Africans In China

By Tichaona Chifamba

HARARE, (Xinhua) — China should look at Zimbabwe as its centre-piece for development co-operation in Africa because the country is more psychologically and strategically prepared to accept China as a development partner than any other country, a former Zimbabwean diplomat has said.

Businessman and former Zimbabwean Ambassador to China Chris Mutsvangwa told Xinhua in a sideline of a symposium on Sino-Africa and Sino-Zimbabwe relations here recently that Zimbabwe was strategically located in the Southern Africa region because most of the telecommunications and transport network were interlinked through the country.

“If you are talking of a strategic location as an investor, this is the place you will think of putting your industry. But more important, because of the fact that we have made more advances than any other country in opening up to China, we are much more psychologically prepared to accept China as an investment partner,” Mutsvangwa said.

Mutsvangwa said Zimbabwe’s problems with the West also stem from the advances it had made in dealing with emerging powers like China and India. “No African country is advanced in thinking as Zimbabwe,” he said.

He encouraged more Chinese investment in Zimbabwe, saying Zimbabwe was not a basket case, but a case for the future of Africa.

Mutsvangwa said there was no way people to people relations could be furthered unless there were Chinese banks in Africa.

“We need sooner rather than later, Chinese banks to have a physical presence in Zimbabwe in one way or another. I know that there you have the China Development Bank but that’s a policy bank. We need presence in the commercial banking sector,” he said.

He also proposed a currency swap between Zimbabwe and China to help restore the value of the local currency and the creation of local economic zones.

While Air Zimbabwe flew to China, Mutsvangwa called for reciprocal flights from the Chinese.

The Secretary of Regional Integration and International Co-operation, Tadeous Chifamba, also proposed a currency swap but went further to highlight the lack of specific integration between China and regional organizations such as the Southern African Development Community.

He added that Zimbabwe had not fully optimized the benefits of bilateral cooperation because of balance of payments problems resulting from persistent droughts and the effects of sanctions.

However, he said, there are high expectations that China, which has always stood by Zimbabwe, will participate actively in the economic recovery efforts of the inclusive government by giving support to the Short term Economic Recovery Program though any or a combination of the following measures: debt rescheduling or forgiveness, provisions of lines of credit and credit loan financing.
Editor: Wang Guanqun

HARARE,(Xinhua) — Zimbabwe’s Foreign Affairs Minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi said on Tuesday Africa will continue to work with China in pushing for the reform of the United Nations so that it caters for the needs of all member states.

Addressing a one-day symposium on China-Africa and China-Zimbabwe relations, Mumbengegwi said the UN needs to be reformed particularly the Security Council which has continued to be viewed as biased towards superpowers such as the United States and Britain.

“China and Africa will continue to wok together to reform the UN, especially the Security Council to ensure it is transparent and accountable,” Mumbengegwi said.

He said China won many African friends when it vetoed, together with Russia, attempts by some western countries to punish Zimbabwe under chapter seven of the UN Charter.

Mumbengegwi said that support was a triumph of their shared commitment to the principal of non interference in the internal affairs of other states.

China, he said, was an all weather friend for Africa because it provides development assistance without conditions.

Under its Forum on China-Africa Cooperation launched in 2000, China is seeking a new strategic partnership with Africa that is premised on the cardinal principals of sovereignty and win-win situation.

As a result of the policy, Africa has benefited from development assistance from the Asian country for construction of hospitals, rural schools and agricultural technological demonstration canters.

“Let us therefore continue to explore every possible avenue of cooperation between China and Africa to improve the lives of both peoples,” Mumbengegwi said.

Chinese ambassador to Zimbabwe Yuan Nansheng said there was greater scope for further strengthening of ties between the two countries.

“Our efforts should contribute towards deepening the China-Africa relations to address some of the challenges we may be facing,” he said.

The one-day symposium attracted participants from a number of African embassies based in Zimbabwe, and ran under the theme “regional integration in southern Africa and China-Zimbabwe relations in the 21st century”.

The symposium is the second to be held in Zimbabwe after a similar one in 2007.
Editor: An

Story by Judith Makwanya

Foreign Affairs Minister, Cde Simbarashe Mbengegwi has hailed the Sino-Zimbabwe relations and the good partnership between the Asian nation and Africans.

