tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16711557.post6249748341783722402..comments2024-03-24T20:40:46.666-04:00Comments on Pan-African News Wire: Zimbabwe News Bulletin: ZANU-PF Wants Recount in 21 Constituencies;
Court Ruling Monday; ANC Supports SADC SummitPan-African News Wirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10958190577776906688noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16711557.post-87034005324852866932008-04-10T12:09:00.000-04:002008-04-10T12:09:00.000-04:00ZIMBABWE Zim war vets deny farm invasionsThu, 10 A...ZIMBABWE <BR/><BR/>Zim war vets deny farm invasions<BR/><BR/>Thu, 10 Apr 2008<BR/><BR/>A leader of Zimbabwe's feared war veterans, hardline supporters of President Robert Mugabe, on Thursday denied the invasion of white-owned farms in the wake of a poll dispute. <BR/><BR/>"There are no farm invasions in Zimbabwe," national chairperson of the War Veterans Association Jabulani Sibanda told SABC radio. <BR/><BR/>Sibanda said war veterans had merely gone to investigate claims that whites were preparing to "take back the land" after opposition Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai declared he had won the presidential poll. <BR/><BR/>President Robert Mugabe's ruling Zanu-PF has been fanning the flames of the land issue in a bid to discredit Tsvangirai, whom they typecast as a pro-Western stooge planning to resettle the whites. <BR/><BR/>The Commercial Farmers Union on Wednesday announced that more than 60 farmers had been driven off their land, in a reminder of President Robert Mugabe's controversial land reforms which started in 2000. <BR/><BR/>"We've got over 60 farmers who have been evicted," Commercial Farmers Union president Trevor Gifford told AFP. "They have been chased away and left everything behind." <BR/><BR/>Gifford said a first black farmer had also been forced off by the so-called war veterans, pro-Mugabe activists who were at the forefront of the widespread seizure of white farms earlier in the decade. <BR/><BR/>However Sibanda said "anyone that had been thrown off the land, it is not by war veterans." <BR/><BR/>"Some went to farms to investigate the groupings of white people. There is no one that has been thrown off their land. War veterans are disciplined." <BR/><BR/>He warned against white people planning to take back farms given to blacks during the land reforms. <BR/><BR/>"The people of this country, they are prepared and ready to protect their country if there is an invasion, an invasion of any kind," he said. <BR/><BR/>AFPPan-African News Wirehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10958190577776906688noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16711557.post-4491488931195766262008-04-10T12:06:00.000-04:002008-04-10T12:06:00.000-04:00ZIMBABWE Mugabe ready to face peers over crisis Fa...ZIMBABWE <BR/><BR/>Mugabe ready to face peers over crisis <BR/><BR/>Fanuel Jongwe<BR/>Thu, 10 Apr 2008<BR/><BR/>Zimbabwe's government said on Thursday Robert Mugabe was ready to face regional leaders this weekend over the country's post-election crisis as the wait for results stretched into a 12th day. <BR/><BR/>Heads of state of the 14-nation Southern African Development Community (Sadc) have been called to a summit in Zambia on Saturday in a bid to break the impasse between Mugabe's ruling party and the opposition. <BR/><BR/>A source in Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa's office told AFP invitations had been issued and Mugabe was fully expected to attend. <BR/><BR/>Zimbabwe's deputy information minister stopped short of confirming Mugabe's presence in Lusaka but said he was more than happy to brief his peers on the situation in the former British colony. <BR/><BR/>"If there is a SADC meeting confirmed by Zambia, President Mugabe will definitely be there," the deputy minister Bright Matonga told AFP. <BR/><BR/>"There is nothing unusual about his attendance. SADC has obviously come under a lot of international pressure over the Zimbabwe elections and needs to be briefed about what is happening here." <BR/><BR/>Southern Africa has been heavily criticised over its traditional reluctance to criticise Mugabe who has presided over his country's economic demise during his 28-year rule which began with independence in April 1980. <BR/><BR/>Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change was furious when a team of SADC observers gave the 29 March polls a clean bill of health before the results had been announced. <BR/><BR/>The party has called on the region's leaders to use the summit to call time on Mugabe's tenure, but regional powerhouse South Africa rejected any notion it would do so. <BR/><BR/>"We are not a government who can ask other presidents to step down," deputy foreign minister Aziz Pahad told journalists in Pretoria. <BR/><BR/>"Nobody