News from Zimbabwe Ruins
Storm over land in Zimbabwe print friendly version



author/source:Washington Post
published:Mon 20-Aug-2001
posted on this site:Tue 21-Aug-2001

Article Type : News

Matibe is neither white nor British, but a black Zimbabwean who purchased this farm with his life savings two years ago. He is also a member of the MDC

Jon PeterChegutu - With its withered tobacco leaves, rot-black sunflowers and an untended wheat crop that has turned a dour shade of green, Phil Matibe's Paarl Farm is a 1,100-acre wasteland, idled by a government land-reform program that evicted the commercial farmer and his family two months ago. The peasants ushered onto the farm by government officials have stripped bare Matibe's tractor, chopped down scores of trees for kindling and shacks, ransacked his tobacco barns and, for good measure, set fire to his house and corn crop. The work stoppage has left nearly 100 farmhands jobless and hungry, scavenging the parched fields for nuts and rats to eat. They, too, must leave the farm by month's end, provincial officials have told them.Entering a campaign season in which he faces the first electoral challenge in his 21 years in power, President Robert Mugabe has trumpeted land reform as the unfinished business of the liberation war that freed this southern African country from British rule in 1980. Flouting the country's laws and ignoring increasing international pressure, Mugabe's governing party, Zanu PF, has used fiery appeals to pan-African nationalism and a fervent pledge to relieve rural poverty to justify its accelerated efforts to transfer farms with the most fertile soil to landless blacks. But the government-led assault on Paarl Farm speaks volumes about Mugabe's motives, his policy and its feasibility. Matibe is neither white nor British, but a black Zimbabwean who purchased this farm with his life savings two years ago. He is also a member of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), the surging new political party that threatens Zanu PF's uninterrupted reign. Among those who have been given plots of Matibe's land are a banker and three police officers who are Zanu PF loyalists.And instead of easing poverty, Mugabe's fast-track resettlement program is actually widening it, critics say, by killing the crops that Zimbabwe relies on for trade and food, and by leaving thousands of farmworkers jobless and homeless just as the country is facing massive food shortages and soaring unemployment. "This," said Matibe, 34, "is not about correcting a colonial imbalance. This is about punishing your enemies and rewarding your friends. This is about staying in power no matter what the damage is to your country or its democracy."Whites account for less than 1 percent of Zimbabwe's population of 12 million but, in a country roughly the size of California, own a third of the arable land. There is a consensus among economists, development experts and diplomatic officials that the concentration of land in the hands of a tiny elite deprives millions of poor blacks of a crucial resource in an economy heavily dependent on agriculture. But critics say that as Zanu PF's popularity wanes, Mugabe, 77, has used land as a smoke screen to cloak his party's mismanagement of the country and also as the principal component of a patronage system that nourishes political devotion and tramples dissenters.The results have been dire in a country in which nearly a third of the population is forced to survive on the equivalent of a dollar a day. Nearly 40 people have been killed since mobs of Zanu PF supporters, led by veterans from the country's independence war, began occupying white-owned farms 18 months ago. The land grabs began in the weeks before Zimbabwe's most recent parliamentary elections and many of the white farmers targeted were supporters of the opposition MDC. This month, clashes in Chinhoyi, a rural area about 75 miles northwest of the capital, Harare, drove more than 100 white farmers and their families from their homesteads. Twenty-one white farmers were arrested and were being held without bail on charges of causing public violence.The lawlessness and the refusal of the police to intervene have led investors to flee the country and donors to freeze funds, driving the unemployment rate to 60 percent. The inflation rate has been 65 percent over the past year, and a trade organization representing the country's 4,500 mostly white commercial farmers announced this month that the disruptions caused by the illegal occupations of nearly 2,000 large-scale farms would reduce crop yields by more than 25 percent next year. Relief agencies are preparing to import up to 500,000 tons of grain to a country once known as Africa's breadbasket."I think famine is unavoidable," said Ian Kay, a white commercial farmer who said his tobacco and wheat crops will be only half their usual volume as a result of squatters who forcibly settled on his farm in June. "All preparation for [next month's] planting season has come to a halt," Kay said. "Whenever one of my guys tried to plow, three or four (squatters) would walk up to the tractor and tell him to get off or they would set him and the tractor on fire." Agriculture Minister Joseph Made this month announced that the government plans to step up its seizure of farms, nearly doubling from 12 million to 20 million the number of targeted acres.And with the U.S. Congress expected to pass the Zimbabwe Democracy Bill, which would ban travel to the United States for Mugabe and his cabinet unless the illegal farm occupations are suspended, Western diplomats and others fear that the violence and food shortages will escalate in the months leading up to the presidential election next spring. Home Affairs Minister John Nkomo this month suggested that the governing party would declare a state of emergency - and possibly martial law - if U.S. lawmakers passed the bill, which Zanu PF has characterized as a sanctions measure that would affect Zimbabwe's national security."And now you have this talk of sanctions?" a visibly angry Mugabe said recently at a holiday gathering to commemorate the black freedom fighters who perished in the independence war of the 1970s. "Just what is our crime? Our crime is that we are black, and in America the blacks are a condemned race." Mugabe's spokesman, George Charamba, said in an interview last week that criticisms of the government's land policy are exaggerated and manipulated by white farmers and colonial interests intent on preserving the economic inequities that remain in sub-Saharan Africa a generation after most countries won their independence."Food shortages we've always had in Africa, and we always will have food shortages," he said. "This is a major, major adjustment we are undertaking, and there is going to be an economic slump. There will be difficulties, but they are difficulties associated with transformation, and in the long run that transformation will be to the benefit of all Zimbabweans. This is about finding a new place for the black man in our economy."That new footing is uncertain as of now. The estimated 350,000 people who work on Zimbabwe's commercial farms represent nearly a quarter of the country's workforce, but of the 122,000 families the government claims to have resettled, fewer than 1,900 are families of black farmhands. Despite its contentious relationship with Mugabe, the mostly white Commercial Farmers' Union puts the number higher, estimating that roughly 10 percent of the 6 million acres seized have gone to former farmworkers. The General Agricultural and Plantation Workers' Union of Zimbabwe estimates that only three of every 500 people resettled by the government are displaced workers.Until the convoy of government cars and truck beds filled with squatters pulled up to Phil and Pearl Matibe's front door in June, their sprawling farm was home to 123 workers and their relatives living in mud-and-grass huts. After giving the Matibes a week to move their household belongings and two young children, provincial officials told the workers they would have to leave because they had not registered to receive plots on the resettled farm. "Where will we go?" said Kariba Hanoki, a farmworker for 38 of his 59 years. "We have nothing. We have no food. We have no soap. We have no money to go back to the rural areas where we came from."More than a dozen farmworkers gathered around him, telling similar stories of life without jobs, food or money, and of eating whatever they could find - nuts, beans, even dead rodents - in fields they are unable to harvest without equipment. "We were hoping that Mr. Matibe could arrange something for us," said Loyas Konorine, 30, a mother of two, who worked on the farm for five years. "But now we understand that Mr. Matibe is having a difficult time as well." Matibe purchased the farm with money saved from a munitions firm that he founded, and he invested more than ,000 in improvements and equipment.While farmworkers often complain of poor pay and abuse by white farmers, several here said the Matibes were fair people who even took one of Hanoki's eight children to live with them at a friend's apartment in Harare when they were evicted to lighten their foreman's burden. Charamba, Mugabe's spokesman, said he was unaware of Matibe's case but that in some isolated instances, land records failed to identify a farm's owner and listed a previous owner instead. A black farmer whose property was wrongly targeted for acquisition, he said, could appeal to the agriculture minister.Uninsured for damage that results from political violence, Matibe said he is unsure what to do now. He does not regret his work with the MDC because he believes that Mugabe has outlived his political usefulness. But he failed to appreciate, he said, precisely how desperate Zanu PF is to stay in power. "I am as indigenous as anyone," Matibe said. "I was born and bred in Zimbabwe and all I know is farming. I wanted to give my farm to my two children. But now I am landless . . . because I had the audacity, the gall . . . to think."



