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Liar, Liar!: Taking stock of Zanu PF promises
Sokwanele
November 08, 2006

http://www.sokwanele.com/articles/sokwanele/liarliar_8november2006.html

Sokwanele is trying to fill that gap here by looking at each one of Zanu PF's election promises from the March 2005 elections, and comparing the promises with reality. Help us and pass this on! Email it to those near and far (see tips at the bottom), and if you have access to email addresses for the culprits, then please send it to them. They need to know that they are accountable, and that people are watching!

This is what they said:

• Getting back your land
• An end to racist factory closures
• An end to racist witholding of commodities
• An end to politically motivated price increases
• An end to sanctions
• No safe havens for corrupt bankers
• No disruption to fuel supplies
• No to political interference
• Empowerment through takeovers
• Faster economic turnaround
• More foreign currency inflows
• Keeping our Zimbabwe
• End to Blair's MDC

Bury Blair, Vote Zanupf

And for Sokwanele's comparison with reality, read on!

Getting back your land
The tragedy of the land reform programme is that very few of the most needy have benefited. No-one in their right mind would deny that some type of land reform was necessary, but the entire country has suffered from the way in which it has been carried out.

From the time the Fast Track Land Reform Programme commenced in 2000, a total of 231 251 families have been resettled under the A1 (communal and small-scale) and A2 (large-scale) models on just over 10 million hectares of land countrywide.

However, a large proportion of the resettled families are those with well-paid jobs in town: mostly government ministers, Zanu PF bigwigs, and the like. Of the remaining resettled people, hardly any have been given access to the tillage, fertiliser and seed that they need to farm: it is reported that 94% of farmers have no seed for the coming planting season.

Consequently, the country is facing starvation
The regime is now having to back-track somewhat, and appears ready to offer leases to white commercial farmers to enable them to resume production and the job of helping feed the nation. This comes in the wake of the Agriculture minister Joseph Made's admission for the first time ever that the country faces a food supply shortfall.

Meanwhile, the World Food Program (WFP) is running out of funding for assistance with food aid: the agency urgently needs USD61 million or 97,000 tonnes of grain to restore distributions to previous levels. The WFP has said that food aid rations in cities will be halved, affecting about 364,000 children and another 190,000 people in vulnerable groups.

Land reform was intended to redistribute land to those poor who had the ability to farm, and to assist them to continue to ensure food security for the population: this has failed on both counts, and a populace weakened by Aids and malnutrition slowly starves. A poor rainy season will see the deaths of many.

An end to racist factory closures
A walk around the CBD of any of the major cities will reveal large numbers of closed shops, and the situation in the industrial areas is the same. But factory closures have little or nothing to do with racism: black and white industrialists are subject to the same economic pressures and many have been unable to continue profitably and have closed. We have no data to back up the following statement but, with inflation increasing exponentially, it is probable that more factories have closed in the 18 months or so since Zanu was re-elected (read "stole the elections") last year than in the whole of the last 6 years.

An end to racist withholding of commodities
Who has withheld commodities? No-one, that we are aware. Price controls (see below) have at times led to providers closing shop until sense was restored but, for the most part, commodities simply found their way onto the black market, where they traded at a premium. Those who benefited were often those men and women closest to the regime, who were able to buy at the controlled price, and then sell the goods on the black market at the going black-market rate (and not many of these people are white….).

An end to politically motivated price increases
Price controls don't work! That has been proven throughout the world, not least in the former communist countries that Mugabe so admired.

Market forces generally determine the price of commodities, for example fuel. The price had stabilised to around $650 per litre before the regime set the price at $350; the result was that the scarce commodity found its way to the black market, immediately commanding premium prices of $1200 and above per litre.

Interventionist policies also saw the regime freezing the price of bread at $200 a loaf at a time the bakers wanted the price raised to more than $300 in order to meet production costs. The price of bread was later agreed at $290 a loaf, but not before the commodity had disappeared from the shelves and was being sold at around $500 a loaf on the black market.