He was speaking at a one day symposium of Zimbabwean Academia and 17 senior scholars from China in Harare.

The symposium is aimed at crafting strategies for strengthening South-South co-operation and to deepen relations between Zimbabwe and China, and China-Africa relations.

It is a follow-up of a similar one held in 2007.

The forum is also a platform for intellectuals of both countries to make contributions to the broadening and deepening of co-operation between Zimbabwe.

Minister Mbengegwi paid tribute to China for the assistance that it continues to give to Zimbabwe and Africa as a whole, in the post-colonial era which includes non-credit development assistance, provision of social services in the health, education and infrastructure development sectors.

Cde Mbengegwi said Zimbabwe and other African countries should take advantage of China’s strong financial and human resources as well as technological expertise to develop partnerships based on a win-win situation.

Minister Mbengegwi said Zimbabwe’s look east policy has yielded benefits in the socio-economic development of the country especially in regards to support for the agricultural mechanization programme.

Chinese Ambassador to Zimbabwe, Mr Yuan Nansheng welcomed the meeting as a platform for Zimbabwe and China to explore Zimbabwe-China and China-Africa relations.

At the same symposium, Secretary in the Ministry of Regional Integration, Cde Tadeous Chifamba spoke of the challenges in the Sino-Zim relations.

The group of Chinese scholars are among leading experts in international politics and Africa study in China and most of them are visiting Zimbabwe for the first time.
(newsnet.co.zw)

by Li Nuer and Tichaona Chifamba

HARARE, (Xinhua) — Former Zimbabwe envoy to China, Chris Mutsvangwa, has described China’s transformation and recent development as a “miracle” which has given a positive example to Africa.

“China is like a human miracle before your face. It happens as you are watching,” Mutsvangwa told Xinhua in an exclusive interview on Tuesday.

“I have lived in New York, Brussels and London and have been to Tokyo and for an African or for somebody from the Third World you go to these cities and they are already built and you feel it’s natural that they are there. But when you live in China you watch this change happening everyday. You actually see a miracle happening before your eyes,” he said.

Mutsvangwa, was served as a diplomat in China from 2002 to 2007, said it was difficult to give people directions through the use of landscapes, because these changed within very short periods as the Chinese continued to modernize their cities.

“There is 1.3 billion people all engaged in trying to do something good for themselves and for their country, trying to build a modern country which can stand up to other countries which have made progress and from an African perspective, it gives us so much hope that the situation of poverty, the situation of underdevelopment, is actually something you can change,” he said.

“Africans had been given the perception that you cannot hope, you are mired in poverty, debt ridden, underdevelopment is your lot, your schools cannot match those of developed countries and you need charity from the West in order to make progress,” he said.

He added that China had changed that perception and instead of being “Afro-pessimists”, people were filled with the hope that they could seize the future and make it theirs.

“You can seize the future for yourself and do something about your present condition so that you can also become a modern state.”

Mutsvangwa noted 30 to 40 years ago, China was a very poor country, with most people surviving on less than one U.S. dollar a day. He said while there were still some people in China still living under those conditions, a lot of effort had been made to improve their lot.

“There is so much going on in terms of changing and improving people’s lives. Not only in big cities, but even in rural areas people are in charge of their future, people are changing their future, which is a very good thing because we Africans would like to do the same.”

From being a poor country, China had now become a big exporter of capital.

He marveled at the transformation of people’s lives, where the young Chinese were saying that they wanted a China which was different from that lived by their parents.

“Parents also wanted their children to be part of the global community and were ensuring that they not only learned Chinese languages, but also foreign ones, also. So many parents devote a lot of energy and resources so that their children can understand not only their language but others, with English being the main language,” he said, adding that English teachers were coming from all over the world to teach in Chinese schools.

The Chinese community had also embraced foreigners and opened up the housing market and business opportunities for them. Chinese learning institutions had also been opened up for foreigners, showing that the Chinese did not have a socio-economic attitude against foreigners, Mutsvangwa said.

One of the things that impressed Mutsvangwa most was the speed at which China put up facilities for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.

“I went to Beijing four years ago and people were still preparing for the Olympics and I thought to myself, will they be ready for the Olympics in 2008, because a lot of the things being talked about in preparation were still on the drawing board. Some things were happening, but suddenly within a very short period of time everything changed.”