Zimbabwe on the verge of collapse



As Zimbabwe's economy totters, fuel shortages are on the increase

By BBC News Online's James Arnold

Increasingly isolated from the rest of the world, Zimbabwe's economy is teetering on the brink of collapse.

Its vital export sectors have been crippled by unrest and political interference, starving the country of hard currency income.

At the same time, the government's sour relationship with foreign lenders and the international business community has reduced incoming investment and aid to a trickle.

For the Zimbabwean population, the result has been widespread shortages, a flourishing black market and a worrying rise in political tension.

"Zimbabwe is a powder-keg waiting to explode," said a Harare-based economist, who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals.

Policy muddle

Zimbabwe was once one of Africa's most prosperous countries, its economy fuelled by rich mineral resources - especially precious metals - and an export-oriented agricultural sector, based largely on tobacco.

But that prosperity has been rapidly eroded by the political and economic policies pursued by President Robert Mugabe, who is pursuing an aggressive campaign for re-election in 2002.

The country's main problem is that there is almost no money is coming in.



Mugabe: Economic mismanagement


Mr Mugabe's policy of encouraging attacks on white-owned farms and other assets has crippled the tobacco and mining sectors, which together usually account for half of all exports.

Simultaneously, the resulting rise in lawlessness has scared off almost all foreign investors - investment so far this year is down by over 60% on 2000.

And despite periodic attempts to mend relations, Zimbabwe still receives no money from the International Monetary Fund or World Bank.

Closing the doors

The government has taken drastic measures in an effort to check the collapse in confidence, in effect attempting to seal the economy off from world markets.

The exchange rate of the Zimbabwean dollar has been fixed, at 55 to the US dollar, and exports of currency are tightly restricted.

Retail prices of many key products have also been fixed.

This has produced an illusion of success: the stockmarket has surged by some 120% this year, as rich Zimbabweans have little else to do with their money than put it into shares.

Key economic indicators, 2000
GDP growth: -6.1%
GDP per head:
Inflation: 56.6%
Total debt per head:

It has, however, only stimulated the black market in foreign exchange, where the Zimbabwean dollar is currently trading as low as 130 against the US dollar.

Worse, the fixed prices, coupled with the country's shortage of foreign exchange, have led to dramatic shortages of many key consumer products.

Annual inflation has surged to 60%.

Fuel is now in dangerously short supply, and a recent move to allow a huge price rise has not brought more onto the market, instead simply causing popular unrest.

Lacking the hard currency to pay, Zimbabwe currently relies on credit lines from Kuwait and South Africa to fund oil imports.

Stumbling through

For Harare-watchers, the question is now whether popular unrest over the economy will balloon as next year's elections approach.

"Any spark could set this thing off, and there are a lot of sparks to choose from," said David Cowan of the Economist Intelligence Unit in London.

As both the maize and wheat crops are in deficit this year, a rarity in traditionally self-sufficient Zimbabwe, there is the genuine prospect of food riots.



Making ends meet


But Mr Cowan said the government willl be determined to make it through to April without being forced to devalue the currency or backtrack on any of its economic policies.

Despite the chaos in the countryside, some exports are still making it through, and prices for agricultural products such as tobacco are currently favourable.

This ought to be enough to stave off complete economic collapse, said Mr Cowan."[Finance minister Simba] Makoni is no fool."


Hard Currencyy to fly Out

News that international airlines will only accept hard currency will deal a further blow to the struggling Zimbabwe tourism industry.
British Airways has confirmed to the BBC's World Business Report that it will only accept payment in US dollars or sterling.
Many other airlines have adopted the same policy.
The move is a reflection of waning confidence in the Zimbabwe dollar, whose value has plummeted in recent months.
On the black market, one US dollar buys 300 Zimbabwe dollars, compared with an official fixed rate of 55 Zimbabwe dollars to the US dollar.
Our image has suffered dramatically over the last 18 months
John Smith, managing director of Zimbabwe Sun
Already, the local tourism industry is suffering as regional and international tourists turn their back on the once popular destination.
In 1999, nearly two million people visited Zimbabwe. This figure is now thought to have halved over the past year.
Dramatically worse
If the situation does not get better soon, it could be many years before the tourism industry recovers, John Smith, managing director of Zimbabwe Sun, the largest hotel operator in the country told BBC's World Business Report.
"The downturn really started at the beginning of last year... There has been bad political press coming out of this country... Our image has suffered dramatically over last 18 months," he said.
The Zimbabwe Sun hotel group accounts for about 40% of the hotel beds in the country.
Key economic indicators, 2000
GDP growth: -6.1%GDP per head: : 56.6%Total debt per head:
About 18 months ago, the tourism industry was operating at occupancy levels of about 60% to 65%.
The international and regional market accounted for roughly 60% of the tourism industry.
Of this, about two thirds was made up of international tourists and one third of regional tourists.
These two markets have fallen off "dramatically", John Smith said, and it is the smaller operators that are hardest hit.
"This particularly applies to the smaller safari lodges, where the marketing is geared towards the international market, they are having a major problem. Their costs are running away with them and they haven't got the revenue bases to sustain those costs," he said.
Collapsing industry
"If it goes on for more than a year, we will see a lot of the tourism industry actually collapsing and it will be many years before they can revive that part of the industry," he said.
Zimbabwe was once one of Africa's most prosperous countries, its economy fuelled by rich mineral resources and agricultural exports, such as tobacco.
The number of attacks on white-owned farms and other assets has crippled the tobacco and mining sectors.
Together these would usually account for half of all exports.
Zimbabwe's vital export sectors have been crippled by unrest and political interference, starving the country of hard currency income.

