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Behind
a façade of normality, Zimbabwe is visibly falling apart
The Guardian (UK)
Rory Carroll in Harare
April 24, 2006
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1759786,00.html
In a rare
dispatch from Robert Mugabe's tightly controlled country, the Guardian
has found a land heading towards collapse
Stand on the
top of Heroes' Acre, a monument to Zimbabwe's liberation struggle
on a hill outside Harare, and you notice two things. Halfway down
the slope dozens of fresh tombs of polished black granite are being
prepared for the octogenarians who led the country to independence
in 1980 and remain in power. The plot beside Sally Mugabe, Robert
Mugabe's first wife, is vacant.
Shift your gaze
to the plain that stretches towards the city and you see a small
forest which swiftly thins and gives way to row after row of tree
stumps. The people of Harare have started hacking down wood for
fuel.
It is a stark
demonstration of the economic catastrophe closing in on the ageing
autocratic rulers. There may be no more trees by the time Mr Mugabe,
82, is buried.
On the surface,
many things seem normal. There is food in the shops, traffic-lights
work, children attend school. Compared with other African capitals,
Harare is calm and orderly.
Reports of ox-wagons
ferrying the sick to hospitals and famine stalking the countryside
are belied by functioning ambulances and villagers who say they
are hungry but not starving. Zimbabwe has not quite collapsed. But
it has hollowed. Behind a facade of normality, a crisis is gouging
the economy and society, causing incalculable suffering in what
was once one of Africa's most developed countries.
Agriculture
and industry are in ruins, unemployment is pushing 80% and the official
inflation rate of 913% is widely deemed a gross underestimate. The
economy has shrunk by 50% in the past six years - the fastest contraction
anywhere outside a war zone.
The result was
visible in the ragged clothes and skinny frames of the crowd attending
independence day celebrations at Harare's football stadium last
week. "I haven't had a proper meal in a long time," said
Herbert Mwinjilo, 29, a now-destitute former gardener. He says he
cannot always afford the insulin to treat his diabetes.
International
pariah
The
crisis dates from the government-sponsored invasions of white-owned
farms in 2000, a chaotic land-reform programme that destroyed agricultural
exports, frightened off investors and helped make Mr Mugabe an international
pariah.
"There
is so much suffering out there. Social services - health, education,
public works - have completely degraded," said Emmanuel Munyukwi,
chief executive of the stock exchange.
Teachers at
Mr Mugabe's alma mater, the elite St Francis Xavier college, say
that a third of the 1,000-plus pupils have left because parents
cannot afford the fees. Text books are not being replaced, classrooms
are falling apart and blackouts prevent evening study. But the teachers
are grateful for free eggs and chickens from a nearby estate owned
by Mr Mugabe.
More than 3
million Zimbabweans are thought to have emigrated. The ruling Zanu-PF
party has branded healthcare workers who moved to Britain as "British
bum cleaners", a pun on the BBC, which is banned as part of
draconian media censorship. Last week, the casualty unit of Harare's
main Parirenyatwa hospital was pristine but short of drugs, blood
and stitches. It was staffed entirely by Cuban and Congolese doctors.
The World Health
Organisation says average life expectancy for women has plunged
to 34 - the world's lowest - and for men to 37. This is the result
of Aids and poor nutrition and medical care. Prostitution has grown.
Sex workers loiter on street corners alongside black-market currency
traders. Some street children have become entrepreneurs, buying
groceries in the morning hoping the hyper-inflation will enable
them to sell at a profit that evening.
Game reserves
have reported a surge in poaching, with 17 rhinos lost in Kwekwe
park alone. Tourists have all but vanished. The government's "look
east" policy - an attempt to lure Asian investment - has flopped:
Chinese tourist numbers are down 70%.
Relief agencies
say good rains should boost harvests by 50% compared with last year,
but several hundred thousand tonnes of food aid will still be needed.
"My family
is down to two meals a day and that's just maize and pumpkin leaves,"
said Violet Charehwa, 42, as she queued in Chegutu district, 90
miles south of Harare, for a wheat ration from the World Food Programme.
The opposition,
meanwhile, seems to have lost its relevance. Since being defeated
in last year's election, which observers said was rigged, the Movement
for Democratic Change has split in two.
Zanu-PF is also
hollowing. In theory, it rules Zimbabwe. The cabinet meets every
Friday, and state media report ministers' statements as if civilians
were in charge. In reality, the party is paralysed by in-fighting
and the economic crisis. Power has shifted to a cabal of senior
officials from the army, police, prison service and intelligence
agencies.
Internal
coup
Over
the past 18 months, serving and retired officers have been slotted
into ministries and parastatal bodies such as the grain marketing
board. Soldiers are responsible for house-building, farming, tax
collection and, to some extent, monetary policy. The takeover was
formalised by the recent establishment of a Soviet-style Zimbabwe
National Security Council, a group of elderly securocrats, chaired
by Mr Mugabe and tasked with managing the economy.
"The whole
government has been militarised. You could almost call it an internal
coup," said a western diplomat.
Mr Mugabe is
still in control and plotting to safeguard his future after 2008,
when his presidential term expires, by installing relatives and
loyalists in key positions. He retains some support from fellow
members of the dominant Shona tribe who accept his claims that drought
and sanctions - not his misrule - are responsible for the country's
plight.
"The president
is doing a good job. He is constant about everything," said
Dick Chingaira, 53, a singer better known by his stage name, Comrade
Chinx, who appears at rallies singing the regime's praises. An official
version of Zimbabwe's situation is not possible to obtain. Due to
restrictions on foreign media working in the country, the Guardian
was not able to approach ministers for comment.
Most people
pine for change. The question many ask, though, is: will the economic
crisis puncture the atmosphere of intimidation and fear inhibiting
protest? "People are angry - yes. But willing to express it
in any visible or tangible manner - no," said one aid worker,
who declined to be named. "The politics of survival has overtaken
the politics of opposition. People are consumed simply by trying
to get by day to day."
About 30,000
people packed Harare's football stadium on independence day last
week. They came not for the president's state-of-the-nation address
but the football match that followed: a rare free treat. Mr Mugabe,
wearing a green sash, spoke for an hour, promising initiatives to
revive the economy, a familiar refrain that might have been expected
to provoke a hostile response from a crowd who had heard it all
before.
It provoked
nothing. No jeers, no shouts, no whistles. Some people snoozed,
the rest chatted among themselves. Mr Mwinjilo, the unemployed gardener,
shrugged. "What good would it do to heckle? It would change
nothing. Anyway the speech is almost finished. The match will start
soon."
State of
decline
- 20mins Frequency
that a child dies of Aids and another is orphaned, according to
the United Nations children's agency, Unicef, which estimates
that 1.6 million children, almost one in three, are orphans.
- 3,000 Number
of people estimated to die of Aids-related illnesses each week,
despite an apparent slight decline recently in the HIV rate.
- 4.3m Number
of people receiving food aid after several poor harvests blamed
on drought and chaotic land reform.
- 34 Average
life expectancy for women - the lowest in the world. For men it
is 37, according to the World Health Organisation. The government
says the figures are exaggerated.
- 3.5m Number
of Zimbabweans said to have emigrated, mostly to South Africa,
Botswana and Britain.
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