wfn.org | All Africa News Agency Jan 12 2004 Features

[Worldwide Faith News <wfn@igc.org>]

ALL AFRICA NEWS AGENCY
P. O Box, 66878, 00800 Westlands, NAIROBI, Kenya
Tel: 254-2-4442215 or 4440224; Fax: 254-2-4445847, or 4443241
Email: aanaapta@nbnet.co.ke

AANA BULLETIN No. 01/04 January 12, 2004 Features

AANA Bulletin			Bulletin APTA
Editor -Elly Wamari		Editor - Silvie Alemba

SPECIAL  REPORT

Different Opinions As Govt Mounts Pressure On LRA

GULU, Northern Uganda (AANA) January 12 - The Acholi community in northern 
Uganda woke up in 2004 surrounded by thousands of government-armed militia 
forces and army personnel determined to decimate Joseph Kony, the leader of 
Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a notorious rebel group operating in the 
region.

Captain Mike Mukula, a Israeli trained anti-terrorist expert, and a 
government minister, who is also one of the leaders of Arrow Militia group, 
has confirmed that a 20,000-strong militia force is ready to combat Kony. A 
hardliner, Mukula has warned Kony that he (Kony) does not have monopoly on 
violence.

Another hardliner, Moses Ecworu has been posted to Soroti district in 
north-eastern part of the country, as a Commissioner.  He is alleged to 
have called for the killing of Acholi who cross over into Soroti.  Apart 
from Gulu district in the north, Soroti has occasionally been targeted by 
the LRA forces.

In his New Year message, President Yoweri Museveni warned that Kony will be 
defeated this year because the military has built up enough capacity. He 
said amnesty to Kony and his second in command, Vicent Otti, was over.

Tribal militia fighters surrounding the Acholi include the Teso, Langi and 
the Karimojong.

In addition, relations between President Museveni and Tabani, a son of the 
late former president Idi Amin, has been warming up.  Tabani has declared 
that he will bring Kony out of the bush.

The December 24, 2003 airlifting of 400 ex-rebel fighters belonging to 
Tabani, from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) underlines this 
declaration.

The presence of Ugandan army in the Sudan, monitoring the northern sector 
of Uganda, reveals a plan that may seal off Acholiland.

However, the Roman Catholic Church is stepping up efforts to forestall the 
plan. On December 31, the church organised a mammoth demonstration in Gulu 
town, calling for peace. According to Carlos Rodriguez, a priest based in 
Gulu, 4,000 people attended.

Even though the Catholic Church abhors Kony's excesses, it criticizes the 
military solution as having resulted in a no win situation, but causing 
dramatic increase in violence in the region.

The Anglican Church is also not keeping quiet. The outgoing Head, Bishop 
Mpalanyi Nkoyoyo, wants the government to drop the military approach.

  "Stop condemning them, forgive them so that you win them over," he told a 
congregation on January 1, arguing that Kony should be treated like a 
prodigal son.  "Kony was once a good boy and it is from our breasts that he 
suckled.  He went astray, but needs to be forgiven.  So, the new year 
should come with a new song," he said.

But Museveni has taken an increasingly uncompromising stand. "Even if Kony 
is given a hand to come out of the mess, he will not accept the gesture," 
John Nagenda, a presidential advisor told a BBC journalist who sought to 
remind him that the arming of militia forces by the government would 
entrench concern that "Violence begets violence".

The government's position comes in the wake of mounting domestic and 
international pressure, calling for settlement of the conflict, which has 
cost the nation about US$ 1.6 billion in its 17-year period.  The United 
Nations (UN), Commonwealth, Inter-Governmental Authority on Development 
(IGAD), and some western states see the prolonging of the conflict as 
unacceptable.

According to Museveni, the LRA has no political agenda.  Their mission is 
mainly materialistic. "All these bandits are after is chicken and food," 
the president said recently.

Some legislators from the north allege that Kony is a government agent 
whose intentions is to disorganise the Uganda Peoples Democratic Army 
(UPDA), which was established in 1986 to fight against perceived 
marginalisation of Acholi people from political and economic spheres. They 
had viewed Museveni's government as largely favouring southern tribes more 
than the north.

"In fact Kony's men used to attack UPDA camps and even killed some senior 
commanders of the group," said Dr Okullu Epak, one of the members of 
parliament from the area.