August 20 2001 at 09:40PM


By Patrick Leeman

Almost half of all adult deaths in South Africa can now be attributed to Aids, according to information gathered from death certificates.

This is according to the latest LoveLife report entitled Impending Catastrophe Revisited.

The publication says that, while these reports still need to be verified, without HIV/Aids, the South African population would have been expected to grow from 43,7 million to 51,3 million by 2010.

As a result of the pandemic, however, and excluding migration, the population is expected to reach only 47 million in 2010 in a best-case scenario.


The educational sector has a responsibility
In the worst-case scenario, the population will peak at 46,7 million in 2008 and show negative growth after that.

The LoveLife report says that, for the past five years, the prevalence of HIV/Aids among teenagers has been above 10 percent. However, for the past three years it has been above 15 percent.

It is clear more attention needs to be given to preventing HIV infections in this age group.

While there is a high level of awareness about HIV/Aids among South African teenagers, many are nevertheless exposed to high-risk situations.

The report says a recent survey indicated 35 percent of teenage girls had been pregnant or had a child by the age of 19.


Nevirapine has been shown to dramatically reduce transmission at birth
Of particular concern was the alleged sexual abuse and rape of schoolgirls by their teachers.

The report says the educational sector has a responsibility to facilitate the empowerment of girls, decrease their exposure to high-risk situations, and ensure educational institutions are free from sexual harassment.

The latest issue of the South African Medical Journal says research at the University of Cape Town has shown antiretroviral therapy significantly decreases the incidence of tuberculosis. This, it points out, occurs even in a country such as ours where TB rates may be among the highest in the world.

These new drugs, the report says, could be a powerful strategy for the control of HIV-associated TB.

The HIV/Aids lobby group Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) is to announce details on Tuesday of a plan to take the government to court over drugs that can prevent HIV transmission from mother to child.

TAC last year threatened a formal challenge over the government's refusal to make the antiretroviral nevirapine available for this purpose in state facilities.

It withdrew the threat when the department of health announced Nevirapine pilot sites were to be set up in each province.

However, TAC spokesperson Anneke Meerkotter said it had become clear the sites were inadequate.

"A pilot site is just that, a research site. So there's no commitment to anything beyond that," she said.

TAC's national executive said the organisation's attorneys wrote to Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang in July asking why nevirapine was not widely available.

Nevirapine has been shown to dramatically reduce transmission at birth, and supporters of its use argue the expense of the one-off treatment is offset by the savings on treatment of HIV-infected children.

UNAids said in October last year its safety and effectiveness warranted use "beyond pilot projects and research settings".



Zimbabwe food harvests plummet
August 02 2001 at 03:41PM
Harare - White farmers, most facing confiscation of their land and violence from ruling party militants, estimated on Thursday that their overall production of food and tobacco will fall by more than 25 percent this year.

The Commercial Farmers Union, representing about four thousand white farmers, said its members' harvests of corn, the staple food, would slump by about 25 percent from 510 000 tons last year to about 384 000 tons.

In the large scale commercial farming sector "every aspect of production is affected by the current lawlessness on farms and the orchestrated violence," said the union's deputy director Jerry Grant.

In a report to the union's annual convention, Grant said tobacco production this year dropped by 20 percent, beef output declined by 15 percent and a 40 percent drop in cotton production by white farmers was forecast.


'Appeals for aid to avert famine are ironic'
Zimbabwe is the world's second largest tobacco exporter after Brazil.

Agriculture is the country's main earner of hard currency.

Grant said 90 percent of the nation's white-owned tobacco farms were listed by the government for nationalisation under its "fast track" program to give land to landless blacks without compensation being paid.

Because of high input costs needed to cultivate tobacco and uncertainty, violence and a loss of confidence in the nation's tobacco industry, the crop was set to further decline, worsening acute hard currency shortages in the economy, said Grant.

Since March, ruling party militants have illegally occupied more than 1 700 white-owned farms and black settlers have been moved onto hundreds of others, where state officials have allocated them plots.


'We have to do the best we can to survive'
The government has ignored six court rulings to remove squatters and follow land reform laws passed by the ruling party last year.

President Robert Mugabe has described land seizures as justified to correct unfair land ownership by whites since the colonial era before independence in 1980.

White farmers produce about one third of the nation's corn in the agriculture-based economy.

Grant said the government acknowledged the nation was facing food shortages later in the year, blamed largely on state-backed disruptions to farming.

"Appeals by the government for humanitarian aid to avert famine are ironic in the extreme when the root of the problem is widely recognised as the politics of that very government," he said.

Overall commercial farm production was set to decline by 27 percent by the end of the year despite above average rainfall for the third successive year.

"The chaotic situation on farms has impacted seriously on farmers' viability. When will the madness end? We are unable to answer that. However, end it will, for the situation is simply not sustainable and the country will once more be governed pragmatically and responsibly," said Grant.

Eight white farmers have been killed in the violent campaign of land seizures.

White farmers own about one-third of the nation's productive land, where about two million farm workers and their family members live.

About eight million people live on the remainder.

The government has targeted more than 4 500 farms - about 95 percent of farms owned by whites - for confiscation.

"As farmers, we have to do the best we can to survive the present chaos and be ready once more to play our part when the time comes," said Grant



Deaths don't stop Zim doctors' strike
August 01 2001 at 08:10PM
Harare - Zimbabwe's striking junior doctors said on Wednesday that negotiations to end a week-old wage strike remained deadlocked and that they would continue their action until their grievances had been settled.

"There is no resolution and the strike continues," said Sibert Mandega, president of the Hospital Doctors Association.

The doctors stopped work last Tuesday, crippling Zimbabwe's crumbling public health sector, to press for higher salaries and allowances. The strike, barely four months after a similar work stoppage by doctors, has been joined by nurses.

The largely state-owned Herald newspaper said on Wednesday that 26 people had died at Harare Central Hospital in the preceding two days. It said some of them would have lived if were not for the strike.


'We regret any loss of lives because of the strike'
It quoted hospital officials as saying army doctors had been called in to offer relief at the main Harare Central and Parirenyatwa hospitals.

"We regret any loss of lives because of the strike, but we have been forced to take this action by our employers," said Mandega.

Doctors say they are also striking in support of senior specialists who withdrew their services nearly a month ago to press their demands for higher salaries and allowances.

