Denford Magora's Latest Zimbabwe News Blog

Members of the ZANU PF Women's League chant and shout during the closing ceremony for their party's Congress yesterday (Saturday 12 December 2009) at the Harare International Conference Centre at Rainbow Towers Hotel. Mugabe used the occasion to dismiss Tsvangirai's calls for the reform of the Security Services, who remain the bedrock of his continued rule of Zimbabwe, using force and intimidation to ensure that Mugabe stays where he is and that Tsvangirai is kept out of the Presidential Office at Munhumutapa Building. Harare, Zimbabwe, 13 December 2009 Robert Mugabe, the dictator of Zimbabwe, yesterday dismissed Morgan Tsvangirai's calls for the reform of the Security Services in Zimbabwe, saying this was what the British and "imperialists" wanted. He sees the call by the MDC as simply an amplification of the voice of the British. “Zipra and Zanla forces constituted the basis of our national army and air force,” he said Mugabe, adding: “That is the most depen...

The Zimbabwe Defence Forces remain opposed in principle to Morgan Tsvangirai and the MDC, whom they accuse of trying to sell Zimbabwe's birthright to the West in return for money. They are also especially bitter about Tsvangirai's call for Zimbabwe to be put under sanctions when he was still an opposition leader (he said South Africa should cut off fuel and electricity supplies). Now, one of their new MPs has had to grovel in front of a Major General in the army, who threatened to kill him and make him "disappear without a trace" for "disrespecting generals and the Zimbabwe Defence Forces." Harare, Zimbabwe, 12 October 2009 MDC Member of Parliament (MP) for Masvingo West, Tichaona Mharadze, went on his knees to beg forgiveness from Major General Englelbert Rugeje after the army Major-General took out his service pistol at a Masvingo and threatened to kill him. Rugeje told those who were with him that he had threatened to kill Mharadze because he had "de...

Although, under the current circumstances and in a more stable country, the presence of the army (above) at the Diamond Fields would be welcome in order to protect the nation's resources, the current situation where we see uniformed forces becoming mining moguls should all give us cause for concern. Put this together with the fact the defence forces themselves are factionalised, each supporting one or the other faction in ZANU PF, then you have a recipe for cooking up civil war Harare, Zimbabwe, 21 September 2009 You have probably read the story below this one, about a group of reporters that went undercover into the Marange Diamond Fields to report on the abuses there. But the absolute shock comes from the revelation in that story that at 400 square kilometres, the Marange Diamond Fields are probably the biggest the deposit of the precious mineral in the WORLD. It is amazing how many people are not aware of this fact. This makes our diamond wealth bigger than Botswana's which ...

Tendai, an illegal diamond miner at the Chiadzwa Diamond Fields shows where he was stabbed with a bayonet by soldiers whom he says he was working for. The people who compiled this report traveled to Zimbabwe as journalists. The report will now be presented to the Kimberly Process. It is devastating. Which, I fear, may lead to Mugabe clamping down again on foreign journalists, accusing them of acting as spies. Harare, Zimbabwe, 20 September 2009 An illegal miner has told a tale of horror from the Chiadzwa Diamond Fields to reporters under cover. Known as Tendai, the miner reveals that he escaped the strafing of the diamond fields by the miners and that, now, everyone at Chiadzwa works for the army "as slaves". Soldiers routinely go after miners whom they decide are not producing quite enough. Tendai was one of them. He was bayoneted through hi knees and stabbed repeatedly on the chest with knives. One of his co-workers died on the spot. The exercise was carried out in public, ...