March 2008.
ZIMBABWE CRAVES LEGITIMACY

There is clear evidence that Robert Mugabe has failed to run the economy. Zimbabwe's elections are being held against the background of worsening economic hardships manifested in the world's highest inflation rate of over 100,000%, massive unemployment of 85% and poverty. It is hoped that the upcoming March 29 elections will give the people of Zimbabwe the chance to freely express their choices. These elections present a real opportunity for democratic change.

Zimbabwe has virtually depended on food handouts from international relief agencies over the past eight years after Robert Mugabe seized white farms that produced the bulk of the country's food. The food shortages have been worsened by shortages of fuel, electricity, essential medicines, foreign currency and every basic survival commodity that even includes Zimbabwe's own bank notes (bearer cheques).

The South African press was awash with reports of the Z$3 trillion spent on Robert Mugabe's birthday celebrations in Beitbridge on February 23 at a time when shortages of just about everything blighted the country. And then there was the balloon tethered on the South African side of the Limpopo River with the legend "Bob, you've had your cake, now beat it" emblazoned on the side. This sounds familiar: "To have one's cake and eat it too." In other words it is to want more than one can handle or deserve, according to Wikipedia.

Yes, the rapid increase in money supply not backed by production is eroding the value of the higher-denominated bearer cheques at an alarming pace. As what happened in June 2006, it is just a matter of time before the central bank faces another dilemma; either to lop off zeros from the currency or print higher value notes than the current Z$10 million in order to stem the excessive demand for cash.

Much of the inflationary pressure has come from accelerating money supply growth, made worse by increasing money printing to meet national obligations in the absence of balance of payments support. The deterioration of balance of payment (BoP) support from the International Financial Institutions (IFIs) to Zimbabwe began in 1999. The IMF and World Bank stopped their financial support to Zimbabwe in response to Zimbabwe falling into arrears with those organisations. Zimbabwe cannot now access new financing from the IFIs until its arrears to them have been cleared. These are the same rules that apply to any other country and they are rules devised and applied by the IFIs themselves.

Other international financial donors always take a cue from the IMF and World Bank. Thus, multilateral and bilateral financial institutions withdrew support to the government of Zimbabwe over non payment of debts and human rights violations. There is a need for foreign direct investment inflows to bring much needed foreign currency to prop up the economy.

At the beginning of March 2008, the United States dollar, which just mid-February fetched Z$7.5 million at most, shot above Z$25 million as the troubled Zimbabwe dollar continued losing ground on the parallel market. Sadly, the depreciating currency could not spur exports because of the skewed exchange rate and serious misalignments in industry that render exports uncompetitive.

It is not that the ruling ZANU (PF) is blind to these issues. It knows exactly what needs to be done but is scared stiff to set the wheels in motion, particularly ahead of a tricky election. And yet the economy has hurtled through a recession for nearly a decade - with three disputed elections in 2000, 2002 and 2005.

The Harare authorities should know better that printing notes creates a lot of money for which there are very few products to buy. This raises the price of those few products and explains why Zimbabwe's economy is gripped by hyperinflation. The government increased the salaries of soldiers and police force at the end of February 2008. The move was criticized as a form of bribery, intended to buy their royalty during the crucial elections on March 29. But it also backfired because other civil servants were demanding salary increases as well.

This latest strike avalanche by civil servants was sparked by the discovery that Robert Mugabe had secretly used a presidential decree to order huge salary increases - Z$1.2 billion for low end privates and up to Z$3 billion for their superiors in the police and military. Most civil servants were taking home between Z$300 million and Z$600 million per month.

In a desperate move to placate hundreds of thousands of civil servants who are battling to make ends meet, the government also raised teachers' salaries to between Z$3.9 billion and Z$5.7 billion. It is to be remembered that these increments are unbudgeted for.

It follows that in order to meet salary payments for the civil servants, the government is forced to borrow money from the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe. The country's hyperinflation is largely the result of the high budget deficits (estimated by the International Monetary Fund to increase by 75% this year) exclusively funded from expensive domestic borrowings in the wake of a dearth in balance of payments support and foreign direct investments. Production in the real sector has also sunk to irretrievable depths on the back of intermittent power blackouts, foreign currency shortages, and high costs of production, punitive interest rates and government's stop-gape economic policies.

