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Govt bars help for blitz victims
Augustine Mukaro, The Zimbabwe Independent
June 17, 2005

http://www.theindependent.co.zw/news/2005/June/Friday17/2548.html

GOVERNMENT has barred humanitarian groups from assisting thousands of families whose shanty homes and informal businesses were destroyed under the controversial "Operation Murambatsvina" in a move described by observers as a desperate attempt by government to cover up the catastrophe the campaign has created.

The clean-up campaign has left more than 300 000 urban families homeless, jobless and destitute after flea markets, stalls, tuckshops as well as backyard lodgings were destroyed.

The operation, which government alleges is meant to rid urban areas of criminals, has been met with condemnation from all angles.

Diplomatic sources who had availed food, blankets and medicines to the destitute victims living in the open have been told to stop their activities forthwith.

"Some NGOs have now resorted to providing assistance through churches," sources said.

"Roman Catholic churches in Hatcliffe and Mabvuku-Tafara are distributing food, blankets as well as other humanitarian assistance to the evicted people."

The United Nations in conjunction with the International Organisation for Migration and other humanitarian assistance non-governmental organisations this week petitioned government on the deteriorating situation among the displaced families who are in need of food and shelter.

Senior officials at the Social Welfare ministry, which approves humanitarian assistance, said governors of provinces had been ordered to block donor groups from distributing food and clothes to the clean-up campaign victims because such aid would expose the shortcomings of the controversial campaign.

Officials said government fears that by allowing donors to intervene, it would be admitting that its actions have caused a humanitarian crisis. So the donors will be kept away while government works out solutions.

Last week Manicaland governor Tinaye Chigudu was reportedly stopping NGOs from distributing medicines and food. He said he had done so only because he wanted to consult with his superiors in Harare.

Chigudu said: "They came to me with proposals that included medicines, food and repatriation. I told them to hold on to the assistance because I needed to consult my superiors in government.

"There is a national policy on donations and I cannot go against that. I did not want to find myself in the unusual situation of being the only governor working at variance with other governors and local authorities. But that does not mean I banned them."

Government last year ordered that food assistance be restricted to targeted groups such as orphans, HIV and Aids patients and the elderly.

But President Robert Mugabe this month made a U-turn by accepting World Food Programme food assistance to feed an estimated four million Zimbabweans facing starvation this year.

With unemployment at more than 80%, the majority of Zimbabweans depended on informal trading to survive, while even those lucky to have a formal job also supplement their inflation-eroded salaries through informal trade.

Economic experts said the informal sector had become a vital safety net in a country now in its sixth year of severe economic recession.

Failure to provide proper housing by underfunded and generally mismanaged urban councils has seen the sprouting of illegal peri-urban settlements around major cities.

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