Zim News Blog -NEWS NETWORK

Source: Teachers deserve better salaries | Daily News

EDITOR — The teachers’ protest is not political but a bread and butter issue. Recently, top government officials were in a crunch meeting with teachers’ union leaders to resolve the salary impasse.

Over 80 percent of teachers joined the industrial action, demanding their salaries in United States dollars.

Nevertheless, it is reported that there are groups of youths and suspected war veterans who are going around rural schools threatening teachers who don’t attend classes with unspecified action.

Our Constitution says, “Every person has a right to sufficient food. The government must take legislative measures to achieve the realisation of this right”.

Some of our leaders are arrogant and ignorant and they live in a bubble of exclusion of everyone else but they hold on to that belief that they are the greatest and unstoppable.

Whatever they do is for their own benefit not for everyone else. They take the teachers’ strike as a cry of a dwarf in the shadow of a giant.

I wonder if they believe in Pan-Africanism, which is aimed at the uniqueness of our identity also as an idea that drives not just identity but education, economy, health, industry, etc.

Zimbabweans are a peaceful and non-confrontational people, our basic model of living is inclusive of everyone but the people are the same but the game is different.

We can’t operate as usual like everything is normal, nothing is normal anymore, the economy is failing.

It appears some people who were sent to intimidate teachers have been captured by hunger for too long and now they think that is the way it should be and that they don’t deserve better.

These people are accustomed to poverty and hunger to the extent that they will do anything for a few dollars.

More so, they are being sympathetic to their captor (poverty) and tend to support it and even wish to be held as hostages of hunger for life.

The people of Zimbabwe, we should forgive them. Teachers deserve better salaries.

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Source: JUST IN: Interpol frustrating ZRP, Matanga | The Herald October 22, 2019

Comm-Gen Matanga

Farirai Machivenyika Senior Reporter
The ZRP Commissioner General Godwin Matanga has accused the International Criminal Police Organisation (Interpol) of frustrating their efforts to extradite people facing criminal charges in the country citing alleged political persecution.

Com-Gen Matanga said this today when he appeared before the Portfolio Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade chaired by Makonde legislator Cde Kindness Paradza to contribute towards the recently gazetted, International Treaties Bill.  He added that the ZRP had since engaged its parent ministry, the Ministry of Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage to pursue bilateral engagements to enable repatriation of fugitives.

“I am actually making a comment on an application I am forwarding to the ministry of Home Affairs and my Permanent Secretary here as a result of the ZRP failing to bring back people who would have committed offences in Zimbabwe,” Com-Gen Matanga said.

“We are a member of Interpol and there is a facility where as a country we file red notices with Interpol to bring back offenders to the country and of late there has been a development with Interpol where they suspect that the ZRP is laying some politically motivated allegation against an individual. “Interpol has categorically said they will not help and where a person runs away from Zimbabwe and is given refugee status in a particular country again Interpol will not assist.”

Com-Gen Matanga added that some individuals were using their connections to evade justice.

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Source: JUST IN: Mpofu sues Matutu for $10 million | The Herald October 22, 2019

Dr Mpofu

Fungai Lupande Senior Court Reporter
ZANU-PF secretary for administration Dr Obert Mpofu is suing the party’s Youth Affairs deputy secretary Lewis Matutu for $10 million after the latter accused him of being corrupt.

The claim emanates from a press conference addressed by Matutu on June 24 this year at Zanu-PF headquarters. Dr Mpofu claims that his reputation and standing as a businessman, politician has been damaged in the eyes of the public because of the statement.  He said the corruption allegations are false, malicious, scandalous, wrongful and defamatory to him.

“The content of the statement was widely disseminated in the local print and electronic media and on various social media platforms,” read the summons. The statement, in its defamatory, false and misleading allegations states the plaintiff has violated the foundation of democracy in Zimbabwe.

“That the plaintiff’s corrupt inclinations continue to undermine socio economic transformation in Zimbabwe and, as a result defendant’s generation is suffering.”

Dr Mpofu added that the statement implies that corrupt individuals like him are undoing the gains of the liberation struggle.

More to follow…

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Source: JUST IN: Immigration in all-female officers compliance operation at Beitbridge border | The Herald October 22, 2019

All female immigration officers during the pre-dawn operation “Good Morning Madam Immigration Officer” held at Beitbridge Border Post. Pictures by Thupeyo Muleya

Thupeyo Muleya Beitbridge Bureau
The Department of Immigration today launched an all-female enforcement and compliance operation dubbed “Good Morning Madam Immigration Officer” which seeks to clamp down on illegal immigrants, touts, child and human smugglers among other criminal vices at Beitbridge Border Post.