Reserve Bank Governor, Gideon Gono's policies have been termed "ambush economics": the general population (and, indeed, many parliamentarians, even on the Zanu side) being ambushed by his surprise decisions.

So, price increases in Zimbabwe are only politically motivated in the most indirect of ways, in that it is the political decisions and political mismanagement of the country which has forced producers to increase their prices to economically viable levels.

An end to sanctions
The sanctions are still there; not, as Zanu would have us believe, against the country itself, but targeted specifically against those directly responsible for the collapse of this country, preventing them from travelling to those countries who are signatories to the sanctions' agreements. The reason why the sanctions remain is clearly that those responsible for the collapse are still in power, and still running the country as Zanu PF Inc., and also still perpetrating human rights abuses on a horrific scale (think of the recent torture of the trades unionists). We thank the international community for not having removed the sanctions - we plead with them to do still more to unseat this regime.

No safe havens for corrupt bankers
To whom does this refer? To the bankers who had to flee the country after their banks had been found to be facilitating foreign exchange deals at parallel market rates. Does anyone remember where Gono was before he was catapulted to the helm of the Reserve Bank ship? He was the CEO of the Commercial Bank of Zimbabwe (CBZ). Were his hands clean?

No, these bankers were, in the main, not corrupt or fraudulent, but doing the best that they could to keep industry running in the face of the Zanu PF machine's destruction.

Maybe these bankers still haven't found a safe haven, but they kept many people's jobs alive.

No disruption to fuel supplies
Fuel supplies continue to be disrupted, and to disrupt the day to day life of everyone here. Without access to hard currency, or to the special allocations that parliamentarians, farmers et al have (enabling them to get fuel at the special low gazetted price), Zimbabweans remain crippled. This has direct implications for the economy, as workers arrive late at factories, having waited for commuter omnibuses which simply don't arrive. Alternatively, the workers eschew public transport and walk to work, unable to afford the luxury of transport: they arrive tired, having got home at perhaps 8pm the previous evening, and risen that morning as early as 5am, in order to be at work on time. Tired workers are less efficient, more prone to accidents, less productive. The entire economy suffers.

Recently we were told that garages were required to sell fuel at the lower, gazetted, prices - about a half of the market price. Quite simply, the garages refused to open, determined not to sell their stock at a loss. This forced the supply of fuel onto the black market, resulting in most urban transport operators immediately raising their fares by about 75%.

The regime has failed again on this one.

No to political interference
Who has interfered with whom? Our guess would be that the regime is referring to regional and international initiatives to restore order, justice, peace and democracy to our beloved Zimbabwe.

They are still saying "No" in resounding terms; who would want to be brought to account for the torture and the crimes against humanity that they have perpetrated or facilitated?

For our part, we do not want political interference. We want Zimbabweans to be able to elect the political party that they want to rule them, democratically, and without fear. But if political interference means being in the international spotlight, being criticised by the African Union, by Mbeki, by Amnesty International, and others, then yes, that is what we want. Until this country is a democracy, we want all pressure put to bear on Mugabe to resign, and to be able to hold free and fair elections.

Empowerment through takeovers
Again, it's hard to know exactly what the regime was promising here. Takeovers are good if they are in the interests of the country, the shareholders and the workforce. However, our suspicion is that this promise has strong political undertones, and that it really means takeovers by those closest to the corridors of power, to enable them to continue their rape and pillage of the country.

While we're on the subject of takeovers, perhaps we could suggest some companies which are ripe for privatisation: the NRZ (National Railways of Zimbabwe), Zisco (Zimbabwe Iron and Steel Company), Air Zimbabwe, the GMB (Grain Marketing Board)……..

Faster economic turnaround

Inflation in April 2005 was 129.1%, just as Zanu PF's new term began. The latest inflation figure (for September 2006) was 1023.3% - in other words, products cost on average 28 times more now than they did just after the March 05 elections - or looking at it yet another way, prices are doubling roughly every 3.5 months. We now have the highest inflation rate in the world.

