The report, "Unprotected Migrants: Zimbabweans in South Africa's Limpopo Province", said Zimbabweans continue to stream into South Africa to escape their own country's deteriorating economic and political conditions. It said the vulnerability of the estimated 1.2 to three million Zimbabweans now living in South Africa is made worse by their frequent lack of legal status, effectively making them refugees.

Women's organisations are outraged by an opposition parliamentarian who urged the national assembly not to pass a bill aimed at stamping out domestic violence, because women were inferior to men. During debate on the Domestic Violence Bill, Timothy Mubhawu, member of parliament (MP) for the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), told parliament: "I stand here representing God the Almighty. Women are not equal to men."

This article is a response to an article (entitled “The Anatomy of Zimbabwe’s Problems (http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/37060) by Maggie Makanza that we published last month. Kwanisai Mafa and Netfa Freeman caution “…all Africans at home and in the Diaspora are to unite against real live enemies and beware of any diagnoses with a psychosis of denial that neglects the most pertinent aspects our anatomical problems.”

We agree with the author of this article that all is not well in Zimbabwe but she fails to objectively explain the causes of the problems in Zimbabwe. It is strange to make a statement like "Most pressure for reform appears to be coming from external rather than internal forces" without referring to the external destabilization measures of the British and US governments, the EU and certain white settlers bent on maintaining power and privilege. This is to speak of such problems in Zimbabwe as if the aforementioned have no bearing on them, or as if they do not exist. In psychology this is analogous to a condition called denial.

Zimbabwe’s problems are caused by two conflicting ideological dispositions, Pan-Africanism versus neo-colonialism. To understand this, we must remember that British Prime Minister Tony Blair stated openly that he is working with the Movement of Democratic Change in Zimbabwe to effect regime change. To achieve this objective the western secret services MI6, CIA, and others used their arsenals of alliances, networks of military bases, economic devices such as sanctions, sabotage, blackmail, and provocateurs. Equally insidious is the psychological weapon of propaganda which aims to impress on the masses a number of imperialist dogmas.

Kwame Nkrumah taught us that these are the “mechanisms of neo-colonialism”. Nkrumah told us “In the labor field, for example, imperialism operates through labor arms like the Social Democratic parties of Europe led by the British Labor Party, and through such instruments as the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), now apparently being superseded by the New York Africa-American Labor Center (AALC) under AFL-CIO chief George Meany and the well-known CIA man in labor’s top echelons, Irving Brown.”

Philip Agee, former CIA operative and author of Inside the Company: CIA Diary, confirms this when he revealed that “…the successes of revolutionary movements in Ethiopia, Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Grenada, Nicaragua and elsewhere brought ‘cold warrior’ Democrats and ‘internationalist’ Republicans together to establish in 1979 the American Political Foundation (APF). The foundation's task was to study the feasibility of establishing through legislation a government-financed foundation to subsidize foreign operations in civil society through U.S. non-governmental organizations. Within APF four task forces were set up to conduct the study, one for the Democrats, one for the Republicans, one for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and one for the American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO).”

Agee describes how this effort developed mainly into the U.S Agency for International Development now doing overtly what the CIA used to do covertly to advance the neo-colonial agenda of the West. The psychological denial around Zimbabwe consistently avoids such facts. The author asks, “Why has the pro-democracy movement not been able to capitalize on many reported failures of the ZANU PF government?” Could it be because this not a legitimate movement? Nor is it for democracy.

Neglected by psychological denial in the anatomy of Zimbabwe’s problems is the fact that the trade union “movement” in Zimbabwe, which spawned the so-called Movement for Democratic Change, is in line with recommendations from a 1998 European Union study on Zimbabwe. These recommendations call for Mugabe’s removal specifically by systematically building up NGOs and the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) as alternative centers of power, supported by fostering strikes, demonstrations, urban unrest, food riots and carefully engineering dissension within the ranks of the government, the ruling party and the country's armed forces.

The blatant violation of Zimbabwe’s sovereignty is inherent in the anatomy of Zimbabwe’s problems. No other word better describes omission of this fact than the condition of denial.

Surprisingly the author who is a member of a liberal organization, Zimbabwe Social Forum, has lost faith in the parliamentary system, and says that “the continual use of the ballot under the present circumstances can only be described as sheer madness.” What other means is the author advocating? Imperialism tells us that western democracy and the parliamentary system are the only valid ways of governing. Zimbabwe has been using this model to run elections since its independence every five years without fail.

It is wrong to say that people lack energy and suffer from inertia to fight the regime. The only democratic means for regime change is through the ballot box. We know, however that the leader of the main opposition in Zimbabwe, Morgan Tsvangirai is on record as suggesting that if Mugabe does not want to go they will remove him violently. He has been exposed through meetings in London and Montreal, Canada in what was more than likely a plot to assassinate President Mugabe and stage a coup d'état.

The leader of MDC has been globetrotting calling for the isolation of Zimbabwe through economic sanctions. While the western governments are fooling the world that these are “smart sanctions” targeting only government and party leaders, so-called progressives abet this misnomer by blaming Zimbabwe’s ailing economy on Mugabe and ZANU- PF.