In 1999, state doctors at major hospitals went on a
10-day strike to press for on-call payout increases, leading to a doubling of their salaries.

Poor salaries and working conditions have led to an exodus of medical staff to other countries in the past 10 years. - Reuters


The 2001 Corruption Perceptions Index
CountryRank Country 2001CPIScore SurveysUsed StandardDeviation High-LowRange
1 Finland 9.9 7 0.6 9.2 - 10.6
2 Denmark 9.5 7 0.7 8.8 - 10.6
3 New Zealand 9.4 7 0.6 8.6 - 10.2
4 Iceland 9.2 6 1.1 7.4 - 10.1
Singapore 9.2 12 0.5 8.5 - 9.9
6 Sweden 9.0 8 0.5 8.2 - 9.7
7 Canada 8.9 8 0.5 8.2 - 9.7
8 Netherlands 8.8 7 0.3 8.4 - 9.2
9 Luxembourg 8.7 6 0.5 8.1 - 9.5
10 Norway 8.6 7 0.8 7.4 - 9.6
11 Australia 8.5 9 0.9 6.8 - 9.4
12 Switzerland 8.4 7 0.5 7.4 - 9.2
13 United Kingdom 8.3 9 0.5 7.4 - 8.8
14 Hong Kong 7.9 11 0.5 7.2 - 8.7
15 Austria 7.8 7 0.5 7.2 - 8.7
16 Israel 7.6 8 0.3 7.3 - 8.1
USA 7.6 11 0.7 6.1 - 9.0
18 Chile 7.5 9 0.6 6.5 - 8.5
Ireland 7.5 7 0.3 6.8 - 7.9
20 Germany 7.4 8 0.8 5.8 - 8.6
21 Japan 7.1 11 0.9 5.6 - 8.4
22 Spain 7.0 8 0.7 5.8 - 8.1
23 France 6.7 8 0.8 5.6 - 7.8
24 Belgium 6.6 7 0.7 5.7 - 7.6
25 Portugal 6.3 8 0.8 5.3 - 7.4
26 Botswana 6.0 3 0.5 5.6 - 6.6
27 Taiwan 5.9 11 1.0 4.6 - 7.3
28 Estonia 5.6 5 0.3 5.0 - 6.0
29 Italy 5.5 9 1.0 4.0 - 6.9
30 Namibia 5.4 3 1.4 3.8 - 6.7
31 Hungary 5.3 10 0.8 4.0 - 6.2
Trinidad & Tobago 5.3 3 1.5 3.8 - 6.9
Tunisia 5.3 3 1.3 3.8 - 6.5
34 Slovenia 5.2 7 1.0 4.1 - 7.1
35 Uruguay 5.1 4 0.7 4.4 - 5.8
36 Malaysia 5.0 11 0.7 3.8 - 5.9
37 Jordan 4.9 4 0.8 3.8 - 5.7
38 Lithuania 4.8 5 1.5 3.8 - 7.5
South Africa 4.8 10 0.7 3.8 - 5.6
40 Costa Rica 4.5 5 0.7 3.7 - 5.6
Mauritius 4.5 5 0.7 3.9 - 5.6
42 Greece 4.2 8 0.6 3.6 - 5.6
South Korea 4.2 11 0.7 3.4 - 5.6
44 Peru 4.1 6 1.1 2.0 - 5.3
Poland 4.1 10 0.9 2.9 - 5.6
46 Brazil 4.0 9 0.3 3.5 - 4.5
47 Bulgaria 3.9 6 0.6 3.2 - 5.0
Croatia 3.9 3 0.6 3.4 - 4.6
Czech Republic 3.9 10 0.9 2.6 - 5.6
50 Colombia 3.8 9 0.6 3.0 - 4.5
51 Mexico 3.7 9 0.6 2.5 - 5.0
Panama 3.7 3 0.4 3.1 - 4.0
Slovak Republic 3.7 7 0.9 2.1 - 4.9
54 Egypt 3.6 7 1.5 1.2 - 6.2
El Salvador 3.6 5 0.9 2.0 - 4.3
Turkey 3.6 9 0.8 2.0 - 4.5
57 Argentina 3.5 9 0.6 2.9 - 4.4
China 3.5 10 0.4 2.7 - 3.9
59 Ghana 3.4 3 0.5 2.9 - 3.8
Latvia 3.4 3 1.2 2.0 - 4.3
61 Malawi 3.2 3 1.0 2.0 - 3.9
Thailand 3.2 12 0.9 0.6 - 4.0
63 Dominican Rep 3.1 3 0.9 2.0 - 3.9
Moldova 3.1 3 0.9 2.1 - 3.8
65 Guatemala 2.9 4 0.9 2.0 - 4.2
Philippines 2.9 11 0.9 1.6 - 4.8
Senegal 2.9 3 0.8 2.2 - 3.8
Zimbabwe 2.9 6 1.1 1.6 - 4.7
69 Romania 2.8 5 0.5 2.0 - 3.4
Venezuela 2.8 9 0.4 2.0 - 3.6
71 Honduras 2.7 3 1.1 2.0 - 4.0
India 2.7 12 0.5 2.1 - 3.8
Kazakhstan 2.7 3 1.3 1.8 - 4.3
Uzbekistan 2.7 3 1.1 2.0 - 4.0
75 Vietnam 2.6 7 0.7 1.5 - 3.8
Zambia 2.6 3 0.5 2.0 - 3.0
77 Cote d´Ivoire 2.4 3 1.0 1.5 - 3.6
Nicaragua 2.4 3 0.8 1.9 - 3.4
79 Ecuador 2.3 6 0.3 1.8 - 2.6
Pakistan 2.3 3 1.7 0.8 - 4.2
Russia 2.3 10 1.2 0.3 - 4.2
82 Tanzania 2.2 3 0.6 1.6 - 2.9
83 Ukraine 2.1 6 1.1 1.0 - 4.3
84 Azerbaijan 2.0 3 0.2 1.8 - 2.2
Bolivia 2.0 5 0.6 1.5 - 3.0
Cameroon 2.0 3 0.8 1.2 - 2.9
Kenya 2.0 4 0.7 0.9 - 2.6
88 Indonesia 1.9 12 0.8 0.2 - 3.1
Uganda 1.9 3 0.6 1.3 - 2.4
90 Nigeria 1.0 4 0.9 -0.1 - 2.0
91 Bangladesh 0.4 3 2.9 -1.7 - 3.8
Note on the Bangladesh score:
Data for this country in 2001 was available from only three independent survey sources, and each of these yielded very different results. While the composite score is 0.4, the range of individual survey results is from -1.7 to +3.8. This is a greater range than for any other country. TI stresses, therefore, that this result needs to be viewed with caution