The legislators allege that Kony later fell out of favour, and turned his 
guns on the government.  According to them, he did so after the government 
failed to pay him for his services.

Reported by Crespo Sebunya

  FEATURES  SECTION

A Bleak Future Still Stalks An Ailing Zimbabwe

As the New Year dawns - presumably on a good note for most southern African 
countries - the diametric opposite could be said of Zimbabwe. Once a 
revered bread-basket of the continent, the sub-Saharan country still finds 
itself entangled in the shackles of seemingly endless tribulations. Apart 
from widespread food shortages, deep-seated political rivalry, and a 
hyper-inflationary environment, the country is facing growing isolation 
from the international community, which analysts say, dents the  prospects 
of a quick recovery from the myriad of political and economic problems 
bedevilling it.  AANA Correspondent, Ntungamili Nkomo, reports.

P
olitical tension between Zimbabwe's two major political rivals, the ruling 
Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) led by President 
Robert Mugabe, and the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) headed by fiery 
former trade unionist, Morgan Tsvangirai, have been largely blamed for 
contributing to the socio-political and economic crisis that has dogged the 
country for the past three years.

Analysts say there is little hope for recovery of the ailing economy within 
this year, especially considering Mugabe's decision to withdraw the 
country's membership from the Commonwealth bloc, a grouping of mainly 
former British colonies.

Zimbabwe was suspended from the 54-member bloc last year, after a disputed 
presidential election that pitted Mugabe and his bitter opponent, Tsvangirai.

International observers claimed that the election was marred by violence, 
and accused Mugabe of manipulating the electoral process in his favour, 
leading to the country's suspension from the club.

The Commonwealth again resolved to keep Zimbabwe suspended "indefinitely" 
last December, when it met in Abuja, Nigeria. The move infuriated the 
ageing Zimbabwean leader, prompting him to pull out of the grouping.

Mugabe described it as a "useless club", which threatened the country's 
sovereignty. But the most fundamental question Zimbabweans would want 
answered is: Is there any political tolerance between Mugabe and 
Tsvangirai, which could lead into some comprehensive talks towards nation 
building?

Just before the close of last year, both leaders delivered gloomy speeches 
that smacked of more tribulations for the already suffering Zimbabweans.

Mass demonstrations, boycotts and strikes was all that the MDC leader 
promised the citizens for the New Year. On the other hand, Mugabe 
reiterated that his government was prepared to shed its blood to "safeguard 
jealously, our sovereignty."

President Mugabe also made it clear that he was not prepared to have talks 
with the MDC, claiming that the party was an appendage of the British 
government bent on "fomenting trouble and causing chaos in my country". 
This further cast a dark cloud over the troubled country's immediate future.

Mugabe, who left the entire world shell-shocked when he pulled his country 
out of the Commonwealth, took the platform to lash out at the British Prime 
Minister Tony Blair, referring to him as a "Mormon and a false god".

"Tony Blair misguided us. He thought by merely whistling a tune that Mugabe 
must go and Zimbabwe must be under MDC, then this would just happen. We 
are prepared to die for our country," Mugabe told hundreds of his party 
supporters attending its annual conference in Masvingo, southern Zimbabwe.

According to an opposition leader, Paul Siwela, Mugabe had spent the better 
part of the year attacking the British Premier instead of fostering 
development. Siwela predicted that the country faces a bleak future.

In his end of the year address, the MDC leader said his party was working 
out modalities to stage protests in the new year, to force Mugabe to resume 
the stalled dialogue. But judging by Mugabe's steadfastness when he makes 
resolutions, it remains to be seen if such strategies will ever bear fruits.

Opposition-led mass protests were staged in June and March last year, but 
they were violently quashed by armed riot police and soldiers. Many people 
were brutally assaulted, while some, including Tsvangirai, were arrested.

"Despite the impressive gains, the national question still remains 
unanswered...The Zimbabwe crisis is deepening. Prospects for democracy, 
freedom, justice and a better life for all seem to be fading as each day 
passes," said Tsvangirai.

Economists and analysts estimate that about 75 percent of Zimbabwe's 
population now live below the poverty line because of the spiralling
inflation.

The MDC leader said that his party had extended several peaceful 
inter-party dialogue overtures to Mugabe in vain.  He, thus, resolved that 
a "detailed programme of rolling mass action would probably be the best 
language that the government would understand to resume dialogue".