He said traffic congestion which made people make appointment for only two meetings in a day was soon a thing of the past as the roads were soon decongested.

“Here were some of the best brains in the world from many other countries working with the Chinese to plan a modern city, how to modernize a city which is 800 years old, keeping some of the old structures of Beijing but also looking into the future.

“I was impressed by the number of architects from all over the world who were in China. If you are a good architect and you are not in China, then there is something wrong with you because all the best architects on earth have moved to China because that is where the government does not only have the ambitions, but has the cash to pay for those ambitions.

“The changing of the skyline of Beijing before my eyes was something which was mind-boggling, but also the way they dealt with the challenges of a modern city in taking the best solutions which may be available on the world market today. That was also impressive like the way they used the old walls of Beijing into ring roads.”

He added that Shanghai had also been changed in a big way and was poised to become the financial capital of the world.

China was not only using Chinese knowledge as it developed, but was also tapping the knowledge of the best possible research and development from all over the world.

However, despite all these accolades, China still had to deal with issues of garbage collection in Beijing, demand for land and how to deal with rural people who felt disadvantaged by current economic developments, he said.

The transformation of China from being a country that was asking for money for internal investment to a financial powerhouse was caused by the Chinese themselves.

Mutsvangwa said a lot of growth was made by the Chinese investing in their country. They have become very big consumers and most of the top 500 companies in the world are now investing in China, he said. “China’s consumption power is also growing and as the middle class grows, domestic consumption increases.”

“The notion that China manufactures for the world, that they are destitute and poor at home, is being disproved completely. They are becoming consumers in their own right, which are attracting some of the best companies in the whole world. So, it is a massive transformation of society which I think in human history has never happened to so many people at such a pace in a short period of time.”

China was the biggest consumer of mobile phones, the internet and lately, the car. It also produces cheap computers and televisions for the export market, he said.

Mutsvangwa said China wanted perfection in whatever it did. “There is very much an effort to open up and say whatever is happening in the world let it be done in China and may it be done better.”

He also said the mainstay of Chinese tourism were the Chinese people who visited various places of interest as they traced their history in their own country.

The lesson which China has given to Africa is one of hope, Mutsvangwa said. “The main gift which China has given to Africa is one of hope that you are not fated to be underdeveloped, that underdevelopment is not the lot of the Third World. They have shown that the future of any people depends on those people and not on charity,” he said.

“We are a continent with so many resources, yet with so much poverty and it doesn’t make sense that we can be so well-endowed with resources yet so poor. You are made to feel that you can never make it but China changes that picture.”

He said he had also noticed the phenomenal increase in trade between Africa and China in recent years. Before the year 2000, the trade between Africa and China was probably about five billion dollars, but now it is almost 80 billion dollars to 90 billion dollars, he said.

He recalled World Bank statistics which said most of the increase in Africa’s Gross Domestic Product had mainly been due to new demand from the new market in China.

He said unlike in the past where some Africans were looked at with disdain when they tried to negotiate for business with some countries in the West, Africa now had a choice in who could be their economic cooperating partners.

“The growing Chinese middle class will also be good for African goods. The growth prospects of China’s African engagement is looking very bright and is giving Africa a new opportunity,” he said.

China also imported many goods from Africa without imposing any tariffs, which was good for Africa’s development.

Mutsvangwa said when he moved to China as ambassador, trade between China and Zimbabwe was between 80 million dollars to 100 million dollars, which had now shot up to about 300 million dollars.

He also applauded China for using its veto powers to thwart further imposition of sanction on Zimbabwe and the behest of some Western countries.

“This marked a high watermark point on relations between Zimbabwe and China,” he added, also recalling that during the struggle for Zimbabwe’s independence, China had been at the freedom fighters’ side.
Editor: Mu Xuequan

By Munyaradzi Mutizwa

LUSAKA - A Chinese government official said on Tuesday that China had donated $10-million to Zimbabwe’s unity government, half of it directly into the state coffers, to help boost the country’s troubled economy,

“The Chinese government last week gave our brothers in Zimbabwe five million US dollars in cash and humanitarian assistance amounting to five million dollars,” China’s special representative for African affairs, Liu Guijin told reporters in Zambia’s capital Lusaka.

“We are happy with the efforts in forming a unity government,” he added.