Mugabe's Family: Ties of Blood and Clan Bring Plum Jobs and Contracts print friendly version



author/source:ZWNEWS
published:Wed 18-Jul-2001
posted on this site:Wed 18-Jul-2001

Article Type : News

Charity begins at home

By a Special CorrespondentOver two decades in office President Robert Mugabe has proved himself a family man. He has diverted plum political jobs and state-funded contracts not only to his favourite nephews and nieces, but throughout a network of extended families belonging to his Gushongo clan. Where there's power and privilege, there, too, are relatives and clansmen of 77-year-old Mugabe: a hugely wealthy businessmen, a former head of the state-run radio and TV, government ministers; the boss of the national football association; top civil servants, members of Parliament.The best-known beneficiaries are the president's favourite sister, Sabina Mugabe, and her children. Since independence in 1980, Sabina Mugabe has been the member of Parliament for the Mugabe family's home area Zvimba, about 80 kilometres north-west of Harare. She is also Secretary for Finance in the ruling Zanu PF party's influential Women's League. All of Sabina's children, except one, use her maiden surname.Her eldest son, Innocent Mugabe, was director of the state's feared Central Intelligence Organisation until his death in June after unspecified surgery. Sabina's second son, Leo Mugabe, is probably the most prominent Mugabe relative to amass huge wealth since independence. He is owner and chief executive of Integrated Engineering Group, a construction and telecommunications consortium. IEG has been awarded contracts running into billions of dollars to construct public buildings and facilities, often ahead of far more experienced construction companies. Its biggest coup came in 1996 when, in association with the Cyprus-based Air Harbour Technologies, IEG won the contract to build the recently commissioned Harare International Airport terminal. The company's tender was fourth behind bids from established international airport building companies. Leo's other interests include Joy Television, and chairmanship of the Zimbabwe Football Association. Critics in the soccer fraternity say he is inept and blame him for the decline of the national team. Leo's brother Patrick Zhuwawo, the only one among Sabina's children who does not use the Mugabe name, manages IEG businesses.Other families who have benefited from the Mugabe tie include:UshewokunzeThis family is related to Mugabe through his mother, Bona, who was a strong influence on him. Mugabe appointed two Ushewokunze uncles, now both dead, as ministers in his Zanu PF government. Herbert Ushewokunze held various cabinet posts and was also political commissar, a vital job in Zanu PF's communist-style politburo. However, Herbert, a medical doctor, was one of the few Mugabe relatives who could claim to have risen through merit. A veteran nationalist , he was in exile in Mozambique during the 1970s war which ended white-minority rule. Unlike other relatives, he clashed with Mugabe in government. But although he was demoted several times, he was never really dropped. At the time of his death in 1995, he was the chairman of the influential Harare Zanu PF provincial executive committee.Christopher Ushewokunze who lectured at the University of Zimbabwe, was an advisor to Mugabe on industry and business affairs, and Minister of Commerce and Industry.ChikeremaAnother family related to Mugabe through his mother. Chikerema uncles and cousins have benefited from the tie - although their relations have not always been rosy. James Dambaza Chikerema was a rival of Mugabe in the nationalist movement of the early 60s. However, in 1999 Mugabe appointed Chikerema to a Constitutional Commission designed further to entrench his rule and thwart calls for a more democratic constitution. The commission's constitution was rejected in a referendum in February 2000.Charles Chikerema, James' brother, edited the government-run Sunday Mail, and when he died in 1998 was in charge of its daily stablemate, The Herald. In 1997, Simba Makoni, current Finance Minister and then chief executive of Zimpapers (Pvt.) Ltd., tried to sack Chikerema – and instead got fired himself on Mugabe's instructions.Mushayakarara: The relationship dates to earlier generations and Mugabe, in accordance with African custom, regards the current Mushayakararas as his nieces and nephews. Elisha Mushayakarara, a former permanent secretary in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, is now the chief executive of the state financial services group Financial Holdings (Finhold). The group owns Zimbabwe's fourth largest bank, the Zimbabwe Banking Corporation. Lupi Mushayakarara, sister to Elisha, is an occasional critic of the Mugabe government but appears to have benefited from the family tie. In 1999 she quit the National Constitutional Assembly, a coalition of civic bodies campaigning for a new and democratic constitution, after Mugabe gave her a job on his Constitutional Commission.MaponderaBrothers John and Hosea Mapondera and their sister Esnath Mapondera have also enjoyed the fruits of old and entwining relationships with the Mugabe family. Hosea is a former director-general of the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation, and John and Esnath sits on the boards of various government-owned companies.ChiyangwaA scion of this family which belongs to Mugabe's Gushungo clan is Philip Chiyangwa, a former member of Ian Smith's Rhodesian army, and now the self-styled champion of black economic empowerment. Chiyangwa, who has direct access to Mugabe, has lucrative business interests in Zimbabwe and in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He is also Zanu PF chairman in Mashonaland West, Mugabe's home province.MuteroMembers of this family also enjoy the status of Mugabe nephews and nieces. Betty Mutero sits on the boards of several companies.


Zimbabwe black middle class flee amid coup fears print friendly version



author/source:Sunday Telegraph (UK)
published:Sun 3-Jun-2001
posted on this site:Sun 3-Jun-2001

Article Type : News

A priceless asset is being driven to seek safety across the globe.

