The MDC has unearthed a plot by the Attorney General’s office and members of the Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) to secure convictions against MDC MPs in a bid to reverse the MDC majority in Parliament.

Deputy Attorney General, Johannes Tomana is leading the plot in which the Zanu PF regime is planning to secure convictions and lay more trumped-up charges against MDC MPs to reverse our majority in Parliament.

This week five MDC MPs were arrested in Harare during the opening of the 7th Parliament of Zimbabwe.

Four of them, Pearson Mungofa, the MP for Highfield East, Eliah Jembere, Epworth; Bednock Nyaude, Bindura South and Trevor Saruwaka, Mutasa Central are still in police custody. They were denied bail.

Hon Nyaude was granted bail by a Bindura magistrate but the State has appealed.

Via an MDC Press Release.

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Zimbabwe Lifts Ban on Aid Groups, but Its Effects Linger (New York Times)

Zimbabwe lifted an almost three-month-old ban on the work of aid groups on Friday. [...] The effects of the aid restrictions will linger. The United Nations World Food Program had planned to feed 1.7 million Zimbabweans next month, but was unable to deploy its partners on the ground, the suspended aid groups, to identify and register the needy this month. “We will not be able to reach most of those 1.7 million people,” said Richard Lee, a spokesman for the World Food Program. “We will try to reach as many as possible, but we haven’t even begun to do the essential preparatory work.”

Mugabe party says it will not yield to new opposition demand: report (AfricAsia)
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe’s party has rejected new demands by the opposition following meetings with South African mediators to get power-sharing talks back on track, state media said Saturday. “The only new but absurd suggestion from the MDC was that the cabinet be co-chaired by President Mugabe and Tsvangirai,” state daily The Herald quoted a source by Mugabe’s ZANU-PF as saying, referring to MDC opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai. “ZANU-PF dismissed the suggestion, not just as insolent, but also stunning ignorance on how government works.”

Mbeki urges Zimbabwe negotiators to end talks (SABC)
President Thabo Mbeki has told Zimbabwe’s negotiating parties that the continent is pinning its hopes on them to find a speedy resolution to the political crisis in their country. Talks to secure a power sharing deal continued in Tshwane yesterday.

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The Minister: Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare

Re: Humanitarian Crisis: Urgent Need For Food Aid In Zimbabwe

Reference is made to your letter to all non-governmental organizations involved in humanitarian distribution of food in Zimbabwe instructing them to stop food aid.

Further reference is made to your letter dated 12 June 2008 seeking to clarify your earlier letter, in which you allowed very few Non-Governmental Organizations to carry out food distribution mostly to persons with certain medical conditions and supplementary feeding programs for children.

On the 21st of July 2008, the three parties in the SADC dialogue signed a Memorandum of Understanding, which among other things addressed the humanitarian crisis under section 10.1 (d), as follows;

“The parties agree that, in the interim, they will work together to ensure the safety of any displaced persons and their safe return home and that humanitarian and social welfare organizations are enabled to render such assistance as might be required.” (more…)

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Visit the festival page here. It’s all about braais, music, sadza, beer etc - and raising money for Zimbabweans in need. Tickets are £20 in advance or £30 at the gate.  Tickets are also available from various outlets (see website for details).

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Press Release from the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition:

Heavily armed police officers stormed a meeting of the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition, in Harare hotel around 12:30 [yesterday] afternoon disrupting proceedings of an Annual General Meeting (AGM) of its membership, gathered for the administrative business of electing new office bearers.

This happened as South Africa’s president Thabo Mbeki, mediator in Zimbabwe’s power-sharing talks, arrived in Zimbabwe for what is expected to be a next leg in his efforts to enforce an unpopular government of national unity.

“They are being very rough, and unreasonable. They are threatening us with arrest and saying that our gathering is illegal”, said Elinor Sisulu, a spokesperson of the group. “This whole attack of civil society flies in the face of the provision the memorandum of understanding of which says that there should be an environment in which social welfare organizations, of which Crisis has a sizeable members who are gathered here today, should be enabled to carry outs their activities without intimidation”.