Liu spoke shortly before 18 leading Zimbabwean activists were detained on charges of attempting to overthrow long-time President Robert Mugabe, a move that his unity government partners warned threatened the fledgling power-sharing deal.

Liu said that even in the face of the global economic crisis, as well as the falling commodity prices; the Chinese government would continue to encourage private investors to Africa.

“We are encouraging our people to create more jobs opportunities in Zimbabwe and the rest of the continent,” Liu said.

The unity government, which only took office in February, says it needs more than $8, 5-billion over three years to haul the country out of economic ruin.
(thezimbabwetimes.com)

We have turned east, where the sun rises, and given our back to the west, where the sun sets — Robert Mugabe

The whole morning I marvelled at the apple-red faces of the 12-year-old Chinese children I teach at a new school I started work at yesterday. The ice-breaker game to introduce myself on my first day with them is a version of Trivial Pursuit. They are extremely curious about me as few have had any kind of interaction with a foreigner before. Having a waiguo laoshi, a foreign teacher is so exciting, like staring at the Father Christmas red stocking and wondering what bounties are nestled within.

So I divided them in teams and asked them questions about me. And each team gets a turn to guess the correct answer. The team who guesses correct gets a star. Chinese children have a spectacularly simple sense of humour. I give them team names by asking them questions, “What’s your favourite football team?” “Manchester United” is the mumbled, badly pronounced answer from the little boy, cute, dark eyes sparkly as a cherub’s. So his team is duly called that. The class laughs; he is delighted to be the chooser of his team’s name. I choose a girl from the next team and ask her, “What’s your favourite food?” “Chicken wings”, she shyly replies, her pretty face reddening as sweetly as a hand-painted porcelain Chinese doll. The class roars with laughter as I write their team name on the board, “Chicken Wings”, and make flapping wings with my elbows and cluck from the stage, perhaps laying an egg or two. This is greeted with gleeful pandemonium.

We then launch into the questions and they are as excited to find out the most mundane things about me (age, when did I get married, what I like to eat on bread) as a sleepy, wide-eyed child trying to X-ray the brightly coloured, wrapped loot stacked around the Christmas tree at 6am on Christmas Day. The best question (how old was I when I first kissed a girl) is met with howls of laughter and disbelief as merry as a Guy Fawkes series of explosions, with kids hooting and nearly falling off their chairs when they finally guess the answer (I was five-years-old when I aimed my first smooch at another five-year-old at nursery school, whose name I still remember: Sarah).

I have taught virtually my entire career, both children and adults. I have learned a lot from teaching, and, by far, Chinese children have helped me see the wonder, the miracle in the simplest things; their purity, their spontaneity is that vibrant. Yet in the same world lurks the likes of Robert Mugabe and his wife, Grasping Grace, as she is often called. Such innocence alongside unchecked, obscene greed and disregard for the entire nation of their own people, the Zimbabweans. The children I teach revel in jokes and rewards that cost nothing, whereas, for the likes of Mad Bob and Grasping Grace, enough is never, ever, anywhere near enough.

With the blood of an entire country on his hands, Mugabe has created an escape route, a bolthole for himself in Hong Kong, should all fail in Zimbabwe. (Well, how do you define fail? Surely Zimbabwe is already a deep failure, arguably the most destitute country in the world.) Having pillaged his country, he and “Dis Grace” have created a way out for themselves, no doubt, I am certain, with the aid of the Chinese government.

Of course, the First Consumer Couple did not want anyone to know, so London’s Sunday Times reporters were seriously attacked by the bodyguards when they approached the house in an up-market part of Hong Kong to take photos and ask questions. The journalists received medical treatment at a local hospital, interestingly enough under strict police supervision. To all intents and purposes, the First Consumer Couple seem to be protected by the local authorities. They are meant to be most unwelcome in most parts of the globe, not assisted.

Plans seem well under way for the First Consumer Couple to make a life outside of Zimbabwe in China. Grace has been found out by the UK Sunday Times to be looking at starting a diamond business with China.

What is the Chinese role and purpose in all this?

It is well known that China accepted the likes of Mugabe during his exile in then Rhodesia and that he received military training and financial support in his struggle to free Rhodesia form colonial rule. China’s interest in Zimbabwe goes back a long way. China was part of the veto against sanctions against Zimbabwe. China tried to send a huge amount of arms to Zimbabwe last year and only because the SA authorities refused to allow the armaments to be unloaded in Durban, along with the international outrage, did the China-Zimbabwe arms deal not go through — apparently. (I have heard no report as to what finally became of that shipment of armaments and I am most curious.

