President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe has refused to sign a controversial new law that would have barred foreign rights groups from operating in the country, a newspaper said on Thursday.
The NGO Bill, which also outlawed local groups from receiving outside funds, was passed by Parliament last year after marathon debate and fierce opposition resistance.
The Bill had to be signed by the president before it became law.
”The NGO Bill was sent to the president for assent and he did not do so because of one or two issues he wanted to be addressed,” Minister of Social Welfare Nicholas Goche told the state-controlled Herald newspaper.
The minister did not say what the issues were.
The proposed law, which drew widespread criticism from rights groups around the world, barred the registration of foreign NGOs if their work was purely for the promotion and protection of human rights.
Several human rights groups in Zimbabwe have since 2000 been chronicling alleged abuses by Mugabe’s government.
Critics said the law would be used to shut down perceived opponents, just as a controversial press law passed in 2002 was used to shut down four independent newspapers critical of the government.
Parliament is set to resume next month, with Mugabe’s Zanu-PF holding a majority of 78 seats to 41 for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.
UN envoy arrives in Zimbabwe
Meanwhile, reports Michael Hartnack, United Nations envoy Joaquim Chissano arrived in Zimbabwe for talks with Mugabe on Thursday as the country plunged deeper into economic crisis, with mass arrests of black-market traders, long lines for gasoline and stampedes for scarce food like sugar.
Chissano, the former president of Mozambique, is due to hold discussions with Mugabe on proposed UN reforms, according to Zimbabwe state radio.
However, the meeting is also expected to touch on growing food shortages in Zimbabwe, which used to be the bread basket of Southern Africa. With an estimated five million Zimbabweans now acknowledged to be in urgent need of food aid, World Food Programme chief James Morris is due to visit the country next week.
Before March 31 parliamentary elections, Mugabe insisted that the country had a ”bumper harvest” of maize and would be self-sufficient in food. But shortly after the poll — won by the ruling Zanu-PF party with a huge majority amid allegations of the use of food as a political weapon to secure votes — the government said it would have to import 1,2-million tonnes of maize.
Stampede for sugar
Reports from the western city of Bulawayo said two women with babies on their backs were injured on Wednesday when hundreds of shoppers stampeded for a limited supply of sugar, not seen in stores for many weeks.
Long lines also formed for bread, wheat flour and maize meal, the staple diet of Zimbabwe’s 11,6-million people.
At a Harare filling station owned by a government minister, motorists who had waited two days for gasoline, sleeping in their cars, were disappointed when stocks ran out after preference was given to a last-minute ”VIP” line of limousines and off-road vehicles, and uniformed soldiers in private cars.
The resulting near-riot caused gridlock on a major arterial road. Drivers of fuel-starved minibuses, which form the backbone of the capital’s public transport system, were outraged but backed down in the face of threats by troops.
Ever since 1998 food riots, which killed seven people, uniformed security force members have claimed preference in lines for all scarce staples.
Police said 800 street vendors, including sellers of black-market fuel, were rounded up on Wednesday in a blitz on downtown Harare.
Economic policy
Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono was scheduled to make a two-hour statement on economic policy later on Thursday.
State radio said devaluation from the present official rate of Z$6 200 to the dollar is expected to feature prominently.
Gasoline, officially Z$3 420 per litre, is selling on the black market for up to Z$20 000 and a large price hike is expected.
Luxon Zembe, president of the Zimbabwe National Chambers of Commerce, led business leaders urging the government to introduce ”a more realistic exchange rate to make exports earning vital foreign currency more competitive”.
In a reference to the country’s growing isolation, Zembe also called for ”more measures to address international relations in order to attract investment and lines of credit”.
Gono is known to want restored links with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), while Mugabe favours a ”look East” policy, replacing Western trade links with an attempt to capture China’s growing prosperity.
Zimbabwe’s economic crisis has escalated since 1998 to 2000, when Mugabe forfeited World Bank and IMF support over chronic financial mismanagement, lost a constitutional referendum, and began seizing 5 000 white-owned farms. — Sapa-AP, Sapa-DPA