20/06/2008 19:48 HARARE, June 20 (AFP)
Mugabe says 'only God' can remove him as rivals consider pullout


President Robert Mugabe said Friday that "only God" could remove him from office, as Zimbabwe's opposition considered pulling out of next week's run-off election amid escalating violence.

"The MDC will never be allowed to rule this country -- never ever," Mugabe told local business people in Zimbabwe's second city Bulawayo, referring to the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.

"Only God who appointed me will remove me -- not the MDC, not the British."

Mugabe -- in power since independence from Britain in 1980 -- has frequently accused his presidential run-off opponent Morgan Tsvangirai of being a stooge of the former colonial power.

Later Friday, at a rally in Bulawayo, Mugabe said: "We will never allow an event like an election reverse our independence, our sovereignty, our sweat and all that we fought for ... all that our comrades died fighting for."

The MDC plans to meet Sunday to consider whether to contest the June 27 vote, with the party claiming that around 70 of its supporters have been killed since the first round of voting in March.

"In the light of the violence and intimidation, we will make a position whether we still feel the people's will will be realised, whether it's conducive to go into an election," MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa told AFP.

There were signs the party was deeply split on the issue, with other MDC officials contradicting Chamisa and vowing to press ahead.

Pulling out would likely mean handing victory to Mugabe, who is defying harsh criticism from abroad.

Western powers and human rights groups say the election has been tainted by violence and intimidation, while Tsvangirai alleges that Zimbabwe now is run by what is essentially a "military junta".

"The people have been subjected to violence and intimidation which are so blatant and they are disappointed that we are not having access to the electorate," Innocent Gonese, the MDC's secretary for legal affairs, told AFP.

"People are saying despite all that we should not withdraw and we also believe withdrawing will not solve anything."

Asked about the possibility of pulling out of the election, MDC treasurer general Roy Bennett told AFP in Johannesburg: "That's nonsense. There is no such thing."

Mugabe has vowed the opposition will never come to power in his lifetime and has pledged to fight to keep it from happening.

Referring to Mugabe's remarks, Chamisa said in comments published Friday in the South African newspaper The Star: "What therefore is the point of this election?"

"Why should we participate in it? Many of our members are now wondering and want us to pull out."

Mugabe has threatened to arrest opposition leaders over the pre-election violence, though the United Nations has said the president's supporters were responsible for the bulk of it.

Zimbabwe's police chief Augustine Chihuri said Friday the MDC was the "main culprit to the political violence that we are currently witnessing in the country".

"As the country prepares for a presidential election run-off next week, all necessary force will be applied on malcontents and perpetrators of violence... This violence is aimed at intimidating people from voting and we know it is in preparation of influencing the outcome of the election."

In a case the opposition describes as harassment, a court on Friday refused to dismiss subversion and vote-rigging charges against MDC number-two Tendai Biti, who if convicted faces a possible death sentence.

The magistrate ordered Biti held in prison until at least July 7.

Zimbabwe's attorney general refused to allow bail for Biti later in the day, though his lawyer has appealed to the high court and a hearing has been set for Tuesday.

Biti, the MDC's secretary general, was arrested on June 12 minutes after arriving back in Zimbabwe following a long stay in South Africa. He has been held in prison since then and was officially charged on Thursday.

A harsh critic of Mugabe, Biti faces a total of four charges including subverting the government, election rigging and "projecting the president as an evil man."

Meanwhile, the human rights group Amnesty International urged regional leaders to meet urgently on Zimbabwe's crisis, in a letter written to the head of the Southern African Development Community.

"People are being killed, tortured and subjected to other ill-treatment while the perpetrators are enjoying complete impunity," its secretary general Irene Khan wrote.

AFP

20/06/2008 23:39 WASHINGTON, June 20 (AFP)
US backs Thabo Mbeki's mediation in Zimbabwe crisis




afp

These six men have been accused of orchestrating the brutal election violence in Zimbabwe, as reported by the Daily Telegraph:

AUGUSTINE CHIHURI

Police Commissioner

One of Robert Mugabe's most hard-line supporters, now 55, has directed the police to turn a blind eye to violence against the MDC. He was an architect of the 2005 Operation Murambatsvina ("Drive out the trash") campaign, in which more than 700,000 homes of poor town-dwellers, seen as supporters of the MDC, were destroyed. He is said to have been the one security chief prepared to let Mugabe step down after his defeat in the March poll, because he was nervous about international reaction.