China has certainly been busy in different parts of Africa extolling herself as part of the solution for Africa in the current global financial crisis and offering financial assistance. Of course, this is commendable. Interesting enough, for all Chinese President Hu Jintao’s visits to various parts of Africa and his development of business and diplomatic ties with various African states, this did not include Zimbabwe.

The deal with Grasping Grace, as the Sunday Times avers, is that the diamond business will involve exporting Zim diamonds to Qingdao in China where they will be cut and polished and sold on the local and international market. How many starving Zimbabweans benefit from this?

It is not a long step from the above Sino-Zimbabwe activity to postulate that China is intent on having economic control of Zimbabwe, thus giving her a firm foothold in Africa, where many future ventures, including new energy sources (such as the solar power that can be harnessed from the Sahara desert) and cheap labour opportunities lie. If this is being done, then the strategy is far smarter than bull-in-a-china-shop Bush virtually blasting Iraq to smithereens to make his point and control the world economy through oil.

Oh well, business is business, I suppose. Very little big international business is squeaky clean. If Zimbabweans benefit, then I salute the Chinese for their cunning. I despise them though for the underhand, indirect role they have played (vetoing sanctions) in virtually destroying Zimbabwe in order to be part of the African and global solution, with, no doubt, China’s own needs coming first.

Meanwhile the endless reports of “Dis Grace’s” spending frenzy, reminiscent of a body of piranhas gobbling down a monstrous prey in minutes, continues to nauseate.

The home the First Consumer Couple is purchasing in Hong Kong is reputed to be about 5.8 million US dollars, bought, ultimately, with Zim money.

I did the maths. I regularly keep an eye on our budget and my eyes grew tired of slowly counting all the digits from right to left in Grace’s latest spending sprees. Let’s take the Hong Kong home first and see what it is in Zim dollars. One US dollar is currently about 37 457 Zim dollars. The final figure was too big for the calculator on my fairly sophisticated new Nokia mobile phone to process, which politely told me “maximum result is 10 digits”, which is the US definition of a billion. This came across as a euphemistic way of saying no household or even a large, middle-sized company comes anywhere remotely near working with those kind of budgetary figures.

However, let’s work with a humbler figure. Grace recently splashed out, at the expense of her country, 65 000 US dollars on marble statues — 65 000 multiplied by only 37 000 gives us the relatively modest 2 405 000 000 Zim dollars. (Hey, my calculator could do that one!) That is roughly two and a half hundred billion in the US definition of a bill, isn’t it, give or take 10 billion or two? Honey, do you have any spare change in your purse to make sure we can pick up that dandy Tuscany nude as well?

This affront to humanity, that these two people are allowed to carry on like this, is more garish, more blatant than the black comedy of the bumper sticker I once saw on a glinting Rolls Royce: “fuck the poor”.

(thoughtleader.co.za)

Hong Kong - A Zimbabwean students’ union was on Sunday calling for Hong Kong to deport the daughter of President Robert Mugabe, who is studying at the city’s top university.

The Zimbabwe National Students Union petitioned Chinese diplomats in Africa after learning that 20-year-old Bona Mugabe is an undergraduate student at the University of Hong Kong.

Students in the impoverished African nation, which is in the grip of a spiralling economic crisis and political turmoil, say Mugabe’s daughter should be made to study back home.

Bona Mugabe has been allowed to study in Hong Kong despite sanctions and travel bans against her father and members of his regime by many Western countries.

In a letter sent to the Chinese embassy in Harare and published in Hong Kong’s Sunday Morning Post newspaper, students’ union spokesperson Blessing Vavu said Mugabe’s daughter should be deported.

The president’s daughter should return in order to “suffer with other patriotic students studying in the state universities,” Vavu argued.

She wrote: “It is disheartening to note that the first family insolently sent daughter Bona Mugabe under an assumed name to the University of Hong Kong, China to further her studies while students in Zimbabwe suffer.

“The state of our education system is so deplorable that the president has seen it fit to trust the Chinese for the education of his daughter whilst ordinary students are failing to get decent education.”