As corruption continues to be rampant, government institutions that are strategically placed to reining in inflation have become willing tools of political vultures, who are manipulating them to enrich themselves. Robert Mugabe's regime continues to subsidise an array of commodities such as wheat, maize and fuel when it is crystal clear that those accessing them are offloading these on the parallel market at a huge premium.

As the haemorrhage continues, the ruling party perfects its blame game in the campaign speeches. "On 29 March, reject him [Simba Makoni] and dump him once and for all .... The bootlicking British stooges, and sell-outs, the political witches, and politics prostitutes, political charlatans and two-faced political creatures," said Mugabe launching his ruling ZANU (PF) party election manifesto in Harare on 29 February.

This has left observers wondering whether Mugabe is focused on any particular theme outside denigrating the opposition and their alleged Western supporters. How appropriate is it for an 84-year-old leader to go around calling his opponents prostitutes? The regime has passed a raft of laws making it illegal to denigrate the president while he is a loose cannon that insults critics. It doesn't sound dignified to display that sort of political behaviour or does it?

In a television interview earlier, Mugabe described Makoni as "worse than a prostitute" and on February 23 at his birthday party in Beitbridge likened him to lice, which can be easily crushed. It is unfortunate that a head of State stoops so low as to incite violence against innocent citizens in a supposedly democratic country.

At the manifesto launch, Mugabe claimed that the poor rural communal lands had "problems of development and bad roads brought about by Britain and Tsvangirai".

"Britain has decided to take us on through the MDC [Movement for Democratic Change]. How can we have blacks who masquerade as whites? Whatever Britain tries to do, we will not back off," Mugabe added. According to him, any political competitor is an enemy of the State and should not be treated as any patriot.

"But truly, it becomes only a successful manifesto when what is in it is what the people expect from us," he added.

Indeed, people have been expecting a successful manifesto since independence. How many manifestos and economic revival plans have been presented by ZANU (PF) since independence in 1980?

Soon after the attainment of independence, ZANU (PF) had several worthy and unworthy economic plans which became much ado about nothing. These range from Growth with Equity and the Zimbabwe Conference on Reconstruction and Development (ZIMCORD) in 1981 through to the first Five Year National Development Plan in 1986; the Economic Structural Adjustment Programme in 1991; the Zimbabwe Programme for Economic and Social Transformation (ZIMPREST) in 1998; Vision 2020; the Zimbabwe Millennium Economic Recovery Programme (MERP) in 2000. And in November 2004, the government came up with yet another new economic blueprint dubbed "Towards Sustained Economic Growth - Macro-Economic Framework 2004-2006".

Zimbabweans, as an electorate, have been bullied by the State for many years and been lied to and manipulated by the government's propaganda machine for as long as they can remember. Zimbabweans hear a lot about the British and the Americans pressing for "regime change", but not much about the process of solving Zimbabwe's political, economic and social problems.

Governance is about concepts, trends and practices. For the past twenty-eight years, the people running the affairs of government have been pre-occupied with their financial and material well-being. Commitment to purpose is the substance of things hoped for but the things the ministers and their cronies have in mind are material possessions, rather than the well being of the people.

It is now crystal clear that solving the economic, political and social problems of Zimbabwe requires new thinking, new orientation, new policies and new strategies. The majority of Mugabe's Cabinet is composed of dead-wood; men and women well over the hill and not fit for the job to resuscitate the economy. They have failed to induce economic growth and financial stability of the country due to their incompetence, ineptitude and corruption.

Zimbabwe is rich in mineral resources and fertile agricultural land and is blessed with a hard-working and skilled work force. The current government has been secretive about the state of the natural resources, preferring to use patronage and cronyism in the conduct of state business. A classic example is the way the government is exercising extreme secrecy over the Marange diamonds. That diamond belt stretches from Botswana and has boosted that country's economy, leading that nation to enjoy a quality of life, personal happiness and security. Not to mention Zimbabwe's gold reserves and many other minerals such as chrome, coal, nickel, platinum, methane and so forth.

What Zimbabwe experiences today is the passing of so-called economic empowerment bills that prioritise dishing out shares to ZANU (PF) cronies. By legislating bad laws, the ZANU (PF) government is committing economic sanctions upon itself. If anybody is doubtful and is trying to look for evidence as to how that is being done, they need look no further than the Indigenisation and Empowerment Bill which would sabotage any efforts to attract foreign investment.