Talks between the two parties collapsed early last year, when Mugabe 
demanded that the MDC recognise him as the legitimate leader of the country 
and withdraw their election court challenge, as a precondition for the 
talks to resume. But the opposition party refused to comply.

For the ordinary Zimbabwean, the political impasse between ZANU-PF and MDC 
is the primary cause of the problems affecting the country.  The general 
consensus among the public is that stalled talks should resume to end what 
is now widely referred to by the international community as the "Zimbabwean 
crisis."

"Surely, what we are currently experiencing in Zimbabwe is pathetic, to say 
the least. As the March (2002) presidential election passed, we thought 
Mugabe, who undeniably swept to victory under suspicious circumstances, 
would hastily find a solution to the economic malaise bedevilling our 
country," said Meluleki Moyo, an economics student at a local university.

"But, all that we have heard and seen from him is rhetoric, propaganda and 
an unprecedented warfare with the international community. Also, there has 
been bickering within the ruling party, not to mention corruption that has 
become so embedded in the society, that it would take a leader of real 
fabric to root it out," added Moyo.

Workers, whose salaries are heavily eroded by income tax, have warned of a 
direct confrontation with the government in the new year.

The country's health sector is yet to recover from the rigours of a just 
ended two-and-a-half-month-long industrial action by nurses and doctors, 
demanding salary adjustments by more than 8,000 percent. Several civil 
service departments, including teachers, gave notice at the end of last 
year, of a strike to take effect at the beginning of this year.

As the crisis continues, humanitarian aid organisations have warned that 
more food aid is needed this year, to cater for an estimated six million 
people facing starvation.

In Botswana, You Are Zimbabwean At Your Own Peril

If you are one of the 130,000 illegal Zimbabwean immigrants living in 
Botswana, chances are that you work at a cattle post, on farm lands or as a 
housemaid. Or if you fail to get work, survival instincts force you to 
steal, slaughter and eat cattle and goats in the bush.	In this write up, 
Henry Omondi reports on the harsh situation desperate Zimbabwean immigrants 
are enduring in Botswana.

I
n his state of the nation address last November, President Festus Mogae of 
Botswana promised to close in on illegal immigrants in the country.

In a carefully crafted speech, laced with connotations referring to 
increase in crime as synonymous with illegal immigrants, President Mogae 
promised to tighten the policing of illegal immigrants into the country.

 From the president's speech, it is apparent that Zimbabweans would be a 
prime target.  They form about 90 percent of illegal immigrants in 
Botswana, and close to 10 percent of the country's total population 
of  only 1.76 million.

According to Botswana's Department of Immigration, there are about 130,000 
Zimbabwean immigrants living illegally in Botswana at a given time.

Most of them herd cattle and goats for their employers, while others work 
in farms or as housemaids. Those who do not get jobs get trapped into 
crime, stealing cattle and goats, which they slaughter and eat in the bush.

Zimbabweans are blamed for the increased crime in Botswana's cities of 
Gaborone and Francistown. They are also held largely responsible for the 
country's soaring HIV/AIDS pandemic, and for the foot-and-mouth disease 
that saw over 16,000 heads of cattle slaughtered in January last year.

As a result, Batswana from the cities neighbourhoods are increasingly 
becoming restless as crime takes its toll on their lives.

"We have had many incidences of critically ill Zimbabweans dumped at 
hospitals, or thickets to die without any one claiming them," says Tutume 
Police Station commander, Seabe Maboka. Last month, three Zimbabweans in 
Francistown died of food poisoning after eating stolen maize meal.

This is in spite of a Botswana-Zimbabwe Joint Permanent Commission (JPC) 
meeting on defence and public security meeting held in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, 
last July. The meeting had promised to promote awareness of refugee rights, 
and at the same time, reduce the influx of Zimbabwe's economic refugees 
into Botswana.

Cross-border crimes like drugs and goods smuggling, car thefts, poaching 
and border jumping sees more than 2,000 Zimbabweans deported from 
Francistown and its environs every month. "We arrest and deport an average 
of 75 illegal Zimbabwean immigrants a day," says Seabe Maboka, adding: "And 
often, we arrest the same people every week."

