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Morgan Tsvangirai, Zimbabwe’s Prime Minister sadly lost another family member in the tragic drowning of his two-year-old grandson at the prime minister’s family home in cholera ravaged Harare. Approximately 91,164 cases, including 4037 deaths have been reported since the current outbreak of cholera began in August 2008.
Tsvangirai is recovering from injuries he received in a recent car crash, which claimed the life of Susan, his wife of 31 years. Moven Mahachi, Defense Minister was killed in a car crash in 2001. Minister Border Gezi Employment died in a car accident in 1999 and Ellit Manyika, a government minister and former regional governor died in a car crash in 2008.
Tsvangirai was only sworn into office on February 13, after months of bitter and violent dispute over the leadership. Tsvangirai won the disputed presidential election in March 2008, by 49%, to Mugabe’s 42%, but Mugabe refused to give up his position of power. After state-sponsored violence against Tsvangirai’s supporters, he was forced to withdraw. Mugabe defiantly declared, “Zimbabwe is mine. No African nation is brave enough to wrest it from me,” in December 2008.
Tsvangirai said he would do everything in his power to rescue the now economically devastated country. Mugabe and Tsvangirai’s new unity government faces the haunting task of attempting to reverse ten years of economic destruction. President Mugabe, now eighty-five years old, has presided over Zimbabwe since the declaration of independence from Britain in 1980. Mugabe has been the leader of the economic and social disaster, of one of Africa’s most affluent nations. It is reported that thousands of people have been pushed to the very edge of starvation, while aid agencies are hampered at every turn, in any effort to assist. Only 6% of the population was formally employed at the close of 2008.
100 trillion dollar banknotes were issued by the central bank in January. They are being sold to tourists as souvenirs for $2. Zimbabwe has the worst hyperinflation rate in modern times, as it reaches 231 million %. The country has been forced to resort to the use of foreign currency.
However the new unity government is saying nothing of the situation in the Marange diamond fields, where the government has thrown out the legal mine owners.
Fear of human-rights violations being financed by the sale of illicit diamonds, has brought about calls to ban the diamond trade in Zimbabwean ‘blood’ diamonds. The World Federation of Diamond Bourses, (WFDB) has called for a total ban of trade in Zimbabwean diamonds, saying the process is financing Robert Mugabe’s government’s ‘human rights’ violations. The EU has also demanded an investigation by the Kimberley Process, whose job is to make certain that the proceeds from diamonds are not used to fund conflict, such as would appear to be evident under Mugabe’s despotic administration.
African Consolidate Resources (ACR) purchased the De Beers concession in December 2006, to have the right to mine the eastern Zimbabwe Marange/Chiadzya diamond fields. ACR was instantly closed down by the Mugabe’s government. A court order gave the mining rights back to ACR, but it was overruled by the mines minister and the Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation (ZMDC) took control of the diamond properties, which produced an estimated US$15m worth of diamonds in 2007.
In December 2006 approximately 15-20,000 illegal miners were working the alluvial deposits. Police and army units drove the miners out, leaving the ZMDC alone working the fields. Last year there were scores of reports of miners being shot dead by security forces.
“By January 2009 the fields resembled a military garrison,” says Partnership Africa Canada. PAC understands the mines are being worked by soldiers and press-ganged villagers from Marange.
Many experts say the Zimbabwe diamond industry is totally out of control. Mugabe’s government has been accused of using brute force to clear the diamond fields. Non-government organizations, along with PAC, are insisting that pressure be kept on Mugabe’s unity government, to return the mines to the deprived mining companies.
All this is in the face of the drastic global decline in the diamond industry over the past six months, due to the world financial crisis.
Dr Wendy Stenberg-Tendys and her husband are CEO’s of YouMe Support Foundation. Their one aim is to help third world countries educate their high achieving students. Countries that have no free education. You could help in this worth while project. Spend a few minutes in Win a Resort (http://winaresort.com)
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