Zimbabwe: The Hangman of Harare prepares for his final execution.

The Washington Post reports

Zimbabwe: Foreigners must close shops by Jan 1.

HARARE, Zimbabwe — Zimbabwean authorities say they have given foreign shop-owners —mostly Chinese and Nigerian nationals— an ultimatum to shut down their businesses by Jan. 1.

My immediate thought is of course that Mugabe and his fellow Zanu PF thieves have run out of farms to steal and having destroyed the agricultural sector of the Zimbabwe economy are now moving in on the retail and service  sectors. I am betting that Chinese nationals will not be targeted by this measure, that said Mugabe is clearly insane.

" While over $3 billion dollars of official Chinese finance in this period ( 2000 and 2011 ) were investments in agriculture, forestry, and fishing projects, the Chinese government also supported activities related to food security, military support, and humanitarian response. It is not obvious, however, that all of these activities were of benefit to the Zimbabwean people. Media reports indicate that Chinese financing has enabled the Mugabe regime to construct a new presidential mansion, purchase equipment to censor independent radio and television stations, as well as monitor the political activities of opponent politicians and their constituents in the 2005 presidential election. "

A top official of the black empowerment ministry said only Zimbabweans had the right to run shops that have sprung up across the country and are termed foreign businesses targeted under the nation’s black empowerment laws, the state-controlled Herald newspaper reported Friday.

The Black Empowerment Ministry have a bit of a name problem here. They have stolen all the white farms and business and in the process bankrupted them, that is a tragedy insofar as these business were feeding millions who are now in mired in poverty, but the white owners generally got out and were able to start again. Now it is the turn of the black business owners to be robbed ironically by the Black Empowerment Ministry. 

Africa.. Zimbabwe is your problem now, Mugabe is your problem... he is now going to rob your expats working in Zimbabwe.  Africa you have sheltered this thief  you have given him a legitimacy he never deserved. You preach Pan-Africanism, this is the Zimbabwe face of Pan-Africanism, 

Those laws, passed in 2007, demand foreign businesses to cede 51 percent control to local blacks.

That needs a little clarification, " local blacks " means the leadership of Zanu PF, this is not about looking after the interests of the Zimbabwe people, Mugabe never has and never will give a toss about them, this is a last desperate roll of the dice aimed at rewarding those who have collaborated in the corruption, a last chance for criminal profit before the whole house of cards collapses.   

The foreign shop owners have been criticized for taking retail trade opportunities from Zimbabwean traders by selling cheap imports.

That is hilarious " cheap imports " as if Zimbabwe has a manufacturing sector. Mugabe and his Zanu PF are now going to destroy for personal gain the only sector of the economy that actually works. 

" Captains of industry meeting for the Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI) annual congress which begins on Wednesday in Bulawayo have their work cut out after the latest manufacturing survey showed a deepening crisis in industry. 

The three-day conference, ending on October 11, is expected to craft strategies to improve industrial production, cut losses and stop capacity utilisation from declining further, as it did in 2012, crashing to 39 percent from 44 percent a year earlier, the survey’s findings showed.

It is symbolic that the congress is taking place in Bulawayo, the country’s former industrial hub, where over the years countless companies have drowned in high debt or are currently reporting widening losses or downsizing operations or falling under judicial management."

Poor townships and city flea markets have in recent years been inundated by shops run by foreigners.

Flea markets, that is all that remains and Mugabe's greed and hatred will now consume even them.

According to state media, shop owners who fail to comply will be arrested.

Arresting people who will not cooperate in their own destruction by a criminal government. Welcome to Zimbabwe Nazi Germany.

" We belong to this continent. We do not mind having and bearing sanctions banning us from Europe. We are not Europeans. We have not asked for any inch of Europe or any square inch of that territory. "  R Mugabe

He means every word of that. He has consumed Zimbabwe, he has along with the other Crocodiles of the continent robbed and raped in the DR Congo. Africa you must stop this evil before he destroys you.

Zimbabwe: The great crocodile wants another term

Al Jazeera reports

Mugabe plans for 'resounding' election win

Zimbabwean president says his party will fight like a "wounded animal" to win next year's elections.

Zimbabwe's long-time president says his party is geared up for a "resounding'' victory in elections scheduled for next year.

Robert Mugabe, addressing 5,000 loyalists at the end of his party's annual convention in the city of Gweru, said on Saturday that ZANU-PF will fight like a "wounded animal to reclaim the government we lost"' in 2008 elections.

Wounded animal is a good description of Zanu PF. The truth is that Mugabe is over his political used by date and I suspect even he realises this. 

Mugabe, 88, has been nominated as his party's presidential candidate. He has ruled Zimbabwe since its independence from Britain in 1980.