Confirming officer Moboka's predicament, Botswana's Chief Immigration 
Officer, Roy Sekgorwane adds: "We are seriously loosing out on our battle 
to deal with the Zimbabwe problem."

Zimbabwe is the newest entrant in the growing list of Africa's failed 
democracies. Other countries in the list include Somalia, the Democratic 
Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

The tension between Batswana and Zimbabweans has been building up since 
August, when Tlokweng elders and leaders called for the repatriation of 
Zimbabweans from their Gaborone suburb.

"Enough is enough. We cannot take it any more," said the Batlokwa tribe 
Deputy Chief, Michael Gaborone.

Claims that most crime in Botswana are carried out by illegal immigrants 
from Zimbabwe have been confirmed by Superintendent Robson Maleka of 
Tlokweng police station. Says he: "Our cells can only hold 12 people. 
Sometimes we house suspects in lecture rooms because there is no space."

The Batlokwa now want all Zimbabweans, legal or illegal, out.  Chief 
Gaborone accuses Zimbabweans of making his people's lives unbearable.

"Crime has gone up because of these people. Rapes, assaults, and house 
break-ins have increased dramatically. We can no longer travel freely at 
night. Our children cannot go to school, and we cannot even send them on 
errands because they fear Zimbabweans," he complains.

According to the former Attorney General Skelemani, "the Dikgosi (Chiefs) 
have been given powers to make sure there is peace, stability and harmony 
within their [communities]".

He reckons that this gives the chiefs great leeway to take drastic 
measures, such as evicting the Zimbabweans altogether, for security 
reasons. "I foresee other tribes taking the same measures as the Batlokwa."

The Minister for Health, Miss Lasego Motsumi, speaking to journalists 
recently, said she was worried by the actions the Dikgosi have taken on the 
Zimbabwe situation.

"This will sour our relations with Zimbabwe much more do we have any proof 
that any of these criminal activities are indeed done by Zimbabweans?" she 
posed.

The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Lt General Mompati Merafhe, echoes Miss 
Lasego's sentiments. She, however, exercises restraint, saying: "The 
Zimbabwe issue is very sensitive."

Towards the end of last year, the Botswana Defence Forces (BDF) and the 
Botswana Police, riding on top of armoured tanks, swept through the White 
City suburb of the capital, Gaborone, in the wake of a surge in armed 
robberies and murders.

Whereas Operation Phepafatso, as it was called, rounded up more than 1,500 
illegal Zimbabwean immigrants and hauled them by back into Zimbabwe, a week 
later, the Zimbabweans were back, and so was their lucrative black-market 
phone business they are know for.

But their actions are probably a result of a dire situation in 
Zimbabwe.  The country's economic environment has deteriorated since 2000, 
when the white farmers were evicted from their lands in a much publicised 
controversial land reform programme aimed at re-distributing land to 
landless native Zimbabweans.

The country's economy has continued to take a downward spiral, with 
inflation hitting the 525 percent mark, the highest in the world. The 
country has also been hit by fuel, food and foreign currency shortages.

  The Intricate Ethnicity Factor In Ivorian Conflict

There are fears that without a speedy resolution, the Ivorian conflict 
could have adverse consequences on efforts to bring peace to the war-weary 
neighbouring Liberia. AANA's Nernlor Gruduah, unveils details of the 
intricate ethnicity links within the region, that is highly considered 
responsible for the conflict in the West African state.

P
resident Laurent Gbagbo's insensitivity to dangerously rising tension and 
xenophobia in the Ivory Coast underpins the manner in which he achieved 
victory in the 2000 elections.

Luckily though, Ivorians have been spared the worst of this tension, after 
rebels holding the northern half of the country resolved to return to the 
power-sharing government that they had left last September, thanks to heavy 
pressure from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).

The rebels pre-Christmas announcement that they were willing to join the 
government came shortly after the two sides began a disarmament process by 
collecting their weapons and storing them at specific locations in their 
respective territories.

Thus, after reaching crisis proportions, the tension has somewhat subsided, 
at least for the time being.

Given that the 58-year-old president was brought to power following a 
popular uprising against former military strongman, Robert Guei, he appears 
bent on staying on in office at all cost.

He was the sole "harmless" opposition candidate after more popular 
opponents of Guei, including former Prime Minister, Alassane Ouattara, were 
excluded from the process that saw Gbagbo taking the presidency.