The 14 member team led by Assistant Regional Immigration Officer (ARIO), Mrs Memory Mugwagwa took many dealers by surprise. According the ARIO-in-charge Beitbridge Mr Nqobile Ncube, the operation saw hundreds of travellers being turned away from the border for violating various sections of the Immigration Act.

All female immigration officers during the pre-dawn operation “Good Morning Madam Immigration Officer” held at Beitbridge Border Post. Pictures by Thupeyo Muleya

He said most of those turned away had full passports and cited issues at the Passport Office, while some travellers turned themselves away when they took notice of the operation.

“Our officers managed to uplift eight passports for irregular movements and the owners were instructed to pay fines. In addition, 30 arrests were effected on those who contravened various sections of the Immigration Act (e.g. noncompliance, entry by evasion and not possessing travel documents). The arrested were escorted to the police post to pay fines,” said Mr Ncube.

The senior immigration officer also said that 38 cars were turned at away at the port of entry for carrying undocumented passengers.  The drivers, he said, were warned and cautioned.

More to follow…

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Source: ‘Zim risks redollarising’ | Newsday (News)

Zimbabwe Ezekiel Guti University pro-vice chancellor Gift Mugano has said Zimbabwe risks going back to dollarisation in the first quarter of 2020 due to failure by the local currency to boost public confidence.

BY RUTENDO MATANHIKE

Presenting at a pre-budget briefing seminar in Harare yesterday, Mugano blamed government for putting in place reactionary policies to deal with the high levels of inflation without looking at their impact on the people, which he said had further plummeted public confidence in the local currency.

“Statutory instruments (SI) are a reactionary way of dealing with the situation; it just lessens the confidence in the currency by local people,” Mugano said.

“We cannot burn the house to deal with a rat, but we have to set traps to deal with it. In order to stop the black market, there is need to set traps to deal with them without necessarily affecting everyone else.”

He added: “We end up having an economy that is speculative than productive because of this form of reactionary policies that want to deal with problems. The policies are formed from a good basis, but they are affecting everyone even those who are not trading in foreign currency on the black market. We run the risk of going full dollarisation in the first quarter of 2020, which is not a good thing for Zimbabwe.”

Zimbabwe banned the 10-year multi-currency system in June this year after government workers demanded salaries in United States dollars which government could not afford. Since then, the country has been in a hyperinflation mode; with prices skyrocketing against stagnant salaries, a feat that has forced citizens to the wall.

Mugano said the recently introduced policies, including the SI 142 that introduced the Zimdollar, caused businesses to act in ways that protected their business investments.

Also presenting before MPs, economist Persistence Gwanyanya said: “Our major problem is that Zimbabwe is not producing. We are a consumptive economy which consumes up to 80% of our gross domestic product. We are eating into the country’s future. Currently, people have to buy their own hard-earned money, so we really cannot establish confidence in our local currency.”

The post ‘Zim risks redollarising’ appeared first on NewsDay Zimbabwe.

The post ‘Zim risks redollarising’ appeared first on Zimbabwe Situation.

This is the interview the MDC Deputy National Spokesperson, Luke Tamborinyoka had with the ZBC on Friday, 18 October 2019. ZBC in its wisdom or possibly lack of it decided not to flight the interview.

Source: The MDC’s unflighted interview with the ZBC – The Zimbabwean

 

The post The MDC’s unflighted interview with the ZBC  appeared first on Zimbabwe Situation.

Source: Doctors in crowd-funding to raise salaries | Newsday (News)

The Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors’ Association (ZHDA) yesterday said it had set up a crowd-funding platform through their affiliate associations to ease financial problems faced by its members, particularly those who did not receive their salaries last week.

By Phyllis Mbanje/Desmond Chingarande

The doctors, who also claim they are receiving indirect threats to force them to abandon their nearly two months’ strike, said the non-payment of salaries had further impoverished them.

“The most recent assault has been the withholding of October salaries for all doctors who have not been reporting to work due to the very fact that they are financially liquidated,” ZHDA representative Tawanda Zvakada said.

Health Services Board chairperson Paulinus Sikosana has, however, denied reports that government suspended salaries for the striking doctors, claiming that some doctors details were omitted by mistake.