(more…)

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‘Nothing will stop Mugabe forming new govt’ (ZimOnline)
[Bright Matonga] told the media: “Nothing is going to stop us from forming a new government. We need to move forward, we need to make sure that Zimbabwe regains its status, we need to work on the economy. People are suffering.” The deputy information minister, who dismissed the MDC as “not serious at all”, claimed Mugabe was given permission by Southern African Development Community (SADC) leaders to form a government after Tsvangirai refused to sign a power-sharing deal that was endorsed by the bloc’s leaders at a summit in South Africa.

Listening for the trucks that will bring the food in Zimbabwe (IRIN)
Hungry residents of a village in Masvingo Province, in southeastern Zimbabwe, have acquired an unusual skill: they have learnt to listen for trucks carrying food aid. Elijah Banguza, 69, has become the village expert and can now identify vehicles by their sound, long before they appear on the road used by government and non-governmental organisation (NGOs) trucks. The villagers are waiting for the grain the government promised them, but aid agency trucks have not come down the road since a ban was imposed on NGO operations in June. (more…)

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Opposition won’t join Mugabe’s government (ZimOnline)
Zimbabwe’s opposition said on Wednesday it will not join any government formed by President Robert Mugabe before conclusion of negotiations meant to bring the country’s feuding political parties into an all-inclusive government of national unity. [...] “It’s very clear that if he announces the new Cabinet it’s a declaration of war against the people. You can’t just have a Cabinet without a mandate,” said Nelson Chamisa, spokesperson of Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC, urging the 84-year-old Zimbabwean leader to wait for the conclusion of negotiations.

Mugabe to name Zimbabwe cabinet despite opposition: minister (AFP)
Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe will defy the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and form a new government, deputy information minister Bright Matonga said Thursday. “Nothing is going to stop us from forming a new government,” Matonga said in an interview on public broadcaster SA FM. “We need to move forward, we need to make sure that Zimbabwe regains its status, we need to work on the economy,” he said.

Security strongmen put pressure on Mugabe (The Star)
President Robert Mugabe is under pressure from his top military and security advisers to form a government on his own, and ignore the power-sharing talks between his ruling Zanu-PF party and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change. Intelligence sources said on Wednesday that after Mugabe’s humiliation when he was heckled and harassed by MDC MPs while opening parliament on Tuesday, angry advisers had told the 84-year-old leader to immediately form a government without Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC.

(more…)

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Mugabe to name new cabinet, says last was ‘worst in history’ (NewZimbabwe.com)
Robert Mugabe will form a new government soon but he says the main opposition MDC does not want to join the new administration, state media reported on Wednesday.

“We shall soon be setting up a government. The MDC does not want to come in apparently,” the state-owned Herald newspaper quoted Mugabe as telling government officials on Tuesday after opening Parliament. [...]

Mugabe said: “The MDC (Movement for Democratic Change) does not want to come in apparently. This time they have been promised by the British that sanctions would be more devastating, that in six months’ time the government will collapse.

“I do not know when that day will come. I wish (MDC leader Morgan) Tsvangirai well on that day.”

Mugabe ‘to form government alone’ (BBC)
Our correspondent says Mr Mugabe was speaking in bullish mood about forming a government after being booed an jeered by at the opening of parliament by opposition MPs. He looked annoyed and raced through the final lines of his speech and it must have been humiliating for him, as the speech was broadcast live on national television, she says. (more…)

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MDC Press Release:

Three MDC MPs were today arrested at Parliament bringing the number of arrested MPs in the past two days to four.

Hon. Broadwin Nyaude, the MP for Bindura South, Hon. Mathias Mlambo, MP Chipinge East and Hon. Pearson Mungofa, Highfield East MP were arrested today while Hon. Eliah Jembere, the MP for Epworth is still in police custody after he was arrested yesterday.

The arrest of the four legislators on trumped up charges of political violence is meant to frustrate the people’s project following MDC’s victory in Parliament in the 29 March harmonised elections.

MDC views this continued harassment and arrest of MDC legislators by the state security agents as a direct affront to the will of the people of Zimbabwe.

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Via an MDC Press Release:

MDC MPs and Senators today handed over a petition to Zanu PF President and First Secretary Mr Robert Mugabe when he came to “officially open” Parliament.