GIDEON GONO

Reserve Bank governor

Gono, 54, came to the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe in December 2003 after many years as managing director of the Commercial Bank of Zimbabwe. His reforms to the bank's fiscal operations have been blamed for Zimbabwe's rampant inflation – now 165,000 per cent . He has run the central bank like a ministry and has printed vast quantities of paper money, against the advice of economists. At one time in 2004 he was rumoured to have been pencilled to take over as prime minister. But his career seems to have stalled after his reforms, which appeared successful at first, failed. Owns the nominally independent newspaper The Financial Gazette.

EMMERSON MNANGAGWA

Head of Joint Operational Command

Aged 61, he is seen as Mugabe's heir and, despite his lowly post as minister for rural housing, now controls Joint Operations Command – a body of security service leaders which is running Zimbabwe.

As National Security Minister in the 1980s, he ran the Central Intelligence Organisation and played a key role in the civil war between Mugabe's Zanu party and Joshua Nkomo. He was largely responsible for the massacre of 20,000 Ndebele people in Matabeleland in the 1980s.

CONSTANTINE CHIWENGA

Zimbabwe Defence Forces commander

In post since 2003, Gen Chiwenga, 51, is the most important member of the Joint Operations Command (JOC) and one of the most powerful men in Zimbabwe.

A veteran of the independence war, he has always been seen as highly political. After the first round of the presidential election in March he said "the army would not support or salute sell-outs and agents of the West", referring to the MDC. His wife, Jocelyn, has benefited from the seizure of white farms and been implicated in assaults on MDC supporters.

PARADZAI ZIMONDI

Director of the Zimbabwe Prison Service

After retiring from the army, Gen Zimondi, 61, was kept in the state's security apparatus with a post running the prisons service.

A trusted officer, he is believed to be especially close to Mugabe.

Before the first round of the election, Zimondi told a gathering of prison officers: "I am giving you an order to vote for the president," adding: "I will only support the leadership of President Mugabe."

PERENCE SHIRI

Air Force commander

A cousin of Mugabe, Shiri, 53, is said to have persuaded him not to step down in March for fear of facing prosecution for the massacre of 20,000 people in Matabeleland in the early 1980s. He was then a colonel in the North Korean-trained 5th Brigade. Despite this, he went to the Royal College of Defence Studies in London in 1986. It is thought he aided farm invasions by "veterans".

__________________
"Nothing is complete and thus nothing is exempt from criticism." - James Luther Adams:

HARARE - Armed supporters of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe have occupied the area where opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai was to hold an election rally on Sunday, Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change said.
"Thousands of armed (ruling party) ZANU-PF youth militia have violently occupied the MDC rally venue at Harare showgrounds to disrupt the rally, which the High Court granted," the MDC said in a statement.




Reuters/MDC

Harare - Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai quit the country's bitterly fought run-off election on Sunday, saying the vote cannot be free and fair.

"We in the MDC cannot ask them to cast their vote on the 27th when that vote would cost them their lives," Tsvangirai told reporters.

"We will no longer participate in the violent illegitimate sham of an election process."


News24

The MDC is pulling out of this farce and charade that Mugabe and ZANU-PF are concoctinglection. It will make thingsa a bit easier for Mugabe in the short term, but infinitely mroe difficult in th elong term.

__________________
"Nothing is complete and thus nothing is exempt from criticism." - James Luther Adams:

Barry Cohen

THERE were only two possible results at Friday's scheduled election in Zimbabwe.

Robert Mugabe and his thugs would rig it and Mugabe would win or Morgan Tsvangirai would win and there would be war. Last night Tsvangirai quit, saying the vote could not be free and fair.

The tyrant responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of his countrymen and the plight of millions of refugees will continue to torture, starve and murder anyone that opposes his will. God alone, he tells us, will end his reign.

And the world's reaction? There'll be wringing of hands and pious platitudes, but not much else. The anti-war activists will be too busy screaming abuse at George Bush while ignoring what's happening in Darfur, Tibet, North Korea and Zimbabwe. There'll be no multimillion marches demanding Mugabe must go.

What will it take for the democracies to demand action to rid Zimbabwe of this odious fellow? His record is well known but it bears retelling. At independence in 1980, Zimbabwe was the bread basket of Southern Africa. It inherited excellent infrastructure, adequate health, education, legal and political systems and basic human rights.

That came to a grinding halt in 2000. A steady decline in living standards throughout the 1990s caused growing dissatisfaction with the Mugabe regime and a series of nationwide strikes. The gloss wore off the national hero who had been the driving force for independence.