Referring to the need for black majority ownership in mining companies at the launch of ZANU (PF) manifesto, Mugabe said: "Unless we are the shareholders [in mining], we will continue to be cheated." Earlier during the introduction of the Bill, Indigenisation and Empowerment minister, Paul Mangwana, said that foreign investors will need to cede 51% of their shares to "appropriate" business people under the provisions of the new Empowerment Bill.

With accusations of cronyisms flying all over, Mangwana fortified people's suspicions by saying that if the investor fails to identify "an appropriate partner", the government would provide the investor with a "database" of business people from which it could select a "partner". It is not difficult to guess who the potential "partners" are before one even looks at the database. The list has already been drawn up.

Many people had thought the Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Act had lapsed. Robert Mugabe had left it unsigned after it was passed by Parliament in September 2007, only to sign it on 7 March, just three weeks before the vital harmonised elections.

Obviously, this sounds like vote buying since Mugabe will be expected to appoint those who are loyal to him, to key positions within large important companies. It should be remembered that there are many cronies who are not running for parliamentary nor senatorial seats who always depended on the abolished presidential nominations to retain their cabinet positions.

Now the table is prepared for an easy income or else most cabinet ministers would become destitute like the late Enos Chikowore who had become destitute before committing suicide. May his soul rest in peace.

Can't Mugabe realise that these laws only help Zimbabwe maintain its trajectory down the economic abyss as opposed to claims that "regime change" advocates in the West are the causes?

Unfortunately, as the politically well-connected enjoy the sweet crumbs falling from the high table of political patronage, even banks, which should sit at the heart of any well-functioning economy, seemed to have been unwittingly drawn into this mess. Banks (that includes the central bank itself) are channelling funds to politically well-connected businesspeople that run up large debts in somewhat misguided acquisition plans. Steeped in a deeply-rooted political patronage system, some banks which were rocked with insolvency were known to practise crony-capitalism - whereby they pump funds to politically well-connected businessmen who run up large debts in misguided expansion plans. In the process, a lot of aspiring businesspeople have largely remained unstuck with their business projects in their desk drawers overshadowed by this new breed of corporate predators.

It is common knowledge that the RBZ governor, Gideon Gono, financed Operation Murambatsvina in 2005. Now two weeks before the election, he is aiding ZANU (PF) to buy votes through the distribution of tractors, motor cycles, combine harvesters, generators, ploughs, scorch carts and cows to beneficiaries of Robert Mugabe's controversial land seizures.

The central bank governor has transformed the national financial institution into an "Elect Mugabe Bank", under a project called the Farm Mechanisation Programme. It is a project specially designed and timely introduced to begin at the same time as Robert Mugabe is seeking a sixth term in office.

Ironically, Zimbabwe has an agricultural bank, - the Agriculture Development Bank of Zimbabwe - but nothing is heard of it in the programme which should really be within its mandate.

Furthermore, there is overwhelming evidence that the ZANU (PF) government is providing food aid to supporters while denying it to perceived adversaries. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights reaches further than basic rights benchmarking to outline specific provisions about the right to food. Zimbabwe acceded to the Covenant in 1991, and is thus bound to recognise everybody's right to adequate food, to act to ensure that this right is realised fairly and as widely as possible, and to co-operate with the international community to ease domestic hunger.

The use of food as a political tool is both morally abhorrent and violates international law. The government should impress upon the leadership of all political parties that it is prohibited for politicians and party supporters either to use food to influence or reward constituents and voters, or to withhold access to food as a reprisal for perceived political opposition.

The theme of ZANU (PF)'s March 29 campaign reveals a lot about the party's priorities: "Defending our land and national sovereignty; building prosperity through empowerment". The banners at the International Conference Centre also had a lot to reveal: "Down with British machinations and economic sabotage", "Zimbabwe not for sale".

Zimbabwe's problems are how the land reform programme was fast-tracked and how empowerment has been used to parcel out national resources to ZANU (PF) party heavy weights and cronies. The question of sovereignty is neither here nor there. It is obvious that Zimbabwe will never be a colony again. Zimbabweans want food on their tables. People are craving for free and fair elections to enable them to choose their own representatives for Parliament.