For the first time since independence, ZANU-PF lost its parliamentary majority to Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change in violence-marred 2008 polls.

It is unfortunate that the Movement for Democratic Change has blotted its copy book with acts of corruption. They are however bumbling amatures by comparison to the masters in Zanu PF.

No election date has been set yet, but Mugabe is pressing for polls to go ahead as soon as possible, saying he has had "enough" of the coalition government with Tsvangirai which was brokered by regional leaders to restore stability after the polls.

That translates as I want to continue to rape the economy and rob the people of Zimbabwe without restraint.

Mugabe Saturday warned his party's top officials to avoid any infighting because it is "dangerous'' and threatened the party's unity.

Deep divisions in ZANU-PF have emerged over Mugabe's likely successor.

The president and his party face an uphill struggle to win over voters, many of whom are disgruntled with the poor state of the economy that has forced millions of Zimbabweans to emigrate to neighbouring countries and abroad.

The result of the election is probably unimportant. Mugabe isn't going to voluntarily give up power. The Mugabe era will end in a shit fight and it can't come to soon.

The economy is battling to pick up pace and Mugabe's campaign for black empowerment which forces foreign firms to give 51 per cent of their shares to locals, is only driving away desperately needed foreign investment.

51 per cent of nothing is still nothing. Mugabe has run out of bribes not that he gave any to those his rule has impoverished.

Can the DR Congo risk the Crocodiles return

SW Radio Africa reports

DRC human rights group say Zimbabwe soldiers not welcome

                  Defence Minister Emmerson Mnangagwa was implicated in a UN report on looting of resources in the DRC

By Lance Guma
22 August 2012

"A human rights group based in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has argued against the inclusion of Zimbabwean soldiers in an international neutral force to be deployed in areas bordering Rwanda and Uganda.

In the last few months a new rebel movement calling itself M23 has brought instability to the already volatile eastern region of the DRC plagued by conflict since the 1990s Rwandan genocide. Leaders in the Great Lakes region last week agreed to deploy a neutral international force in an effort to bring stability."

"But the African Association for the Defense of Human Rights (ASADHO) has argued that the neutral force must exclude all countries that are already engaged in the war and in the illegal exploitation of natural resources in the DRC. They singled out Angola, Zimbabwe and Namibia for exclusion."

It is very hard to argue against excluding them, Zimbabwe  Zanu PF can't be trusted.

"ASADHO suggested that countries who could contribute soldiers to the international force would be Tanzania, Zambia and Kenya which are also members of the International Conference of the Great Lakes Region Countries. None of these countries had been involved in the war."

Makes sense to me.

"On Monday a DRC government spokesman, Lambert Mende, said: “It’s not ASADHO, but the government and parliament that are allowed to make decisions regarding the war. ASADHO does not have power to decide which countries should come to assist DR Congo which has been attacked.”

Why would you set a fox to patrol a chicken coop ?

"Mugabe sent troops into the DRC in 1998 to help his ally, the late Laurent Kabila, hold of a rebel advance. The conflict sucked in several SADC states and saw senior army officers and ZANU PF chefs enrich themselves from the country’s mineral assets “under the pretext of arrangements set up to repay Zimbabwe for military services.”

Zanu PF venality knows no boundaries

"A UN report implicated current Defence Minister Emmerson Mnangagwa, the late army commander Vitalis Zvinavashe and Zimbabwean-backed entrepreneurs John Bredenkamp and Al-Shanfari, a “convicted criminal based in South Africa”.

Emmerson Mnangagwa is known as the Crocodile for a reason and may well succeed Mugabe and god help Zimbabwe should that come to pass.

Incidentally Alex has a couple of great new posts up and this is his French blog .

"As strange as this might sound, the cogwheels of commerce were hardly
stopped by the current war in North Kivu.

In fact, there's a thriving trade and even a two-way movement of
people between M-23-occupied areas and the city of Goma--and beyond.

The M-23 are relying for now on hefty taxes on merchandise and road
tolls on trucks heading to Goma.

On their part, the FDLR are killing near-extinct species of animals at
the Virunga National Park and selling them wholesale to traders, who
then go to sell them on retail in Goma. "

And more worrying 

"You don't find anything worthwhile these days in Goma markets and
everything has become very expensive: corn, beans, milk, all basic
commodities.

"Before [the insurgency], a 100kg-sack of manioc cost between $25 and
$30. Today, the same quantity costs between $45 and $50.

"And 1kg of beans, for example, that cost $0.5 before now fetches almost $1.

"Prices for basic commodities have almost doubled!

"In a city where residents are already very poor, people are suffering.

"Many people are unemployed and the minimum income and wage of a
person living off of small trade or working in a shop is only between
$20 and $30 per month.

"Food therefore now costs the earth. "

Go and have a read.