Denford Magora's Latest Zimbabwe News Blog

In this file photo, Tendai Biti is seen with Nelson Chamisa soon after the now Finance Minister of Zimbabwe had treason charges against him dropped to allow the Inclusive Government to be formed. Tonight, the two came face to face with a ZANU PF minister at a function I attended and the coldness of the air was palpable. Harare, Zimbabwe, 30 October 2009 It has just gone pat 8p.m. as I write this and I have just come back from a very interesting function hosted by Trevor Ncube, publisher of the Zimbabwe Independent and Mail Guardian. When I arrived at the function to commissioning of the new Zimind Publishers printing press in Graniteside this evening, Nelson Chamisa and Finance Minister Tendai Biti were already there. (Unfortunately, I was wearing my Spokesperson hat, so I had left my camera behind. I wished I had not...) The function proceeded well with guests standing about and chatting before the speeches started. Trevor Ncube was about half way through his speech when a lady walked...

Radio Zimbabwe Studios in the teeming Harare township of Mbare: the government gave promises to a delegation from the Community Radio Stations Association, but the promises and the demands give away the game: no licences will be coming any time soon and when they do, how the radio stations operate will be tightly controlled, just as Mugabe tightly controls news out of Zim. Harare, Zimbabwe, 20 August 2009 A delegation from the Community Radio Association met today with the Minister of Media, Information and Publicity, ZANU PF's Webster Shamu (who famously said in June that he does not take orders from Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai). They got promises and had a few more obstacles put in their way, but they had hit such rock bottom before this that they consider the empty promises from ZANU PF to be worth something. First, they were told that the issue of their being licenced was being looked into (as it has been ever since Gerry Jackson and her crew were hounded out of Zimbabwe b...

Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai addresses the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London yesterday June 23 2009. It is now clear that there really are two governments in Zimbabwe, working at cross purposes There is no government in Zimbabwe, of that we can be certain. We will break it down like this: The Prime Minister is supposed to be in charge of policy formulation and implementation. His title misleadingly suggests that he is also Head of Government. Which he is not. Webster Shamu, minister of information, made that clear. Instead, we were told that Tsvangirai is the leader of government business in parliament and that is all there is to it. In other words, and if we are to put it in local parlance, "Tsvangirai anotonga muparliament chete " – meaning "Tsvangirai only governs in parliament." So that is the attitude: you have a majority in parliament, and that is where you can prance around and call yourself boss. But every cabinet minister has a right to...