There is overwhelming evidence that electoral fraud guaranteed Mugabe victories at the polls during the previous elections despite clear evidence that he has failed to end Zimbabwe's severe economic crisis. Mugabe has managed to hang on to power through a violent crackdown on political opponents that has led to some of the worst human rights abuses in the southern African country. ZANU (PF), despite being the author of the nation's misery, is promoted as the only authentic claimant to the people's trust.

Under the mantra of sovereignty, those seeking to engage the international community to help rescue the country are damned as traitors. No one should propose an alternative economic programme to the regime's bankrupt policies. Mugabe and his henchmen have exposed their failure to offer a solution to the crisis they have spawned. Just now they are locked in the mantras of the liberation war. The war was fought and worn and what people want today is bread and butter.

The continued weakening of the Zimbabwe dollar (now at Z$55 million to US$1) and surging inflation (now estimated at 150,000%) would ignite protests anywhere else in the world and would have meant certain defeat for Mugabe's government in presidential, parliamentary and local government elections.

In his campaign speeches, Mugabe says he will win by a landslide. It is difficult to find data and information to support his claim when the economy has collapsed, services and farming infrastructure are derelict. In a sense, he regards himself as irreproachable, a super human being endowed with a different set of rights.

Why would anyone vote for a continuation of the suffering and deepening hunger in the country? Who, in his/her right mind, would vote fore sewage and garbage that litters the streets and the endless nights without electricity?

It is logical to believe that Mugabe's claim of a "landslide" is based on the fact that ZANU (PF) is making efforts to rig the elections. It is known for a fact that with Simba Makoni's entry into the presidential race, Mugabe and people around him are in panic mode.

One example that supports claims by the opposition that ZANU (PF) is in the process of rigging the elections is the distribution of polling stations. If one looks at polling stations in Harare, one discovers that the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) has allocated 300 polling stations for about 733,000 voters. This means 2,443 voters per polling station, i. e. less than 20 seconds per voter. This is an impossible feat. On the other hand, Mashonaland Central, which is seen as a Mugabe stronghold, has 500,000 voters and was allocated over 1,200 polling stations (417 voters per polling station).

Zimbabwe's government has barred official observer delegations from Britain, as well as from the European Union and the United States from monitoring the March 29 plebiscite. The only European country invited is Russia. If the elections are going to be transparent, if they are going to be free and fair, the ruling party should also invite its critics as observers to satisfy Zimbabweans and other interested parties that this time round, the elections will be free and fair. In barring critics from coming to observe the elections, the regime shows that it has something to hide.

In addition, the regime is screening foreign journalists ahead of the elections amid suspicion that some may be spying for hostile Western nations, the government-controlled Sunday Mail reported. At least 300 foreign journalists have applied for accreditation under Zimbabwe's sweeping media laws, the newspaper said. Priority is being given to journalists from Africa and other friendly developing nations that are sending election monitors, it said. Western media organizations, including The Associated Press, have received no word on accreditation requests submitted weeks ago.

Mugabe and ZANU (PF) could have been voted out of office a long time ago. However, after independence, the party was determined to root out all threats to its rule. It can be recalled that in August 1980, newly elected Prime Minister Robert Mugabe, asked the North Korean communists for help in setting up a special army unit devoted to quelling Zimbabwe's internal dissent - the Fifth Brigade - the one used during Operation Gukurahundi. This army unit was used to coerce PF-ZAPU into the 1987 Unity Accord after the massacre of over 20,000 civilians in Matabeleland and the Midlands.

With his sights set on the creation of a one-party state, Mugabe knew that PF-ZAPU and its charismatic leader, Joshua Nkomo, could become his only serious opposition in the long run. Thus, Gukurahundi sent Nkomo into temporary exile in Britain before returning to agree to merge his party with ZANU (PF) in exchange for the largely meaningless title of Zimbabwe's second vice president.

After the birth of the Movement for Democratic Change in September 1999 and Mugabe's defeat in the February 2000 constitutional referendum, ZANU (PF) unleashed violence against supporters of the MDC. Hundreds of men and women were raped, tortured, maimed and others died in cold blood murder.

In May 2005, Mugabe initiated Operation Murambatsvina (Drive Out Filth) which rendered homeless up to 700,000 of Zimbabwe's citizens. Because these people were suspected to be MDC supporters and potential election winners for the opposition, they were being driven to their respective communal areas. The police repeatedly failed to act within the law, ignored court orders, beat people and destroyed their property.

