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"Give us this day our daily bread" takes on new meaning in Zimbabwe city
ZimOnline
February 02, 2006

http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/VBOL-6LMK9X?OpenDocument&rc=1&cc=zwe

BULAWAYO - Tucked in her small one roomed apartment in the poor and sprawling suburb of Makokoba in Bulawayo, a visibly exasperated Mercy Moyo dips two slices of bread into some thin vegetable soup which she takes with black tea.

Moyo's two little children, Thabani and Thembi, who are sitting cross-legged on a small mat on the floor, are also busy shoving some bread down their little throats.

For Moyo and her family, it has been weeks since they last had a formal meal - a plate of sadza (a thick maize-meal porridge) taken with vegetable or beef stew - and the main staple for over 90 percent of Zimbabweans.

"Things are not well here, we have not managed to buy any maize-meal in the last three weeks.

Sometimes the maize-meal is available on the parallel market but is too expensive for us" says Moyo, throwing her hands in the air in desperation.

For the past three weeks, Moyo like most other residents in Makokoba, has been forced to survive on poor quality bread and sweet potatoes due to the serious shortage of maize-meal in the city.

"The sweet potatoes are readily available. We sometimes eat sweet potatoes during lunch and dinner but now my two daughters are beginning to show signs of kwashiorkor. It is not healthy to eat the same food every day for three consecutive weeks," says Moyo.

Zimbabwe, once a net food exporter, has virtually survived on food handouts from international donors over the last six years after President Robert Mugabe destroyed the key agricultural sector through his often violent farm seizures from the minority whites for redistribution to landless blacks.

The disruptions on farming operations caused by the land reforms saw food production tumbling by about 60 percent, leaving the country dependent on aid. Food aid agencies say at least four million Zimbabweans, a quarter of the country's 12 million people, are in urgent need of food aid between now and the next harvest in April or they would starve.

But the food crisis is hitting hardest the poor families here in Bulawayo and the surrounding Matabeleland provinces, traditionally a drier region and prone to hunger.

For example, Bulawayo Executive Mayor Japhet Ndabeni Ncube last year said several people had died in the city due to malnutrition-related illnesses. But the government was quick to refute Ndabeni-Ncube's figures although the mayor was quoting records compiled by the state's own deaths and births registry office.

Residents here in Bulawayo however say it matters little as to who between their mayor and the government was telling the truth about the number of people who may have died of hunger-related illnesses.

After two months without any maize-meal in the shops most residents interviewed by ZimOnline said their biggest fear was that Bulawayo may soon witness its first death directly caused by hunger, especially among marginalised groups such as orphans and the elderly.

"Many people cannot afford the mealie-meal that is being sold on the black market because it is very expensive. A 10kg bag is selling for over $800 000 and that is too expensive," another Bulawayo resident, Norman Khumalo said, summing up the plight of most people in the sprawling city.

Khumalo said he had witnessed many of his neighbours sending their kids to bed without having eaten anything for supper because they could not afford to buy mealie-meal on the black-market or bread.

But the kids at may have to go to bed on empty stomachs for a little longer thanks to incessant rains that according to the National Millers Association (NMA) were making it difficult to transport enough maize imports from South Africa to Bulawayo.

NMA chairperson Thembinkosi Ndlovu said the association even had to throw away sizable quantities of maize after they discovered that it had gone bad due to poor weather.

"The weather is quite bad and some maize that was brought into the country was found to be rotten after it was exposed to rain and seven wagons of maize had to be thrown away. This is the reason why we are having a shortfall," Ndlovu said.

Ndlovu did not say when exactly the next supplies of maize were expected in the city.

And that according to another Bulawayo resident, Simon Siziba, may mean "we simply have to take Mugabe's advice and change from eating sadza to become potato and rice eaters forever."

He was referring to comments by Mugabe on the sidelines of the United Nations Summit in New York last year when he flatly denied that Zimbabwe was facing food shortages saying there were lots of potatoes and rice in the country.

Mugabe said the only problem was that Zimbabweans did not fancy rice or potatoes, a comment which critics said was the ultimate proof that the veteran President was completely out of touch with the plight of ordinary people like Siziba and his starving fellow residents in Bulawayo.

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