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Zimbabwe: Negotiating the election maize
Mail & Guardian
March 29, 2005

http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/MMQD-6AXUAV?OpenDocument&rc=1&cc=zwe

President Robert Mugabe's claims of the triumph of his seizures of white-owned farms ring hollow at campaign rallies where people are hungry.

Confronted by unenthusiastic crowds, Mugabe has admitted for the first time while campaigning that the country is confronted by widespread food shortages.

Meanwhile, police have threatened to jail a civic leader who has charged that the government is withholding food from areas that support the opposition.

But the food shortages are undeniable. Maize meal supplies have been erratic in both rural and urban areas over the past month, with supermarkets in the cities without stocks for days. Zimbabwean residents say large areas of planted crops stand dry and damaged, and international agencies estimate that more than four-million Zimbabweans are in need of food aid.

Speaking in Zimbabwe's rural heartland, Mugabe was forced to acknowledge that the people were suffering from a lack of maize, the country's staple grain. At a rally for his Zanu-PF party on March 17 in Gutu, in southeastern Zimbabwe, Mugabe blamed the shortages on the failure of the seasonal rains.

"The main problem we are facing is one of drought and the shortage of food, we are going to work out a hunger alleviation programme ... I promise you that no one will starve," Mugabe told a listless crowd of 7 000, according to Reuters. The villagers sat through Mugabe's 40-minute speech, many with blank faces.

International aid agencies say at least four-million people -- a third of the population -- will need food aid this year after a bad harvest due to poor utilisation of the lands seized from white farmers, scanty rainfall and inadequate supplies of seed and fertiliser to small rural farmers.

Leading civic rights group, the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA), charged on March 17 that Mr Mugabe's ruling party was using food as a political tool, with people in areas short of food having to produce party cards to get supplies.

Campaigning candidates from Zanu-PF threaten hungry villages that they will not get state food supplies if they do not vote for the ruling party, according to a report issued on March 21 by Human Rights Watch.

Mugabe denies his land seizure policy has sparked off the country's worst economic crisis, blaming instead the sanctions imposed on his government by some western governments.

"We had tried in the farming sector but the drought has let us down. I have made a promise to your traditional leaders that we are not going to let you down," Mr Mugabe said in Gutu.

The regional famine early warning system has cautioned since last year that Zimbabwe would be facing food shortages. Last month the agency reported that the most serious shortages were in the drought-prone provinces of Matabeleland, Manicaland and Masvingo, where analysts say that if Mugabe's party loses any support, it could swing the vote in favour of the main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

For more than a year Mugabe has adamantly maintained that the land seizures have been an unqualified success and that the country has enjoyed a bumper harvest.

Last year Mugabe stopped international donors from distributing food to rural areas. "We are not hungry, why foist this food on us? We don't want to be choked on your aid," an indignant Mugabe said on Sky TV.

But critics say his main reason for blocking the aid was to give his government total control over all food supplies during the election period. The state Grain Marketing Board (GMB) has a legislated monopoly over all sales and transportation of maize.

Political analysts say Zanu-PF -- which draws most of its support from rural people who make up more than 60% of the population -- must show it can handle the food crisis competently or risk losing this support.

"The hunger is very real and the shortages are obvious," said a Harare-based commentator. "Even the state media can no longer mask it. He's compelled to say something."

The MDC said the country urgently needed 1,5-million tonnes of the staple maize to avert hunger. Shadow minister for agriculture, Renson Gasela, said Zimbabwe required urgent food aid and Mugabe's government could not handle an unfolding crisis.

Gasela said the government had no foreign currency and could not mobilise donor support because it lacked legitimacy. Also, international aid agencies would be reluctant to help Zimbabwe after Mugabe stopped donors distributing food last year.

Gasela charged that Zanu-PF was politicising food, especially in the drought-prone Matabeleland and Midlands regions, known as areas of MDC support, and that most people attending opposition rallies complained of hunger.

The NCA repeated the charges that Mugabe's party has used food as an elections weapon. "The use of food as a tool for campaigning is noted as a cause for concern because clearly it is a violation and it would appear to constitute vote buying," said spokesperson Jessie Majome, presenting the NCA report to Harare-based diplomats.

Later, police threatened to arrest NCA leader Lovemore Madhuku for the allegations in the report. "I stand by every detail in our report," said Madhuku. "I am prepared to defend the accusations in court.

"Everyone knows there is not enough food and that people are going hungry. Everyone knows that you must be Zanu-PF to buy maize meal from the Grain Marketing Board."

The NCA said it obtained its information from community monitors in eight of the country's 10 provinces and that they backed the allegations of food supply manipulation.

The NCA is a loose coalition of churches, student and labour unions, business and rights groups that has lobbied for a new constitution to replace one it says entrenches Mugabe's power. The group denies charges that it is anti-government.

International rights group Amnesty International has also accused Mugabe's government of manipulating the GMB. It said GMB officials limit access to maize meal purchases to Zanu-PF members and control shipments of maize meal to create artificial shortages in opposition-dominated areas. The government has denied the charges.

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