Anna Kajumulo Tibaijuka, the Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme, said the operation was a disastrous venture which violated international law and led to a serious humanitarian crisis. Her report described the actions of the government as "indiscriminate, unjustified and conducted without regard for human suffering".

The question that is uppermost in the people of Zimbabwe's minds is whether a mix of violence, insults, coercion, deceit and official propaganda will be sufficient to avoid ZANU (PF)'s demise at the polls on March 29?

Notwithstanding, what is indisputable is that in order to regain economic stability there must be the restoration of the rule of law. This will be difficult as long as the judiciary is for sale to the highest bidder, or beholden to the Executive through patronage. Already the Electoral Court has refused to adjudicate on electoral discrepancies brought forward by the opposition.

The MDC had wanted the court to order the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) to disclose the number of ballot papers printed for the joint presidential, parliamentary and council elections on March 29. The opposition party - that according to sources believes more ballots were printed to allow for easier manipulation of the vote - also wanted the court to order ZEC to allow inspection and auditing of ballot papers. The MDC also wanted ZEC ordered to increase the number of polling stations in its stronghold urban areas. Analysts say fewer polling booths allocated in cities and towns could turn away voters.

A lawyer with Coghlan Welsh and Guest, acting for the opposition party said the MDC had also sought to compel ZEC to give the number of postal votes and to identify postal voters - where they come from and where they will cast their votes.

The Electoral Court was set up to specifically hear disputes related to and about elections. Its refusal to examine these matters is a "reflection of the failure of the whole electoral system" and only helps to undermine the independence of the court and the judiciary at large.

Hardly ten days before voting, had Robert Mugabe used the Presidential Powers (Temporary Measures) Act to amend electoral laws to allow policemen into polling stations to "assist" illiterate people to vote, state radio said on March 18. The amendment appears to backtrack on changes fast-tracked by Parliament in December 2007 that restricted the police from doubling up as election officers. Under the electoral law amendments, police were not to be allowed within 100 metres of a polling station to avoid intimidating voters.

The police and military are credited with keeping Mugabe in power, always ready to use brutal tactics to keep public discontent in check in the face of an economic meltdown.

As long as people continue to distrust the police force that they often consider to be just there to enforce the will of one particular political party, the electoral process will remain illegitimate. Business managers were being interrogated and arrested for allegedly supporting the opposition. Mcdonald Lewanika, spokesperson for the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition, said this intimidation of businesses is not new. He confirmed that intimidation is rife and much of it is occurring behind closed doors. He said the government's reaction is a sign that they are running scared.

Both local and foreign investors are hesitant to invest in the economy until such time as they believe that the rule of law has been restored.

"The British are manipulating their companies in Zimbabwe to arbitrarily increase prices of goods and services in the hope of turning the electorate against ZANU-PF," Mugabe said in a report broadcast by state media. When will Robert Mugabe understand that the increases are regulated by natural economic laws of supply and demand?

Zimbabweans are in no compromising mood because they cannot afford the things they need and this will definitely affect the outcome of the elections this month even in the face of a culture of fear pervading. The prevailing atmosphere has nothing to do with Britain or the USA - Zimbabweans woke up on March 14 to find that prices for most basic goods and transport had more than doubled overnight.

Boozers were shocked to find that a quart of beer was now selling at Z$50 million, up from Z$20 million. Cascade orange drinks that were Z$7.5 million were now Z$25 million. Mealie meal could be found on the black market at Z$100 million for a 10 kg bag. A loaf of bread currently costs Z$15 million in supermarkets, from Z$3.3 million. (On the black market 15 million Zimbabwe dollars is only 27 US. cents.) Bus fares into Harare city centre from the outer suburbs went up to Z$10 million from Z$5 million. Even with the huge salary increases that civil servants and teachers were promised this month, it won't be long before they are demanding more, again.

This is a vicious circle which can only be stopped through a change of economic policies. And that change can only be found in a free and fair election. Regrettably, it is evident that what Zimbabweans are yearning for is not at the centre of neither Mugabe nor ZANU (PF)'s agenda. The people are crying out loud for a leadership that can transcend the limitations of partisan political discourse to begin to addressing the root causes of the country's debilitating political and economic crisis.