These so-called progressives neglect to consider that these sanctions openly oppose “any extension by [international financial institutions] of any loan, credit, or guarantee to the government of Zimbabwe" and in addition oppose any reduction or cancellation of debt. It is dishonest denial to suggest the anatomy of Zimbabwe’s problems can be determined without conceding to these facts. The ordinary person is suffering because of these sanctions.

If ZANU PF were intolerant of the opposition, MDC would not be in parliament. Most mayors and councilors in urban centers are MDC. MDC legislators head most parliamentary portfolio committees. This demonstrates that people in Zimbabwe have the capacity to choose the leadership they want. ZANU PF knows that urban centres are MDC domains. MDC knows well that rural constituencies are ZANU PF strongholds. The majority of the Zimbabwean population lives in rural areas. The author is not correct to say that rural folk have been used and then “abandoned” after elections. Since independence, government has embarked on many developmental projects in rural areas to improve their lives. Most of the major dams were built in rural areas for irrigation and fisheries.

Most rural areas have benefited immensely from the government rural electrification programs. Schools and clinics have been built and recently the government is building major referral hospitals in all districts. Every farming season the government dispatches tractors to rural folk for tillage but the major challenge has been fuel, a need mostly impeded by foreign versus domestic challenges.

There are so many government community empowerment programmes underway in rural areas. Seed packs and fertilizers are given to the rural folk and new farmers for free by the government. With these things is it not also a denial to say rural people are being neglected?

However, the author is right when she says, “the opposition has worked on the false assumption that no one supports ZANU PF.” Tsvangirai and his controllers have seen that they cannot dislodge ZANU PF through the ballot box. That is why they are trying to create the “necessary conditions needed for combustion to happen” so that they can violently remove the government. Tsvangirai even asked President Thabo Mbeki to cut all lifelines to Zimbabwe including trade routes, electricity supply and fuel. Any leader with people at heart would not ask for the continued suffering of his own people until they vote him into power.

On the land issue, the author needs to do more thorough research about the history of this question in Zimbabwe. There is nothing poor or chaotic about the land reform programme. What solution could have been better to address the racial land imbalance maintained by the “willing buyer-willing seller” clause? Who was willing to sell land and who, in a new nation of mostly poor Africans, was in a position to buy it?

An honest analogy for the anatomy of Zimbabwe’s problems is more like a gang taking control of a family’s’ house. Only after being forced by the family to relinquish control in part, the gang then co-opts certain family members to badger the rest into infighting while the gang ransacks the house and from outside, standing in front of their glass homes they throw stones. Our call to all Africans at home and in the Diaspora is to unite against real live enemies and beware of any diagnoses with a psychosis of denial that neglects the most pertinent aspects our anatomical problems.

• Kwanisai Mafa is an Electronic Resources Librarian at Zimbabwe’s Midland State University and Chairman of the Ujamma Youth Farming Project in Gweru. He can be reached at [email][email protected] Netfa Freeman is the Director of the Social Action & Leadership School for Activists at the Institute for Policy Studies and an organizer with PALO, the Pan-African Liberation Organization. He can be reached at [email][email protected]
• Please send comments to [email protected] or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org

Mr. Akbar Ganji, an Iranian investigative journalist and human rights activist, and Mr. Arnold Tsunga a lawyer and a radio commentator from Zimbabwe, will receive the 2006 Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders (MEA) on Wednesday 11 October 2006, 17h30. Mrs. Louise Arbour, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights will present the award during a ceremony at the Bâtiment des Forces Motrices in Geneva (Switzerland), within framework of the International North South Media Festival.

Police are defying a magistrate's order to produce a detailed report on the alleged assault and torture while in custody of more than a dozen Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Union (ZCTU) members after a protest was foiled by the security forces. On Tuesday magistrate William Bhila dismissed a police report written by the arresting officers, which said there was no substance to the torture allegations, and ordered the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) to take over the enquiry, as it was improper for the police "to investigate themselves".

Candidates from the ruling ZANU-PF party romped home with huge margins in by-elections held at the weekend, although accredited election observers voiced concern about the way the poll was conducted. The by-elections in the ZANU-PF bastions of Mashonaland East and Mashonaland Central provinces coincided with celebrations marking the seventh anniversary of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), and were widely seen as an acid test of the opposition's ability to penetrate government-held strongholds.

During the week of 3 October 2006, four detectives from the police's Law and Order section visited the Harare distribution offices of "The Zimbabwean", a weekly newspaper published in London, and demanded certain information from the proprietor before confiscating some documents. They were particularly interested in the previous week's issue, although they did not specify which article had attracted their attention. In it, the front page story, headlined "ZNA top brass slam corrupt ZRP", had outlined the tensions between the army and the police after the arrest of a former colonel for alleged corruption at the state grain monopoly, the Grain Marketing Board. The detectives took away documents pertaining to the importation of the weekly newspaper from South Africa, where the southern African edition is printed.