“The HSB receives consolidated information from registers compiled by individual hospitals. For senior doctors, this is based on an on-call roster and as such if the doctor on-call was called to attend to patients and did not come, they were considered to be absent from work,” he said.
Addressing the media at Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals yesterday, Zvakada, who was flanked by other members of the ZHDA executive, said while they acknowledged attempts by government in addressing their pleas, the offers fell short of their expectations.

Although their employer dragged them to court which ordered them to go back to work, the doctors have said they remain incapacitated to go back to work.

“While the willingness to comply with the ruling is there, we maintain that we remain physically and materially incapacitated,” Zvakada said.

Of concern to doctors is the fact that they have received threats.

“We as the ZHDA leadership, we feel there are indirect threats that have been made towards us. We condemn such actions if indeed they were directed to us or if there is anyone planning to do so,” they said.

The threats come three weeks after ZHDA president Peter Magombeyi was allegedly abducted and tortured by suspected State security agents and had to be flown to South Africa to receive further treatment.

Meanwhile, suspected Zanu PF members took to social media yesterday describing the doctors’ strike as a political move being sponsored by the United States government.

This followed President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s remarks last week that there was a third force behind the doctors’ strike. He alleged that his government had discovered that there were four or five leaders who went to meetings at night and came back to influence others not to return to work.

The suspected Zanu PF members went on Twitter, accusing human rights lawyer Doug Coltart of handing over US$19 300 to ZHDA spokesperson Masimba Ndoro at Fishmonger Belgravia to cushion doctors who failed to receive their salaries.

But Coltart refuted the allegations, accusing Zanu PF of making desperate allegations to divert attention from the strike.

The post Doctors in crowd-funding to raise salaries appeared first on NewsDay Zimbabwe.

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Source: Police helmets case: Suspects granted bail | Newsday (News)

HARARE magistrate Learmore Mapiye yesterday granted $100 bail to each of the 10 informal traders, who were severely assaulted by the police in an incident which later led to the passing on of one of them while in prison custody.

BY HARRIET CHIKANDIWA/ NHAU MANGIRAZI

Hilton Tamangani, a 29-year-old Chitungwiza resident passed on last Friday while at Harare Central Prison after he was arrested by police on October 12 and linked to the over 200 police helmets recovered from a city building.

Besides Tamangani, police also arrested Evans Chinyanga (39), Tichaona Mazia (22), Petros Kayesa (44), Adoration Tafadzwa Madziwa (23), Lovemore Chitengo (42), Robson Mutseta (31), Hillary Nyawasha (29), Wambo Denford (41), Blessing Chirodza (41) and David Tawanda Tekere aged 35, accusing them of assaulting a law enforcement agent and fleeing into the basement of a city building where the helmets were allegedly recovered from.

The 10 were granted before police again clamped down on MDC youths and campaigners who were singing at the court in solidarity with the arrested vendors.

There was drama at the courts as armed police shoved and dived arresting those who had come to show solidarity with the arrested vendors.

Denford Ngadziore, the councillor for ward 16 in Harare’s Mabelreign suburb, Makomborero Haruzivishe, a pro-democracy campaigner and John Matoratora, who are represented by Gift Mtisi of the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, were detained at Harare Central Police Station over disorderly conduct.

Tamangani, who was in prison pending the determination of his bail application by Mapiye, died after the Zimbabwe Prison and Correctional Services (ZPCS) officials allegedly denied him permission to be attended to by a private doctor of his choice.

The refusal by ZPCS came after Tamangani’s lawyers Marufu Mandevere and Kudzayi Kadzere of ZLHR wrote to the officer-in-charge at Harare Remand Prison seeking his release as he had developed a fatal infection.

Tamangani’s lawyers also filed an application before Mapiye, seeking an order to allow his body to be examined by an independent pathologist so as to ascertain the cause of death.

In court, Chamunora Kuvheya of ZPCS said prison authorities were yet to get a notice of death from the prison doctor.

Meanwhile, Vendors Initiative for Social Transformation (Viset) have given notice to stage a march against police heavy-handedness following Tamangani’s death. The march has been slated for Monday next week.

Viset executive director Samuel Wadzai said they will hand over petitions to the Clerk of Parliament and police officer commanding Harare district, Home Affairs ministry and ZPCS.

The post Police helmets case: Suspects granted bail appeared first on NewsDay Zimbabwe.

The post Police helmets case: Suspects granted bail appeared first on Zimbabwe Situation.

Wildlife lovers have trucked 9,000 bales of hay to Zimbabwe’s popular Mana Pools National Park [...]