe agreed on Wednesday to pay $3.5 billion in compensation to Zimbabwe white farmers whose land was expropriated by the government to resettle black families, moving a step closer to resolving one the most divisive policies of the Robert Mugabe era.
But the southern African nation does not have the money and will issue long term bonds and jointly approach international donors with the farmers to raise funding, according to the compensation agreement.
Two decades ago Mugabe’s government carried out at times violent evictions of 4,500 Zimbabwe white farmers and redistributed the land to around 300,000 Black families, arguing it was redressing colonial land imbalances.
The agreement signed at President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s State House offices in Harare showed white farmers would be compensated for infrastructure on the farms and not the land itself, as per the national constitution.
Details of how much money each farmer, or their descendants, given the time elapsed since the farms were seized, was likely to get were not yet clear, but the government has said it would prioritise the elderly when making the settlements.
Farmers would receive 50% of the compensation after a year and the balance within five years. Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube and acting Agriculture Minister Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri signed on behalf of the government, while farmers unions and a foreign consortium that undertook valuations also penned the agreement.
“As Zimbabweans, we have chosen to resolve this long-outstanding issue,” said Andrew Pascoe, head of the Commercial Farmers Union representing Zimbabwe white farmers.
The land seizures were one of Mugabe’s signature policies that soured ties with the West. Mugabe, who was ousted in a coup in 2017 and died last year, accused the West of imposing sanctions on his government as punishment.
The programme still divides public opinion in Zimbabwe as opponents see it as a partisan process that left the country struggling to feed itself. But its supporters say it has empowered landless Black people. Mnangagwa said the land reform could not be reversed but paying of compensation was key to mending ties with the West. Reuters
NEWS
Chinamasa calls U.S. ambassador ‘thug’ as anti-government protests loom
Published
2 years agoon
29/07/2020
Zimbabwe’s ruling ZANU-PF party on Monday called the United States ambassador a “thug” and accused him of funding the opposition ahead of this week’s planned anti-government protests that authorities say are meant to overthrow the government.
Without providing evidence, ZANU-PF spokesman Patrick Chinamasa told reporters that U.S. ambassador to Harare, Brian Nichols, was involved in subversive activities to topple President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government.
Chinamasa’s comments echo the Robert Mugabe era, where the ZANU-PF government regularly accused the United States and Britain of seeking to dislodge it from power.
“He (Nichols) continues to engage in acts of undermining this republic and if he does so, if he continues engaging in acts of mobilising and funding disturbances, coordinating violence and training insurgents, our leadership will not hesitate to give him marching orders,” Chinamasa said.
“Diplomats should not behave like thugs, and Brian Nichols is a thug.”
The U.S. embassy in Harare did not immediately respond to Chinamasa’s comments. Political tensions are rising fast in the southern African nation after activists called for demonstrations on July 31 against government corruption, which they blame for deepening the worst economic crisis in more than a decade.
Last month, the government summoned Nichols after a senior White House official said Zimbabwe was among “foreign adversaries” using the civil unrest in the United States following the death of George Floyd to interfere in U.S. affairs.
The U.S., Britain, E.U. embassies and the United Nations have all criticised Zimbabwe for the arrest of journalists and political challengers.
Relations between Zimbabwe and the West were promising when Mnangagwa replaced Mugabe after a coup in 2017, but have soured over the government’s human rights record.
Patrick Chinamasa urged party supporters to defend themselves from protesters and avoid a repeat of the deadly violence that followed post-election demonstrations in August 2018 and the January 2019 protests over a steep fuel price hike.“No, this time no. Use any means at your disposal to defend yourselves,” Chinamasa said. Organisers say this week’s protests will be peaceful. Reuters

Kembo Mohadi resigns amid sex scandal

Zimbabwe agrees to pay $3.5 billion compensation to white farmers

Chinamasa calls U.S. ambassador ‘thug’ as anti-government protests loom
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