will tell us when our president will step down and we will never ever allow a situation that we ask other presidents to step down. On what basis would we do that? Zimbabwe is not a province of South Africa." <BR/><BR/>Pahad refused to confirm South African President Thabo Mbeki's attendance at the SADC summit, but said he would go "if his programme allows." <BR/><BR/>While the results of a simultaneous parliamentary election were announced more than a week ago, the outcome of the presidential vote in which MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai took on his 84-year-old rival Mugabe remains a mystery. <BR/><BR/>Tsvangirai has already claimed to have won enough votes to avoid a second round run-off against Mugabe. The president's party however says a run-off will take place with Mugabe again as its candidate. <BR/><BR/>The electoral commission says it needs more time to collate and verify the votes, even though the body has already begun dismantling its operations centre in the capital Harare. <BR/><BR/>While Mugabe has lain low, Tsvangirai has launched a diplomatic drive in recent days, visiting neighbours and pleading for help in forcing the result. <BR/><BR/>In an interview on Wednesday the opposition leader accused Mugabe of a "de facto military coup," saying he was deploying troops around the country to try to intimidate people ahead of a possible run-off election. <BR/><BR/>"We'll manage to get Mugabe out. Mugabe is being deserted. No one wants to touch Mugabe in the region now. Eventually, we will ease him out," Tsvangirai told Time magazine. <BR/><BR/>Opposition hopes that the country's high court would order the electoral commission to announce the results before the summit were dashed when a judge said he would only decide whether to issue such a ruling on Monday. <BR/><BR/>But Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF) has already called for a total recount of the presidential vote and is contesting enough seats to overturn its first ever loss of a parliamentary majority. <BR/><BR/>Tsvangirai (56), was expected to travel on to Zambia and Mozambique after holding talks Wednesday with new Botswana President Ian Khama. <BR/><BR/>Mugabe has often bridled at any kind of outside intervention, blaming the country's economic woes on a limited package of Western sanctions imposed after he allegedly rigged his 2002 re-election. <BR/><BR/>The former British colony now has a six-figure inflation rate and unemployment is beyond 80 percent, while average life expectancy stands at 37 years. <BR/>AFPPan-African News Wirehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10958190577776906688noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16711557.post-19790677320961254252008-04-10T11:58:00.000-04:002008-04-10T11:58:00.000-04:00ZIMBABWE Zim ready to discuss crisisThu, 10 Apr 20...ZIMBABWE <BR/><BR/>Zim ready to discuss crisis<BR/><BR/>Thu, 10 Apr 2008<BR/><BR/>Zimbabwe's government downplayed ongoing uncertainty about presidential poll results ahead of an unscheduled meeting of its neighbours on the crisis, state media reported on Thursday. <BR/><BR/>Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu said Zimbabwe was ready to inform the Southern African Development Community (Sadc) of political developments on the ground, during an extraordinary summit called in Zambia on Saturday. <BR/><BR/>"That's normal within Sadc community to call for meetings. We are neighbours and that is the spirit of Sadc to meet and consider anything," Ndlovu told the state-run Herald newspaper. <BR/><BR/>"We are waiting for ZEC (Zimbabwe Electoral Commission) to do its work, verifying the results because it should announce the correct results, so we don't see any problem." <BR/><BR/>Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa, chairperson of the 14-nation Sadc, on Wednesday announced he was calling southern African leaders together to "discuss ways and means of assisting the people of Zimbabwe." <BR/><BR/>International pressure is mounting for Zimbabwe to release the outcome of presidential results, 12days after polling. <BR/><BR/>The outcome of the parliamentary poll saw President Robert Mugabe lose control of the majority in his worst defeat in 28 years of power. <BR/><BR/>The winner of the presidency is not yet known as election officials maintain they are still busy collating and verifying votes. <BR/><BR/>"We have conducted a harmonised election, the first of its kind in the world, it was a mammoth task," said Ndlovu. <BR/><BR/>"Sadc observers were here and more than 300 journalists and western countries have admitted that their predictions of them not being free and fair had been proven wrong." <BR/>AFPPan-African News Wirehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10958190577776906688noreply@blogger.com