Police in eastern Zimbabwe will soon launch night raids on businesses and bus companies trying to circumvent price controls by operating only in the dark. Police spokesperson for Manicaland province, Brian Makomeke warned that anyone trying to dodge President Robert Mugabe’s controversial price-cut campaign would be punished
Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe has signed into law a Bill allowing the state to eavesdrop on private phone conversations and monitor faxes and emails. The Interception of Communication Act, published in the Government Gazette on Friday, provides for the setting up of an interception centre to listen into telephone conversations, open mail and intercept emails and faxes.
A man was killed in a scuffle over a loaf of bread in Zimbabwe, where food shortages are worsening, press reports said on Thursday. The man, believed to have been an illegal gold panner, was killed on Thursday on the outskirts of the city of Gweru, central Zimbabwe, the official Herald daily said.
Renewed bickering among Zimbabwe’s opposition only months after a vow to bury their differences looks set to wreck prospects of a united challenge to President Robert Mugabe at elections next year. Analysts believe the only winner is Mugabe, seeking a seventh term in office next year.
Zimbabwe’s main opposition leader said on Wednesday a government price freeze was unsustainable and had left inflation-battered consumers worse off. Zimbabweans have struggled to buy basic commodities since President Robert Mugabe’s government ordered businesses to cut their prices to mid-June levels in a bid to rein in inflation.
Taps in Harare are running dry even though the city’s main supply dams are more than 60% full, according to figures from the Zimbabwe National Water Authority. With more than half of Harare’s three million inhabitants now experiencing water shortages, residents are resorting to desperate measures to find supplies.
The city council of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe’s second largest city, has issued a warning to residents of a possible outbreak of disease following a massive cut in the city’s water supply. This is the first time in Bulawayo’s history such a health warning has been issued. ”Water will be available for seven hours in every two days and during that time people are advised to fill their containers and cover them up.
Zimbabweans were reminded on Tuesday that there is only one certainty in their lives. Prices are running wild and there is nothing they can do about it. The latest bad news came from Mozambique, where an International Monetary Fund official projected the Southern African country’s year-on-year inflation could reach over 100Â 000% by year end.
Zimbabwe’s central bank on Tuesday introduced yet another higher denomination banknote as it grappled with runaway inflation that is rendering lower-value banknotes useless. The new ZÂ 000 bearer cheque is the latest addition to a series of temporary bank notes introduced as a stop-gap measure at the height of a critical shortage of bank notes.
The life of Zimbabwe’s paper money has been extended by another year, the state-controlled Herald newspaper reported on Saturday. Zimbabwe’s latest set of bearer cheques was introduced in July last year, when Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono slashed three zeros from the local dollar.
Zimbabwe’s main trade union said on Friday that police were guilty of attempted murder when they beat dozens of protestors earlier this week. About 150 members of the pro-democracy National Constitutional Assembly had to be hospitalised after police arrested and beat them on Wednesday, reports said on Friday.
Lawyers for the alleged British mastermind of a foiled coup in Equatorial Guinea launched an appeal on Thursday against his extradition from Zimbabwe, arguing the move would amount to a death sentence. ”He is so ill he should not be extradited. He will not be able to withstand trial,” Mann’s chief attorney, Jonathan Samkange, told the hearing.
Zimbabwean police concocted accusations of terrorism against an opposition MP and 12 followers based on testimony from non-existent witnesses at a fictional South African farm, a judge has said. Prosecutors had failed to produce the witnesses when ordered to do so and were unable to pinpoint the farm on a map, Justice Lawrence Kamocha said.
Zimbabwe’s central bank on Wednesday increased the price of gold by 757% in a bid to curb rampant smuggling of the precious metal and cover soaring production costs, an official said. ”With immediate effect, the support price has been increased from the current ZÂ 000 per gram to Z-million dollars per gram,” central bank governor Gideon Gono said.
Zimbabwe is to import 200 000 tonnes of the staple maize from Tanzania to avert widespread food shortages following a poor harvest, state television reported. The report said efforts were under way to bring in another 200 000 tonnes from Malawi.
Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe on Tuesday said Britain and its Western allies had ”redoubled” efforts to topple him, accusing them of sponsoring violence to destabilise his inflation-ravaged nation. Mugabe, in power since independence from Britain in 1980, also defended a new policy that forces stores to cut and freeze prices.