Two white commercial farmers have become the first to be tried for defying eviction orders after they appeared in a Karoi magistrates’ court. Although Izak Daniel Nel and Gert Cornelius Terblanche, who are brothers-in-law, won an interim order three months ago to stay on their farms, State Security Minister Didymus Mutasa is reported to have personally issued them with a 90 day eviction order. The order was handed to them four days after winning the temporary reprieve by the High Court.

A Finance Ministry report on the alleged looting of the Zimbabwe Iron and Steel Company has been pulled out of circulation, government sources said, thickening the plot in the "Steelgate" scandal that some say is the biggest since independence. Sources in the Finance Ministry said President Robert Mugabe's office had recalled the report from the handful of officials who had received copies, apparently to keep it from being leaked.

The price of anti-retroviral drugs has gone up again, further pushing the life-prolonging drugs beyond the reach of many. A survey revealed that the drugs had gone up by between 50 and 65 percent in the last three months. The price of a monthly course of imported ARV's at pharmacies went up from $10 000 to $12 000 in July while in August they rose to $16 000. The price went up to between $18 000 and $20 000.

Thirteen members of Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA), arrested in Bulawayo on separate incidents in June 2004, will stand trial at the Western Commonage and Tredgold Provincial Magistrates Courts on 3 and 4 October 2006 respectively at 8:30am.The first trial on 3 October concerns four women arrested at Matshobana Hall on June 16 2004 while conducting meeting on Self-Help Projects. They face charges under the Public Order and Security Act.

During May-July 2005, an estimated 700,000 people lost their homes, their livelihoods, or both when the Zimbabwe government forcibly evicted them and demolished their homes and businesses as part of Operation Murambatsvina (Drive Out Rubbish). Visit this Amnesty International webpage to read more about the situation and to take action and demand justice.

12 September is a special day for all people across the world who believe in Black Consciousness and the concept of Ubuntu. This is the day when Africa lost one of its gallant sons of the soil, Steve Biko, who died in 1977 in a South African prison from ‘brain damage’. The truth of the matter is that his death emanated from continuous torture exerted on him by the South African apartheid government. As a young black African woman living in a society where freedom of expression and association is violated by the government of the day, Steve Biko has become my source of inspiration as a young man in his 30s, who was willing to sacrifice his own life for the freedom of the black people of South Africa.

When it comes to Steve Biko’s legacy within the Zimbabwean crisis, I personally believe that civil society in Zimbabwe should always mark this day, the 12th of September, as an important date in the history of Southern Africa. Young people should take up the challenge to emulate Steve Biko and his beliefs, for they can learn a lot from what he stood for, that is equality, freedom, respect for human life, and being proud to be a black person. Civil society and academics should organize public seminars and workshops on the life and history of Steve Biko on such occasions, so that people will not forget his dream and vision for a better Africa.

Next year will be the 30th anniversary of his death and I do hope that progressive movements in South Africa, Zimbabwe and the region as a whole will meet, reflect, share experiences, and take stock of what has been taking place in the region since Steve Biko’s death. Steve Biko made me realize the importance of being black and being proud to be a black African woman. Such ideals should be advocated for in our society, especially where the local and international media makes people believe that having a slim modeled body and straightened hair makes a person beautiful. This has led to many young people becoming disorientated and disrespecting the African way of life and its beauty. I do believe that the beauty of any person comes from within and not outside .I guess that’s what defines a human being at the end of the day!!

Viva Steve Biko, Viva!!
Amandla, people of Africa, amandla!!

The Girl Guides Association of Zimbabwe (GGAZ) will next term introduce an HIV/Aids awareness campaign in children's homes and primary schools countrywide. The project was launched at Chinyaradzo Children's Home and president of the association, Mrs Maria Chaniwa, said this would help in reducing the Aids scourge.

Two white Zimbabwean farmers are to be charged for refusing to vacate their land, ZimOnline reported. Another 50 white landowners across the country had meanwhile been ordered to surrender their properties, the Commercial Farmers Union said. Vice-president Trevor Gifford said the two farmers would appear in the magistrate's court in the farming town of Karoi in the Mashonaland West province.

Zimbabwe women call for stiffer penalties for domestic violence offenders. With 90% of Zimbabwe's domestic violence targeting women, women groups have been pressuring their government to enact The Domestic Violence Bill, first dismissed 10 years ago.

A spokesman for Zimbabwe’s ruling party confirmed Monday (September 25) that ZANU-PF intends to extend the term of President Robert Mugabe by postponing the presidential elections due in 2008 to 2010. ZANU-PF information chief Nathan Shamuyarira said this would save money by consolidating presidential voting with parliamentary elections.

News of Zimbabwe's declining HIV prevalence rates have been met with scepticism and confusion, particularly in view of the country's economic and political climate. Can this good news be attributed to behavioural change or skewed statistics?

The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), the World Confederation of Labour (WCL) and the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) express their firm support for the leaders and members of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU).

The government's withdrawal of free agricultural inputs for new farmers is certain to affect food production adversely, analysts are warning. Farmers who were allocated land under the fast-track land reform programme that began in 2000 have received fertilisers and seed for the past three years, for which they could pay after the harvest, but last month the agriculture ministry announced that it had stopped the "free" inputs scheme.