Bona Mugabe’s presence in Hong Kong, where she enrolled in university under an alias last autumn, emerged after her 43-year-old mother Grace allegedly assaulted a freelance photographer who took pictures of her shopping in the city in January.

According to London’s Sunday Times, the Mugabes secretly bought a 5.7-million-dollar luxury home in Hong Kong’s Tai Po district.

The University of Hong Kong declined to comment specifically on the campaign by the students’ union but a spokesperson said Bona Mugabe was free to study there.

“We believe that many of our students will share our belief of right of education for everybody and our view that people should not be responsible for what other members of their family have done,” she said.

A Hong Kong government spokesperson said: “We note the campaign and do not comment on individual cases.” Immigration officers decided each case on individual merits, she added.

- SAPA

(http://www.news24.com)

China on Tuesday said it was considering providing emergency aid to Zimbabwe, which is currently struggling against a cholera epidemic that has already claimed nearly 600 lives.

“To help the people in Zimbabwe overcome the current difficulties, China is actively considering providing emergency humanitarian assistance, including food assistance to Zimbabwe,” foreign ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao told reporters.

More than 6,000 cases of cholera have been identified in Zimbabwe’s capital Harare alone since late August, and the UN children’s agency UNICEF warned last week that the nation could see 60,000 in the coming weeks.

This could increase the death toll nearly five-fold. Zimbabwe has declared a national emergency over the outbreak, appealing for international aid to fight the waterborne disease.

Liu said China was concerned over the deterioration of the situation in Zimbabwe, which also faces crippling shortages of food.

But he did not join growing international calls for President Robert Mugabe to step down after a 28-year-rule that has left Zimbabwe’s economy in a shambles amid a political deadlock after disputed elections this year.

Hopes had soared for an end to the crisis when Mugabe, a Beijing ally, and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai signed a power-sharing deal on September 15, but the agreement is now floundering.

Liu said that China was supportive of efforts to mediate the crisis.

“China stands ready to work with the international community to provide support and assistance for Zimbabwe in maintaining stability, national solidarity and economic development.”

(africasia)

The African Union rejected tougher action against Zimbabwe on Tuesday and said only dialogue could solve the deepening crisis, while U.S. President George W. Bush joined calls for President Robert Mugabe to step down.

Zimbabwe’s government, which accuses Western powers of exploiting a cholera epidemic that has killed nearly 600 people to try to bring down the veteran leader, said it was taking serious measures to deal with the threats.

“It is time for Robert Mugabe to go,” Bush said in Washington. “Across the continent, African voices are bravely speaking out to say now is the time for him to step down.”

U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said countries in the region, notably South Africa, should do more to speed Mugabe’s departure.

“They have unused leverage, at this point, that they could bring to bear. And we would hope, that they, as well as others, would bring to bear whatever leverage, political leverage, that they might have to help the situation,” he told reporters in Washington.

But the African Union made clear it did not back calls for much tougher action.

“Only dialogue between the Zimbabwean parties, supported by the AU and other regional actors, can restore peace and stability to that country,” said Salva Rweyemamu, spokesman for AU chairman and Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete.

Rweyemamu said sending peacekeeping troops or removing Mugabe by force, as proposed by prominent figures including Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga and Nobel peace laureate and South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, were not options.

“We have a serious humanitarian crisis in Zimbabwe. We have cholera. Do they think that we can eradicate cholera with guns?”

Many African leaders see Mugabe as a hero of the liberation war from white minority rule. They also resent foreign interference. South Africa will oppose any move to send troops to Zimbabwe, a senior government official there said.

Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai reached a power-sharing deal brokered by regional mediator Thabo Mbeki, South Africa’s former president, in September. But they are deadlocked over how to implement it.

Asked whether the United States was no longer interested in the power-sharing agreement between the opposition and Mugabe, McCormack said: “At the end of the day, that was a sham. It was just one more feint (by Mugabe) to try to stay in power.

“It’s hard to see Zimbabwe being able to lift itself out of this crisis with the help of the international system, with Robert Mugabe still there,” he added.

COLLAPSE

The spreading cholera, coupled with chronic food shortages, has highlighted the economic collapse of the southern African country, once relatively prosperous. Basic foodstuffs are running out and prices of goods have been doubling every day.

Zimbabwe ordered prices of goods and services to be cut to December 3 levels after prices surged when the central bank increased bank withdrawal limits.