The following is the full text of the petition:

TO: Mr Robert Gabriel Mugabe-ZANU PF 1st Secretary and President

FROM: MDC Senators and Legislators, Harvest House, Harare

DATE: 26 August 2008

We, the undersigned members of the Movement for Democratic Change elected both to the Senate and the House of Assembly declare that:

1. This official opening of the 7th Parliament of Zimbabwe is a clear breach of the Memorandum of Understanding and is therefore of no force and effect.

2. The purported opening by Mugabe, the illegitimate usurper of the people’s will as reflected on 29 March 2008, is illegal and of no force and effect.

3. For the avoidance of doubt, the only person who can officially open this session of Parliament will be determined by the outcome of the on-going dialogue sponsored by SADC.

4. The appointment of Senators and governors by Mugabe is an affront to the MOU and a fraud on the people of Zimbabwe, which wrongfully and unlawfully was designed to affect and did affect the election of both the President and Vice President of the Senate.

5. The continued harassment, arrest of MDC legislators and activists by members of the police and related security institutions is a direct affront to the will of the people of Zimbabwe.

6. The people of Zimbabwe await anxiously for the resolution of the SADC-brokered dialogue in order that the humanitarian crisis they face is urgently and immediately addressed.

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Police in early morning raid on MDC in hotel (Zimbabwe Times)
The police besieged a central Harare hotel in the early hours of Tuesday morning and threatened to arrest a number of MDC legislators who are booked there. The police say the names of the targeted Members of Parliament appear on a list of persons wanted by the police. Officers from the Harare Central Police Station’s Law and Order section threatened to break down the door to hotel room number 512 at the Quality International Hotel around 4 am Tuesday. The MDC’s Chipinge East legislator Mateo Mlambo is booked in that room.

FEWS Southern Africa Food Security Update Aug 2008 - 8 million are at risk of food insecurity (Relief Web)
Recently concluded vulnerability assessments indicate that while a majority of households in southern Africa will have adequate food over this consumption season, widespread acute and chronic food insecurity remains a real concern in parts of most countries where these assessments have been conducted. Currently, over 8 million people in seven countries (Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland, Zambia, and Zimbabwe) are at risk of food insecurity between now and March 2009 and require some kind of assistance. Numbers are expected to peak over the November to February hunger season. (more…)

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Via an MDC Press Release:

The will of the people of Zimbabwe who voted for change on 29 March today reverberated in Parliament when elected 110 MPs from across the political divide voted for MDC national chairman, Lovemore Moyo, as the Speaker of the 7th Parliament of Zimbabwe.

This historic occasion has taken five months to fulfil; with at least 200 Zimbabweans having lost their lives due to political violence while thousands were brutalised or had their homes burnt.

(more…)

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Via SW Radio Africa:

The national chairman of the MDC-Tsvangirai, Lovemore Moyo, was on Monday elected the new speaker of parliament, making him the first non-Zanu PF speaker since Independence. Moyo is a 43 year-old former liberation war hero and his landmark victory gives the MDC control of one of the most powerful posts in the country. As MP for Matobo in Matabeleland South, Moyo took 110 votes against 98 for Paul Themba Nyathi, the only other candidate, who was fielded by the Mutambara MDC.

Zanu-PF did not put up it’s own candidate and backed Nyathi. When it was announced that Moyo had won after secret balloting, it sparked joyful scenes among MDC MPs in parliament, who sang and cheered ‘Zanu is rotten.’ Party leader Morgan Tsvangirai phoned Moyo upon hearing news of his election to congratulate him, according to his spokesman George Sibotshiwe. (more…)

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The BBC have a report here:

Mr Moyo won with 110 votes, against 98 for Paul Themba Nyathi from the smaller faction.

Our correspondent says the results mean at least one Zanu-PF MP voted for Mr Moyo in the secret ballot.

The MDC has 100 seats - one seat more than President Robert Mugabe’s Zanu-PF - while the Arthur Mutambara-led MDC faction has 10 seats in the House of Assembly.

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Via CNN:

[...] One of those detained — Shuwa Mudiwa — appeared back in parliament, but the other member — Elia Jembere — was not seen, according to sources.

Government spokesman Bright Matonga said Jembere had been accused of rape, but that he has been released from custody.

A third member — Elton Mangoma — escaped an arrest attempt when other party members came to his rescue, MDC officials said.

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