By David Blair in HarareThere was a sense of doom and gloom yesterday as hundreds of passengers waited to board flight UM724 from Harare to London. Almost all of those crowded round the Air Zimbabwe check-in desk were black, smartly dressed and, judging by their bulging suitcases and tearful relatives, not planning to return. President Robert Mugabe's regime might have furiously dismissed reports that senior generals are plotting a coup, but the rumours have added to the climate of fear that is driving tens of thousands out of Zimbabwe. While Mr Mugabe has singled out the white community for vilification, the overwhelming majority of those fleeing are the blacks whose interests he claims to serve.Every flight out of the new international airport in Harare carries several hundred more on the journey to escape the fastest shrinking economy in Africa, in which Mr Mugabe presides over an all but worthless currency, mass unemployment and an inflation rate of 57 per cent that wipes out earnings and savings. While few diplomats believe that a coup is likely, the suggestion that a cabal of hardline generals could replace Mr Mugabe adds to the list of dangers from which Zimbabweans are fleeing. Air Marshal Perence Shiri, named as a central figure in the alleged plot, is inextricably linked with the worst excesses of the Mugabe regime. He led the brutal crackdown against dissidents in Matabeleland in the 1980s, which claimed at least 5,000 lives. Last year, he helped to organise the invasion of white-owned farms by mobs claiming to be veterans of the war against white rule. The "war veterans", who have become the shock troops of the regime, claim to be waging a revolutionary struggle to empower blacks with wealth seized from whites. Yet their murderous activities have forced more and more blacks to fill the flights leaving Zimbabwe.Although few figures are available, there is clear evidence of the scale of the exodus. According to the Ministry of Health, 16,000 Zimbabwean nurses left to work in British hospitals last year. More than 45,000 people were caught by the authorities last year as they made illegal attempts to reach South Africa by fording the Limpopo river. Perhaps five succeed for every one whose attempt is foiled. Packing companies have recorded an enormous surge in business. In 1999, Prime Forwarders, a leading freight company, helped two families to leave for Britain. It now makes this arrangement at least 10 times a week. Bernard Chimedza, the company's director, said: "It's mainly the black Africans who are leaving." According to figures supplied by removal companies, about 300,000 of Zimbabwe's 12 million residents have fled the country.Most have gone to South Africa. Britain appears to be the second most popular destination, while Australia and New Zealand have also taken large numbers. Rudo Maumburudze, 23, an employee in the customer services department of a mobile telephone company, is preparing to leave for London in three weeks' time. The collapse of Zimbabwe's economy has already forced Miss Maumburudze's sister, Jesse, 27, to move t America, her brother, Tapiwa, 25, to emigrate to South Africa, and dozens of her friends to settle in Britain. "The Zimbabwe dollar is worth nothing," she said. "I have to earn wages in a real currency. We work, work, work here and we get paid peanuts. I want to go to Britain to work, study and have a real life.”Many blacks are leaving for political reasons. As civil servants, all nurses are expected to support Mr Mugabe's Zanu-PF party and the "war veterans" have singled them out for intimidation. A presidential election is due by next April and a violent campaign has already begun. Andrea Ndhlovu (not her real name), who works at Harare Central Hospital, has decided to seek the safety of Britain. She said: "There is no future in Zimbabwe. The coming election really worries me and I don't want to be here when it happens.” White Zimbabweans have been leaving the country since Mr Mugabe came to power in 1980 and the trickle has now become a flood. A pre-independence population of 250,000 has plummeted to about 60,000. Almost alone in Africa, Zimbabwe once boasted a sizeable middle class of educated, black professionals. Now that priceless asset is being driven to seek safety across the globe.

Zimbabwe Doctors Flee as AIDS Crisis Widens print friendly version



author/source:New York Times
published:Sat 2-Jun-2001
posted on this site:Sun 3-Jun-2001

Article Type : Report

Fleeing the deepening hardships in Zimbabwe and following the lure of opportunities unimaginable here, medical professionals are abandoning the country as never before.

Henri E. CauvinBulawayo - Like the rest of the country's hospitals, Mpilo Central is sick. Mpilo, the biggest hospital here in Zimbabwe's second-biggest city, is losing its doctors, its nurses, its pharmacists and, slowly, its spirit. Fleeing the deepening hardships in Zimbabwe and following the lure of opportunities unimaginable here, medical professionals are abandoning the country as never before. The health care system, as a result, is sinking into crisis, consuming the colleagues left behind.Mpilo, for example, which handles many of the most difficult cases in the region, now has just one general surgeon instead of three to serve its 1,037 beds. "I am on call every day," the surgeon, Dr. Julio Feliu, said one afternoon after completing seven scheduled operations before heading off to teach a medical school class. Over the last few years, as many as 100 doctors and hundreds – if not thousands - of nurses are estimated to have emigrated from this nation of 11 million people. While losing medical professionals is neither new nor unique to Zimbabwe, the scope appears unprecedented.With one of the world's worst AIDS epidemics and with its economy in turmoil, the country could hardly be more vulnerable. Indeed, business executives, teachers, engineers and others are leaving too, costing Zimbabwe much of the enormously successful investment it made in education after blacks won majority rule 21 years ago. Their marketability is a testament to Zimbabwe's successes in improving education and nurturing a black professional class. But those achievements are in jeopardy as people flee. Zimbabwe's economy, once one of Africa's most promising, is a wreck. A standoff over how white-owned farmland should be redistributed has roiled the country and harmed agriculture, the country's economic base. Exports and tourism are down, giving the country little of the foreign currency it needs for imports like fuel and drugs for its health care system. Unhappy with the state's policies and priorities, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund have cut Zimbabwe off, and President Robert Mugabe has refused to make concessions. Inflation is at nearly 60 percent. Professionals like the doctors at Mpilo, who envisioned lives of at least modest prosperity for their families, instead find themselves struggling to cover their bills."It's money first and foremost," said Dr. Zulu Mahlangu, the acting medical superintendent of Mpilo, when asked what was luring away his staff. Doctors in government service typically earn to $1,100 a month and nurses to , according to the Health Ministry and the nurses' union. So when countries like Australia, Britain, Canada and the United States, all facing critical health care staffing shortages, have come calling, they have found legions of workers looking for something better. "It was mostly junior doctors at first, but now even people who are in private practice, senior doctors, are leaving - it's a lot more now," said a specialist in his 40's who works for a government hospital. "They are worrying about the education of their kids, their security, the general economic climate."Opened in 1957, Mpilo Central would, in another time, seem a decent place to work. Set on 28 acres a couple of miles northwest of the city's central business district, it appears spare, but well kept. It is not cutting edge, but neither is it a medical wasteland. Such mundane charms apparently no longer suffice for many of Zimbabwe's medical professionals. Of the 600 posts for doctors in government hospitals, nearly 100 are vacant, as are 600 of the 5,000 positions for general nurses, said Davies G. Dhlakama, the Health Ministry's director of technical support.Dr. Barton Matshe is one of three staff obstetricians at Mpilo - which delivers 11,000 babies a year. The other two are on loan from Cuba, and go home for several weeks each year. By Dr. Matshe's reckoning, Mpilo should have at least six obstetricians; by the hospital's, it should have at least five. No one expects more anytime soon. Dr. Matshe came to Bulawayo, eager to go where his skills are "really needed." Now, however, there are days when he questions his judgement. A 37-year-old father of three, he was born in Shurugwi, 125 miles northeast of here. After studying at the University of Zimbabwe Medical School in the capital, Harare, he fulfilled his required government service at the city's public hospitals. Then, like many other young doctors, he left the country to train in his chosen specialty. He spent six years in Cape Town, South Africa, and Johannesburg and six months ago he started work here."Part of me thinks I made the right decision, but there are times that I think from a personal point of view and from a professional point of view," he said, "that it wasn't quite the right decision." The fees each term for his two children in primary schools come to more than his monthly salary. Bulawayo, with 800,000 people, is the business hub of southern Zimbabwe. In many ways it is better off than the rural areas in its ability to attract doctors and nurses. But then those small rural hospitals are not asked to take on the most challenging cases, as Mpilo is. "We hardly ever see any low-risk patients," Dr. Matshe said.And Bulawayo finds itself a second choice for many specialists, who prefer to be in Harare. The capital has not been spared, however. Even medical professionals who remain in Zimbabwe are devoting more time to private practice, which offers the only, albeit diminishing, hope of earning a good living. The sort of specialized treatment that was once available only in the capital is increasingly not offered any more. For example, children with rheumatic heart disease now have little chance of ever having the surgery they need. "It's disheartening when the children keep coming back and saying, `Why can't I be fixed,' and you have to say, `Because the government has no money for operations,' " said Andrew Bowman, a cardiologist and secretary of the Zimbabwe Medical Association. "It's very sad."Parirenyatwa, the only hospital in the country with the facilities to perform open heart surgery, no longer offers this surgery. The equipment is still there, but there is no money for essential supplies, said one of the country's few cardiac surgeons. What that has meant, the surgeon said, is that the few patients with medical insurance and enough money travel to South Africa for the surgery. "Those who cannot afford it," the surgeon said, "are dying - and there are a lot of them."The day-to-day frustrations erode the faith of many doctors and nurses in what they are doing and give them another reason to leave, on top of the economic hardships. The medical professionals who stay say they understand the thinking of the ones who don't. "It's very personal, and you can't interfere with that kind of decision," said Dr. Matshe, the obstetrician at Mpilo Central Hospital. After all, the idea of leaving has occurred to almost all of them. "I suppose all of us have at some point or another thought about, but somebody has to hang around here," said Dr. Mahlangu, Mpilo's medical superintendent. "I was born here. I was brought up here. This is home."