A loaf of bread cost 30 million Zimbabwe dollars — worth $1 on the black market — on Tuesday, compared to 2.5 million Zimbabwe dollars last Wednesday. A similar price freeze in June 2007 badly affected local businesses.

Mugabe’s spokesman George Charamba said the West was using the cholera outbreak to try to bring down the president, who is 84. He accused Britain and the United States of trying to put Zimbabwe back on the U.N. Security Council agenda.

Zimbabwe was taking measures to address any threats, Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu told reporters.

“I will not tell you what … but the Zimbabwe government is taking serious measures to offset any threats and any further sanctions on the people … We won this country through the barrel of the gun and we will defend it the way we won it,” he said, ruling out any idea of peacekeeping forces in Zimbabwe.

In a sign that Mugabe’s traditional ally China may be distancing itself, Beijing stressed the need for the formation of a unity government between Mugabe and the opposition. China also offered aid.

The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said the number of cholera cases stood at 13,960, with 589 deaths. “It is total chaos, three hospitals in Harare are closed due to a lack of personnel,” spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said up to 60,000 could catch cholera if the epidemic gets out of control. The disease is preventable and treatable under normal circumstances, but Zimbabwe’s health sector is near collapse.

Mugabe blames Western sanctions for Zimbabwe’s hardship, while his critics accuse him of increasingly authoritarian rule.

(reuters)

Shame Makoshori, Senior Business Reporter

THE Jingniu Group, a Chinese company, will spend about US$400 million in the next five years in constructing a glass manufacturing factory in Kadoma, The Financial Gazette can reveal.

Construction of the glass producing and processing centre by the Jingniu Group is already underway amid expectations that the project might absorb thousands of workers who were left jobless following the closure of gold mines and textile factories in and around Kadoma.
“With a planned investment of US$400 million and occupying an area of 100 hectares, China Jingniu Glass Factory in Zimbabwe is expected to be completed in five years,” said a statement jointly issued by the Ministry of Commerce of the People’s Republic of China, China National Machinery and Equipment Corporation and CMEC International Exhibition Company.
Once completed, the factory would become the second glass-manufacturing project to operate in Kadoma after a similar project by Romanian firm, Romsit, a joint venture with the Industrial Development Corporation, collapsed in the 1990s after it failed to produce durable glass.
Under Zimbabwe’s “Look East Policy,” the country has been promoting ties with Chinese companies.
Trade volumes between the two countries are expected to peak to US$500 million this year from US$275 million in 2006.
China has become the country’s second largest trading partner after South Africa although the balance of trade has remained in favour of the Asian economic giant.
Chinese investors have built the Sino-Zimbabwe Cement Company in Gweru that has become one of the largest cement producers in Zimbabwe with exports into southern Africa among other projects.
The Chinese government is also planning to build rural schools and an agricultural technology experimenting centre in Zimbabwe.
A Chinese official recently told The Financial Gazette that his country would this year double tobacco imports from Zimbabwe to US$100 million from US$40 million last year.
“China is the biggest buyer of Zimbabwean tobacco,” Hu Ming, economic and commercial chancellor at the Chinese Embassy in Harare said. “China wants to buy more tobacco from Zimbabwe this year because it is good quality tobacco. We used to import big volumes of tobacco from Brazil but Zimbabwean tobacco has good quality and the people of China want more of it. China will import US$100 million (worth of tobacco) this year,” Ming added.
(fingaz)

China announced Friday it would give cholera-plagued gives Zimbabwe vaccines worth US$ 500,000 to help the country contain an outbreak of the disease which has claimed the lives of about 400 people in recent weeks. Tens of thousands of Zimbabweans have been hit by cholera countrywide, prompting regional and international aid agencies, including the World Health Organisation, to step in with assistance. Neighbouring South Africa, where cholera-related deaths of Zimbabweans have been reported, announced this week it would keep its borders open to sick Zimbabweans seeking medical treatment. A Chinese diplomat said the vaccines were being rushed to Zimbabwe and should arrive in the country shortly. “We are sympathising with the Zimbabwean people and we want to help as best as we can to stop the spread of the cholera disease that has killed many people in this country,” He Meng, deputy Chinese Ambassador to Harare, said. The cholera outbreak is being blamed on poor sanitation, particularly lack of clean water supplies in most urban areas.
(afrik)