An attempt by Guei to steal the results and declare himself winner after 
losing the October 2000 elections backfired when a massive public revolt 
prevented him from claiming power.

After General Guei's military coup of 1999, which briefly interrupted more 
than three decades of civilian rule and stability in Ivory Coast, many 
thought Gbagbo would bring back the country's religious and ethnic harmony.

Sadly, instead, Gbagbo has taken the once prosperous world's largest cocoa 
producer down a path similar to what has destroyed neighbouring Liberia and 
Sierra Leone during years of internal strife, according to political
analysts.

Nearly 40 years of stability nurtured by the late founding father of Ivory 
Coast, Felix Houphouet Boigny, have given way to deep-rooted ethnic hatred 
that spiraled into a series of recent mass killings in the country.

By adopting divisive and authoritarian style of leadership, Gbagbo is said 
to have fuelled the seeds of ethnic discord planted by Boigny's immediate 
successor, Henri Konan Bedie, through a policy known as "Ivoirite" 
(Ivorianness).

The president has seized upon this policy, said to be responsible for the 
wave of xenophobia sweeping across Ivory Coast, whose population of 16.6 
million has a large proportion of immigrants working on cocoa and coffee 
plantations.

The deepening ethnic divisions boiled up on September 19, 2002, when an 
army mutiny degenerated into a full-scale civil war, with the rebels 
capturing vast swathes of territory in the north and west of the country.

It followed Gbagbo's alleged plan to expel those recruited into the force 
by Guei from the Christian and animist west and predominantly Muslim 
north.	In the ensuing fighting, thousands were killed, majority of them 
immigrants accused of supporting the rebels.

Death squads, particularly formed by pro-Gbagbo youths and security forces, 
are reported to have gone on the rampage in the commercial capital Abidjan 
and other towns, killing hundreds and burning homes of foreigners and 
people from regions perceived to be sympathetic to the rebels' cause.

However, the country was prevented from descending into total anarchy, when 
former colonial power, France, intervened to separate the two sides.

The French troops were later joined by an ECOWAS observer mission, with the 
French contributing about 3,800 of some 4,000-plus troops.

Although the war has largely stopped, it is Gbagbo's alleged failure to 
implement a January 2003 French-brokered peace accord, that led to the 
rebels walking out of the unity government in September.

They accused President Gbagbo of manipulating the process and refusing to 
give the neutral Prime Minister, Seydou Diarra, a free hand to appoint 
Cabinet ministers.  Gbagbo counter-charged that the rebels were stalling 
the peace process by refusing to disarm.

While Western media have divided the country into Muslim north and 
Christian and animist south, the ethnic divisions are more profound than 
suggested.

The Yakouba ethnic group, which inhabits the west of Ivory Coast, extends 
deep into northeastern Liberia and known there as Dan or Gio. The Krahn 
group of southeastern Liberia stretches across the border into southwestern 
Ivory Coast.

No sooner had the civil war erupted in the Ivory Coast than freelance 
fighters from Liberia and Sierra Leone joined the fray.  Gbagbo accused the 
then Liberian president, Charles Taylor, of being behind the escalation of 
the conflict.  Naturally, Taylor denied the charge.

As the two men traded accusations and counter accusations, Gbagbo recruited 
former Liberian fighters hostile to Taylor, both from across the border and 
among refugees in Ivory Coast into his (Gbagbo's) army.

In addition, while French troops moved to western Ivory Coast to stop the 
influx of fighters from Liberia and flow of arms in both directions, Gbagbo 
was busy organising a new rebel group against Taylor.  The group came to be 
known as Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL).

The new group, was until last April, part of the main rebel force, 
Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD), that invaded 
Liberia from Guinea.

MODEL, drawn mainly from the late Samuel Doe's Krahn tribe, took advantage 
of Taylor's besieged government, crumbling under United Nations (UN) 
sanctions, and seized the southern half of Liberia in an almost effortless 
drive.	Samuel Doe was a one time president of Liberia, and widely 
considered a dictator.

In light of the complexity of the crises in both Ivory Coast and Liberia, 
observers note that ECOWAS leaders and the international community must 
apply more pressure and address all the underlying factors in order to 
restore lasting peace in the entire West African sub-region.

There are fears that without a speedy resolution, the Ivorian conflict 
could have adverse consequences on UN efforts to bring peace to war-weary 
Liberia.