Driver #2 got bitten by the evil snake
author/source:Sunday Telegraph (UK)
published:Sun 20-May-2001
posted on this site:Mon 21-May-2001

Article Type : News

Street signs melted down for coffin handles

Christina LambThe first time it happened to me, I couldn't quite believe it. I had arrived in Harare, a place I had reported from for years, though hadn't been to for some months, breezily checked into Meikles hotel, where all the journalists stay, and caught a cab over to the Sheraton to find my usual driver. "Can you call Solomon for me?" I asked the bell captain. "Sorry Aunty, we have no Solomon," he replied. "Yes, you do. You know Solomon, Driver No 2," I insisted in that arrogant way we representatives of the British press unfortunately seem to adopt the moment we arrive in a Third World country, leaving the words "You Silly Man" hanging unspoken in mid-air."Driver No 2 is ended," he said. What could he mean? Had mild-mannered Solomon with his funny black pork-pie hat been struck off the register? With a sinking feeling I remembered forcing him to drive straight through a roadblock of war veterans, in addition to secretly taking me to one of his cousins who had served as a soldier in the Congo. All for a few lines in a long-forgotten article. Had Mugabe's henchmen somehow found out and persecuted him? In today's Zimbabwe anything is possible. Eventually the bell captain explained. "Driver No 2 has gone to the sky. He was got by the evil snake."I looked at him in horror. The evil snake is how some Africans refer to Aids. I shouldn't have been shocked. I knew the statistics. Four out of 10 young men in Zimbabwe are HIV positive so there was a good chance that many people who I have come to know here would die of the disease. There is a vast difference, however, between reading the statistics and losing your friends. Solomon and I had been through a lot together. He often got us lost, but always cheerfully, and was endlessly resourceful, persuading a group of baffled villagers on an oxcart to go back and forth along the gleaming Robert Mugabe Highway for a photograph until the ox lost patience and landed them all in a ditch.He loved asking me questions about London - how many buffaloes we had in the streets, how many cows my husband had paid for me, and was ecstatic to know that we too had a Woolworths just like that in Harare. Solomon was younger than me and for years he had worried that I - in my thirties - was getting old and was still single, so he was overjoyed the time I turned up and told him I was now a respectable married woman. He had a baby son born only two weeks after mine. Gift was the name of his child because he was a much longed for son who would in years to come bring in income for the family. While my son has a wooden crib and a plastic chest full of cars and Thomas the Tank Engines and musical cubes which make sounds when pieces are dropped inside, Gift slept in a drawer and his toys consisted of a cardboard box stuck with magazine pictures and a tin can with a stone in for a rattle. What would Gift's future be without a father who was the only wage-earner supporting eight people living in their two-room shack?Harare is full of ragged Aids orphans living by begging coins or catching pigeons which they roast on pavement fires. I tried to track down the family but when I finally found Solomon's shack, it was empty and no one knew where they had gone. Harare for me is not the same without Solomon. He and his ilk are the real unsung heroes of journalism - they are the people who, for 50 dollars a day, will risk their lives and their vehicles driving us to front lines or opposition activists in hiding. We western journalists kid ourselves that it is a fair deal as we are paying them what might be the equivalent of a month's wage, conveniently forgetting that while we can get the next plane out, they must live with the consequences.Unfortunately Solomon's fate is becoming all too common in southern Africa, where according to the United Nations Programme on Aids, half of all 15-year-olds can expect to die of the disease. All too often now when I arrive in places and telephone contacts, from local journalists to academics, there is a silence and then I am told the person has died. In the past year I have lost the wonderfully-named Good News in the Niger delta - a would-be Michael Schumacher who insisted that if we didn't drive at 200mph we would be kidnapped. I will also miss Haile in Addis Ababa with his flashing fairy lights taped along his windscreen and his pirated Bruce Springsteen tapes, not to mention Parks Mankahlana, the talented if somewhat prickly spokesman for Nelson Mandela.A whole generation is being wiped out. My friend David who runs a large farm in northern Zambia says he despairs of training supervisors and mechanics as they all keep dying. In 1998, Zambia lost 1,300 teachers to Aids in 10 months. In Ivory Coast, seven out of 10 teachers' deaths are due to HIV. By 2010, life expectancy will have fallen to 29 in Botswana, 30 in Swaziland, and 33 in Namibia and Zimbabwe. At the moment there seems little cause for hope. The problem is not just the prohibitive cost of Western drugs but also attitudes in countries where sex at truck-stops costs less than breakfast and government ministers see fund-raising for Aids as an easy way to line their own pockets.In many African countries men do not expect to be faithful and often take several wives. If a husband dies, his wife is often then taken on by his brother, thus passing on the infection. The situation is getting worse. Back in Harare last week all the road signs had disappeared. I asked where they had gone. The reply was sinister. While the traffic light bulbs have been taken by nightclubs unable to obtain them because of the country's foreign exchange crisis, the street signs are being melted down to provide metal for coffin handles.