From this discontent emerged the Movement for Democratic Change led by Tsvangirai, the former secretary-general of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions. At each successive election Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) increasingly used fraud, intimidation and murder to retain power.

Although, in 2000, Mugabe controlled the electoral commission, the judiciary, the army, the police and the state-owned media, he won only 62 of the 120 seats in the parliament with the MDC winning 57. He extended his majority by appointing an additional 30 seats of his own.

With a presidential election due in March 2002, Mugabe increased his control of all organs of government by striking fear into the opposition through the use of force, torture, beatings and murder. In an act of monumental stupidity he turned his war veterans loose on the 4500 white-owned farms that had been the backbone of Zimbabwe's economy. With 90 per cent of farms taken over by those with no experience of farming, production collapsed, creating a desperate shortage of food ensuring millions of Zimbabweans starved. The white population declined from 250,000 to 75,000.

From then on it was all downhill. The figures are mind-boggling. The World Food Organisation states that seven million are at risk of starving; inflation is at 165,000 per cent; unemployment at 80 per cent, refugees, mostly to South Africa, have been between three and four million, ensuring that the population has dropped from approximately 18 to 13 million. Zimbabwe also has one of the highest HIV/AIDS infection rates in the world.

Life expectancy has dropped from 62 to 34. As The Sunday Times recently reported: "The numbers of dead are fast heading into realms previously explored by Stalin, Mao and Adolf Eichmann." These are the bare facts but they do not capture the reality of what is happening in Zimbabwe. Let me tell the story of Sekai Holland.

Born in Zimbabwe 65 years ago, she arrived in Australia in 1964, graduated from ANU and in 1968 married Australian civil engineer, Jim Holland. Her activist role in the Aboriginal movement and opposition to the 1971 Springbok tour earned the admiration and affection of everyone involved.

When white minority rule in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe ended in 1980 Jim and Sekai returned to try to make a contribution to building a democratic nation, something only too rare in Africa. Things went well for a while but by the '90s, the Mugabe regime was beginning to show its true colours.

Initially a member of ZANU-PF, Sekai became a leading participant in the MDC. Chairwoman of the Association of Women's Clubs from 1992 she was in the vanguard of the struggle against Mugabe.

In March 2007, a year away from the election, Mugabe's thugs broke her leg, arm, ribs and inflicted over 80 cuts to her body.

Smuggled into South Africa and then to Australia for operations and convalescence she returned last February, against the advice of her friends, to run for the Senate. She won the seat of Chizhanje in Harare by 13,700 to 4300, but since the election has been constantly moving or in hiding for fear of her life.

Supporters in Australia, headed by former Wallaby Anthony Abrahams and former MP Meredith Burgmann, have raised $25,000 to provide Sekai with security guards. Three have been murdered.

The situation is likely to worsen. Regrettably, it appears only force will stop this tyrant and the 14 member countries of the Southern African Development Community are the ones that should apply it.

Sadly, the country that should be leading the way - South Africa - is led by the spineless Thabo Mbeki.

Apparently, this is due to some twisted sense of loyalty to Mugabe for his support in the battle against apartheid.

Fortunately, not all African leaders feel the same. Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga doesn't mince words. He had called for an international peacekeeping force to ensure a free and fair election. Rwanda's President, Paul Kagame, asks why would Mugabe bother holding an election if he didn't intend to respect the outcome?

Zimbabwe is a problem that should be solved by Africans. With the possible exception of Great Britain, the rest should stay out. They should only become involved as a last resort. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.



Barry Cohen is a former minister in the Hawke government.

Why is it that it only takes an alleged threat of mass destruction for the allies to attack, uproot and destroy a once stable Iraq yet Mugabe can get away with making a mockery of democracy and killing thousands of black and whites? Do we truly have to conclude that because Iraq is rich in natural recourses and tactically significant for a possible war with Iran it is worth fighting a war over yet because Zimbabwe lacks those two criteria it is not worth restoring order and justice?

The world the Zimbabweans have to live in is far worse then that of the Iraqi’s under Saddam. Am I the only one who thinks that an allied intervention in Zimbabwe is overdue and South Africa’s petty attempt to negotiate, though good in attention, is pointless and only actions will make the difference?

Zimbabwe's opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai says he is pulling out of Friday's presidential run-off, handing victory to President Robert Mugabe. Do you agree with the MDC's decision?