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ZINASU statement on April national stayaway
Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU)
February 27, 2007

Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU) is  shocked by the reckless utterances from the Minister of State Security, Mr. D. Mutasa saying that he will crush any protests by workers to get poverty datum line linked minimum wages. The demands by the workers are just and legitimate and we would like to counter-warn Mutasa that any attempt  to force the uniformed security forces and ZANU PF youth militia to impose barrack gangsterism on the protesting workers will not go unchallenged. In fact such as myopic decision will result in a prolonged but decisive struggle. The students will not sit idly and cowardly watch as our parents, brothers and sisters being brutalised by an illegitimate force. That is impossible Nyati! ( Mutasa`s totem). Struggle is our birthright!

Our future is being threatened by a cabal of crocodile liberators, intellectual hyenas, crooks and fraudsters. We still remember the Kondozi Farm scandal. The ruling vampire elites looted all farming equipment at Kondozi farm with brutal efficiency and all dissenting voices where silenced with a military discipline. The illegal invasion and subsequent looting at the commercial farm  left more than 4 000 workers unempolyed, deprived the nation of earning foreign currency through exports of farm produce, resulted in a serious negative balance of payment and contributed to the current   economic demise in Zimbabwe. History will judge all the looters harshly.

Our vision for a free and democratic  Zimbabwe has transmogrified into a melodrammatic nightmare. Inflation is now soaring over 1600% per year, unemployment rate is over 85%. Of those 85%  70% are youth. Life expectancy rate is at frightening levels: 35 years for males and 33 years for females. 90% of the population is living in abject and chronic poverty. The fees in colleges, universities, high schools and primary schools increased by a range from 1200% to 2000% over the last 13 months. One in every four tested pregnant women is HIV positive, over 60% of higher learning institution students are living with the deadly virus and college drop out rate is 31.5%.  There is rampant violation of basic human rights in Zimbabwe. The right to freedom of   assembly, freedom of expression and freedom of associtaion are being criminalised. Dear Minister, is this the Zimbabwe we `fought` for?.

Mindful of the foregoing, we the students in Zimbabwe would like to unequivocally   reassure the Minister and Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) that ZINASU supports and will actively participate in  the 3 to 4 April 2007 national stay away. The students will be on a class boycott from 5 March 2007 until their demands are met .

Time is on the side of the truth and victory belongs to the fearless.  Change is coming.  

For and on behalf of students in Zimbabwe

Promise Mkwananzi
President

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