Experts warn of mass starvation in Zimbabwe print friendly version



author/source:Sunday Independent (SA)
published:Sun 20-May-2001
posted on this site:Mon 21-May-2001

Article Type : News

In rural areas, people are already complaining that they cannot buy basic foodstuffs because of rampant inflation.

By Basildon PetaHarare - A team of international food experts has concluded that Zimbabwe faces starvation on a massive scale because of serious disruptions in its farming activities. The international team said the Zimbabwean government needed to re-establish relations with donors urgently to get assistance to import food and meet expected deficits in staple agricultural crops this year. The warning of mass starvation was contained in a study concluded last week by a team of food experts from the World Food Programme (WFP), the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) and the early warning unit of the Southern African Development Community (SADC).The team was in Zimbabwe to establish the impact of the disruptions in farming activities by restive war veterans and supporters of the ruling Zanu-PF party. It is understood that the team decided to release its report on Zimbabwe after it had concluded similar studies in Swaziland and Mozambique so that the report would not appear as though it was targeting Zimbabwe. "It would be better if the report is released as part of a wider study on regional countries than just on Zimbabwe, for political reasons," said a source close to the team.The team confirmed estimates by Zimbabwe's farming industry that the nation would face a 600 000 ton deficit of maize, the country's staple crop, this year. The country needs at least 1,8 million tons of maize annually to feed its population of 12 million. This year farmers are expected to produce only 800 000 tons of maize in addition to the 500 000 tons that would be drawn from the strategic grain reserves, leaving a deficit of about 600 000 tons. Most of the maize crop this year would be drawn from peasant farmers scattered throughout the country. The large-scale farmers who normally supplement the peasants' output to meet Zimbabwe's annual needs hardly engaged in maize production last season because of the activities of the war veterans.The team also estimated a massive deficit exceeding 200 000 tons in wheat output. A possible wheat deficit has already been confirmed implicitly by the Zimbabwe government, which last month banned all wheat exports. Zimbabwe needs about 450 000 tons of wheat annually and might find itself having to import a substantial part of this. The SADC, FAO and WFP team forecast deficits for other crops such as sorghum, peanuts, soya beans and an assortment of vegetables.In rural areas, people are already complaining that they cannot buy basic foodstuffs because of rampant inflation. The price of bread was raised by an average 12 percent this year, and even reports in state-controlled media warn that the new prices of basic foodstuffs had gone far beyond the reach of poor families. The price of bread will rise again soon after Zimbabwe runs out of its wheat stocks and must start importing the grain. However, the country has no hard currency to pay for imports. Mark Prior, the chairperson of the National Bakers' Association, said there was not much the bakers could do as they could no longer absorb the ever-escalating input costs. He said the cost of flour, yeast, fats, packaging and transport had gone up in the past few months. Shortages of foreign currency have persisted in Zimbabwe and created a power and fuel crisis which has lasted for more than a year. The lawlessness supported by Mugabe's government has transformed Zimbabwe into a pariah state and most donors have frozen aid.




author/source:New York Times
published:Mon 14-May-2001
posted on this site:Wed 16-May-2001

Article Type : News

Washington and Pretoria can wait no longer

By Robert I. RotbergThe economic and political cancer of President Robert G. Mugabe's regime in Zimbabwe now promises to spread to South Africa - and so endanger the continent. Zimbabwe's man-made tragedy desperately threatens all its neighbors, and deeply compromises American attempts to help Africa help itself. President Mugabe's paramilitary troops have brutalized and killed opponents; assaulted lawyers, human rights activists and democratic reformers; and invaded factories and universities as well as farms. Washington, London and Pretoria must act together to end this lawlessness before it undermines the entire region.Mr. Mugabe turned recklessly violent when the Movement for Democratic Change challenged his 20-year omnipotence. The months before last June's parliamentary elections were rife with intimidation; Mr. Mugabe's paramilitaries killed many opposition activists. The Movement for Democratic Change still won 57 seats in the 150-seat parliament. Before the election, Mr. Mugabe had controlled all but three seats.In reaction, Mr. Mugabe and his associates have ignored rulings by the Supreme Court and forced the chief justice to resign, illegally occupied hundreds of (white-run) farms, killed prominent farmers and their supporters, closed radio stations, bombed the only independent daily newspaper, arrested leading opposition figures, legislated to prevent the Movement for Democratic Change from receiving funds from abroad, and rebuffed Secretary General Kofi Annan of the United Nations, the president of Nigeria, and the British and American governments.As a result of these and other developments to its north, South Africa has seen its own currency depreciated, its economic growth compromised and its race relations, especially in the white farming sector, endangered. Mr. Mugabe has repeatedly snubbed President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa. Nearly a million immigrants have walked into South Africa from Zimbabwe - an exodus that endangers South Africa's economic future. President Mbeki fears the spread of Zimbabwe's violence to his own country.Mr. Mugabe hopes to destroy the opposition in advance of next year's presidential election. Only Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change is a credible challenger. "I am firmly asserting to you," Mr. Mugabe told a rally in April, "that there will never come a day when the M.D.C. will rule this country - never, ever." The intimidation has escalated in part because serious shortages of wheat and maize - Zimbabwean dietary staples - are expected later this year. Zimbabwe has had virtually no foreign exchange since September, and production of its biggest exports, tobacco and gold, has shrunk considerably. A trickle of petroleum and electric power continues to arrive from South Africa. Zimbabweans now experience long lines for gasoline and frequent brownouts. Inflation has soared, the currency has lost much of its value against other currencies, gross domestic product has fallen 10 percent, unemployment has reached 60 percent, tourism has declined by more than half, and hospitals and schools barely function. Twenty-five percent of all adults are infected with H.I.V.Life in Zimbabwe is increasingly brutish and short, and most of the responsibility lies with Mr. Mugabe. Washington and Pretoria cannot wait until after next year's election to act, hoping that Zimbabwe will save itself. Mr. Mugabe will not let a free election occur. Constructive engagement can no longer curb Mr. Mugabe's assaults on Zimbabweans or his flouting of international norms. Pretoria has shown new signs of alarm since South African-owned businesses were attacked last month. South Africa should now stop supplying fuel. Most Western donors, including the International Monetary Fund, have already frozen aid, and many charitable organizations have abandoned their operations - not least because of attacks by paramilitaries. Washington should refuse visas to Zimbabwean officials and their relatives and work further to isolate Zimbabwe until Mr. Mugabe stops oppressing his people and restores the rule of law.Robert I. Rotberg is director of the Program on Intrastate Conflict at Harvard's Kennedy School and president of the World Peace Foundation.