http://www.zimonline.co.za/headdetail.asp?ID=9811
Residents plead for weapons to fight Mugabe
Mon 30 May 2005
MUTARE - Residents in Zimbabwe’s eastern Mutare city - driven to desperation after their informal businesses were destroyed by the government – pleaded for weapons at the weekend to wage war against the government because they were just “fed up.”
Several hundreds of residents, who attended a meeting held at Sakubva Beit Hall in the working class suburb of Sakubva in the city, told local Member of Parliament, Innocent Gonese, to source guns for them to fight the government.
Even the presence of the police at the meeting did not deter the irate residents with several standing up to openly declare they would rather die trying to “remove President Robert Mugabe from power” because they had nothing to live for after their only source of livelihood was destroyed in the ongoing controversial campaign by the government to clean up cities.
“We want you to provide us with guns because we are fed up,” a middle aged man rose from the crowd to declare boldly.
With the angry crowd urging him on, the man continued: “This government has no respect for the people. Our houses have been destroyed, our businesses have also gone. We have nothing to live for. We are prepared to die removing Mugabe. We don’t want to hear all this talk of going to court (to sue for compensation from the state).”
Gonese, a lawyer and a senior member of the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party, had trouble trying to calm down the residents who wanted him to say whether his party was prepared to lead an armed resistance against the government.
“Going to the bush (to wage a guerrilla war against Mugabe) is not the solution,” the legislator tried to explain. “Of course we have a wicked government but we should seek legal recourse. That is the best solution,” he said.
More than 18 000 people have been arrested and goods worth several hundreds of millions of dollars destroyed in a crackdown against informal traders and homeless people that began in Harare two weeks ago and has now been widened to include other cities and towns.
The government says the campaign is meant to rid cities of filthy and crime particularly the illegal black market which it says was thriving among informal traders.
But MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai accuses Mugabe of unleashing the police against residents in urban centres, all of them strongholds of the opposition, to punish voters there for backing the MDC in last March’s disputed general election.
The opposition leader has also accused Mugabe of wanting to provoke spontaneous and violent reactions by residents so he could find a pretext to declare a State of Emergency and rule by decree.
With tension rising across the country especially in Harare where some residents fought running battles with the police, Mugabe last Friday openly declared he was behind the crackdown against informal traders and homeless people.
As Mugabe spoke, armoured cars and heavily armed soldiers rolled into several suburbs in Harare last Friday to help suppress swelling anger against the clean-up operation.
The vast majority of Zimbabweans survive on informal trading while most of those still holding on to formal jobs must also engage in informal trading to boost up inflation-eroded incomes. Zimbabwe’s inflation is pegged at 129.1 percent while unemployment is about 70 percent.
In nearly every city, authorities say at least a quarter of residents stay in illegal wooden shacks, which the government says must all be destroyed.
For example in Mutare city, Zimbabwe’s fourth largest city, the city council says there are less than 30 000 legal housing structures and the rest of the city’s estimated 1.5 million people live in wooden shacks.
At the weekend, several thousands of families in the city had to sleep in the open after their dwellings were destroyed by the police.
Meanwhile, the MDC national council yesterday released a statement calling on Zimbabweans to mobilise against the government.
“We call on all Zimbabweans to mobilise against this assault on their dignity, livelihoods and well-being. The National Council is calling upon all Zimbabweans to contribute to the struggle,” read part of a statement by party spokesman Paul Themba Nyathi.
The opposition party, blamed by critics of being as lost as the government about how to rescue the country from a deepening economic and political crisis, did not say how exactly ordinary Zimbabweans must contribute to the “struggle.”
The MDC statement did not also indicate whether the party had any specific programme to help aggrieved citizens assert their rights in the face of the government’s clean-up operation. - ZimOnline
Residents plead for weapons to fight Mugabe
Mon 30 May 2005
MUTARE - Residents in Zimbabwe’s eastern Mutare city - driven to desperation after their informal businesses were destroyed by the government – pleaded for weapons at the weekend to wage war against the government because they were just “fed up.”
Several hundreds of residents, who attended a meeting held at Sakubva Beit Hall in the working class suburb of Sakubva in the city, told local Member of Parliament, Innocent Gonese, to source guns for them to fight the government.
Even the presence of the police at the meeting did not deter the irate residents with several standing up to openly declare they would rather die trying to “remove President Robert Mugabe from power” because they had nothing to live for after their only source of livelihood was destroyed in the ongoing controversial campaign by the government to clean up cities.
“We want you to provide us with guns because we are fed up,” a middle aged man rose from the crowd to declare boldly.
With the angry crowd urging him on, the man continued: “This government has no respect for the people. Our houses have been destroyed, our businesses have also gone. We have nothing to live for. We are prepared to die removing Mugabe. We don’t want to hear all this talk of going to court (to sue for compensation from the state).”
Gonese, a lawyer and a senior member of the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party, had trouble trying to calm down the residents who wanted him to say whether his party was prepared to lead an armed resistance against the government.
“Going to the bush (to wage a guerrilla war against Mugabe) is not the solution,” the legislator tried to explain. “Of course we have a wicked government but we should seek legal recourse. That is the best solution,” he said.
More than 18 000 people have been arrested and goods worth several hundreds of millions of dollars destroyed in a crackdown against informal traders and homeless people that began in Harare two weeks ago and has now been widened to include other cities and towns.
The government says the campaign is meant to rid cities of filthy and crime particularly the illegal black market which it says was thriving among informal traders.
But MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai accuses Mugabe of unleashing the police against residents in urban centres, all of them strongholds of the opposition, to punish voters there for backing the MDC in last March’s disputed general election.
The opposition leader has also accused Mugabe of wanting to provoke spontaneous and violent reactions by residents so he could find a pretext to declare a State of Emergency and rule by decree.
With tension rising across the country especially in Harare where some residents fought running battles with the police, Mugabe last Friday openly declared he was behind the crackdown against informal traders and homeless people.
As Mugabe spoke, armoured cars and heavily armed soldiers rolled into several suburbs in Harare last Friday to help suppress swelling anger against the clean-up operation.
The vast majority of Zimbabweans survive on informal trading while most of those still holding on to formal jobs must also engage in informal trading to boost up inflation-eroded incomes. Zimbabwe’s inflation is pegged at 129.1 percent while unemployment is about 70 percent.
In nearly every city, authorities say at least a quarter of residents stay in illegal wooden shacks, which the government says must all be destroyed.
For example in Mutare city, Zimbabwe’s fourth largest city, the city council says there are less than 30 000 legal housing structures and the rest of the city’s estimated 1.5 million people live in wooden shacks.
At the weekend, several thousands of families in the city had to sleep in the open after their dwellings were destroyed by the police.
Meanwhile, the MDC national council yesterday released a statement calling on Zimbabweans to mobilise against the government.
“We call on all Zimbabweans to mobilise against this assault on their dignity, livelihoods and well-being. The National Council is calling upon all Zimbabweans to contribute to the struggle,” read part of a statement by party spokesman Paul Themba Nyathi.
The opposition party, blamed by critics of being as lost as the government about how to rescue the country from a deepening economic and political crisis, did not say how exactly ordinary Zimbabweans must contribute to the “struggle.”
The MDC statement did not also indicate whether the party had any specific programme to help aggrieved citizens assert their rights in the face of the government’s clean-up operation. - ZimOnline