Zimbabwe’s central bank on Tuesday said it was indefinitely postponing a much awaited mid-year monetary policy statement due next week to give time to analyse the implications of government price controls and an imminent supplementary budget.
As Zimbabwe’s supermarkets rapidly continue to empty, Finance Minister Samuel Mumbengegwi has pleaded with shoppers not to hoard goods, reports said on Tuesday. Shoppers have cleared supermarkets of most basics following massive state-ordered price slashes earlier this month.
Zimbabwe’s Parliament opens a new session this week to debate radical plans to nationalise foreign firms and a law empowering the house to name President Robert Mugabe’s likely successor without a national vote. Mugabe will on Tuesday officially open the last session of the House of Assembly and the upper Senate ahead of general polls due by next March.
A woman in Zimbabwe had her leg broken in a crush of people desperate to buy scarce sugar following a delivery in the eastern town of Marondera, reports said on Monday. A queue about 800m long built up on Saturday outside a supermarket where 30 tonnes of sugar had just been delivered, said the state-controlled Herald newspaper.
Zimbabwe police are hunting a traditional spirit medium who led President Robert Mugabe’s government on a fruitless search for much-needed fuel she said was mysteriously oozing out of a rock. The Southern African state is battling with acute fuel shortages amid an economic crisis many blame on Mugabe’s policies.
Long, chaotic lines of vehicles built up on Friday at the few gas stations still supplying fuel after the government banned a hard-currency coupon gas-purchasing system used by well-to-do Zimbabweans. The worsening gasoline shortages caused panic among drivers on Friday.
Zimbabwe central bank governor Gideon Gono has warned President Robert Mugabe’s government that it risks strangling the already battered economy by banning private fuel purchases in foreign currency. A severe economic crisis many blame on Mugabe’s policies has left the Southern African state struggling.
Zimbabwe has scrapped a scheme allowing fuel purchases with foreign currency, removing one of the few remaining ways for people to acquire petrol in a country struggling with a crumbling economy. The facility is also used by foreign diplomats and officials working for international aid organisations.
Zimbabwean police summoned a leader of the country’s main union organisation to answer charges on Thursday that he called for President Robert Mugabe’s overthrow in a May Day speech, the movement said. A spokesperson for the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions confirmed secretary general Wellington Chibebe had gone to Harare’s main police station.
Zimbabwe’s second largest city, Bulawayo, warned residents on Wednesday to guard against outbreaks of disease as it was forced to cut their water supply. Authorities said they had decommissioned one of Bulawayo’s three remaining dams because water levels were too low.
Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe on Wednesday rebuked Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube for breaking his vow of celibacy after state media ran pictures of his arch-critic in bed with a married woman. ”Since you are my archbishop, Pius, and you swore to celibacy, keep your vows,” Mugabe said at the burial of a former army chief.
Zimbabwean Vice-President Joseph Msika has warned that businesses in the country will suffer if they fail to stock their shelves with goods, reports said on Wednesday. Msika, who was speaking in the east of the country, said President Robert Mugabe’s government was at war with retailers and manufacturers.
State media published photographs on Tuesday said to have been taken by a camera hidden in the bedroom of Zimbabwean Roman Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube, claiming they show the outspoken government critic undressing along with a woman named in an adultery case.
Zimbabwe is set to intensify its pricing blitz after leaders of the ruling party declared the crackdown had so far yielded impressive results, state media reported on Tuesday. Nathan Shamuyarira, Zanu-PF’s secretary for information and publicity, said a meeting of the party’s politburo on Monday had decided to extend the three-week old operation.
”If I am going to change anything in my script, it will be punctuation marks. I am not changing anything else,” says Cont Mhlanga, a prominent Zimbabwean playwright and founder of Bulawayo-based Amakhosi Theatre Production House, in response to the banning of his play titled The Good President.
President Robert Mugabe has saluted the security forces in Zimbabwe for supporting his government’s controversial campaign to slash prices of all goods and services in the country, reports said on Monday. The 83-year-old leader was speaking on Sunday as he gave out prizes after the President’s Medal shooting competition in the capital, Harare.