In order to turn the country around, two major issues need to be tackled: firstly, to rein in government spending; secondly, to boost industrial and agricultural production, which would generate the badly needed foreign currency for the country.

Zanu PF has failed dismally.

More foreign currency inflows
Foreign currency inflows result from a stable economy: one in which investors have confidence, one in which goods are produced for export, one to which tourists flock to spend their dollars, pounds or rand. The country needs foreign currency (forex) to trade; it needs forex to purchase its imports and the raw materials for manufacture; it needs forex to buy essential medicines which are not manufactured here; it needs forex to keep communications going; and so we could go on ad-infinitum. If you want an example of how badly we need forex to keep ourselves going, look no further than the crisis just a few weeks back, when the internet came to a standstill, because the regime had no money to pay the USD700 000 that was owed to international telecommunications companies.

Just recently, we read in the government papers that all MTA's (Money Transfer Agencies) were to be closed with immediate effect. The MTAs appear to have raised the Reserve Bank's ire because, instead of trading at the official rate (Z$250 to the US dollar at the date of closure), the agencies were exchanging foreign currency at rates near those of the parallel market (approximately Z$1300 to the US dollar on the same date). Mugabe's government is still suffering acute foreign currency shortages, and the latest monetary manoeuvre by the Reserve Bank is seen as a way of funnelling foreign currency into the country through commercial banks and the Reserve Bank's Homelink facilities, which only trade foreign currency at the official exchange rate.

Mugabe and his party have not done anything to stabilise the economy, generate exports, encourage tourism, or any of the other things needed to create more foreign currency inflows; in fact we are in a far worse mess than we were when Zanu PF made these empty promises. The exchange rates for 1 USD speak (volumes) for themselves: in April 2005 Z$18 000; in October 2006 Z$1 300 000 (reconverted back to the old currency pre-revaluation)…….

Keeping our Zimbabwe
It seems that this is not something that most people want, judging by the number of legal and illegal emigrants leaving Zimbabwe for other countries over the past 6 years: 3 million by all accounts. People want food, health care, education, jobs, and a future for their children. If Zimbabwe is to be what it is now, people just don't want it, and are voting with their feet. The evidence is there to see.

End to Blair's MDC
They tried their best on this one - the CIO went into full swing to attempt to destroy the Movement for Democratic Change (the MDC), and they very nearly succeeded. However, the one party has now split into two, and both remain a credible challenge to the misrule and kleptocracy of Zanu PF. Neither before nor after the split, however, had the opposition anything to do with Blair or the United Kingdom in general.

Rather Mugabe's conspiracy theories fuelled the fire of the regime's propaganda. Thankfully the opposition in Zimbabwe is alive and well, and we hope that the two factions of the MDC will each serve to keep the other in check, as well as to work to defeat the evil regime in power.

Failed again, it seems. Zanu's promises are shallow holes. To those few who really did vote for Zanu PF in the last elections, we ask: "Are you living comfortably? Is your standard of living better now than 18 months ago?" - WAKE UP, we say! This regime is only out to serve itself; better you realise that now.

But there is hope! Zimbabweans need to unite in ways they never have done before, and find creative and peaceful ways to destroy and demoralise this regime:

• stop patronising businesses owned by those close to the ruling party (you know who they are!)
• get out and join WOZA (Women of Zimbabwe Arise) on the streets - or MOZA (the men's equivalent)
• pass on the pamphlets you find, take them out to the rural areas
• stop buying the Herald and the Chronicle
• save up to buy the Zimbabwe Independent or the Zimbabwean, and take them to your rural homes with you
• get ZWNews sent to you by email (ironhorse@zwnews.net) and pass it on to others

Think of other ways, talk to your friends, challenge your MP's! We are all in this together, and it is only together that we can overcome! Remember Edmund Burke's words:

"All that is necessary for evil to prevail is for a good man to do nothing"

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