Chen says no crisis in Zimbabwe

Chen says no crisis in Zimbabwe

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After Didymus Mutasa's shock denials of any food shortages in Zimbabwe despite United Nations experts concluding that half the country's population needs aid, it was the turn of acting Information Minister Chen Chimutengwende to give the government's position on some of the topical current affairs. Below, we reproduce the full transcript of Chimutengwende's interview with SW Radio Africa's Violet Gonda for the Hotseat programme aired last week

Violet: The acting Minister of Information, Chenhamo Chimutengwende is the guest on the programme this week, commenting on the European Union targeted sanctions that were updated on 29 July and the controversial 'Clean Up' Exercise. The EU recently added six more names of Mugabe's cronies to its sanctions list that now comprises a total of 126 individuals. The updated list includes Sekesai Makwavarara, the Acting Mayor of Harare, and the three assistant police Commissioners, Edmore Veterai, Munyaradzi Musariri and Wayne Bvudzijena. The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Local Government, Patson Mbiriri, and Melusi Matshiya the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs are also on the list. The update includes people seen to have been responsible for the human rights violations committed under the controversial Operation Murambatsvina. In a wide ranging interview on the programme 'Hotseat', the Acting Information Minister denied that thousands of people had been made homeless after the government's 'Clean Up' exercise, and echoing Robert Mugabe's line, the Minister remained adamant that people are not starving. Chen Chimutengwende first gave us his party's reaction to the extended targeted sanctions

Chimutengwende: Well, it doesn't really affect us as a country. It means practically nothing to us as a country. It will not weaken our position nor will it improve the position of the European Union. These targeted sanctions were started to frustrate individuals in government, but that doesn't really mean anything, because not many of us want to visit the European Union anyway.

Violet: But, Mr Chimutengwende, the EU says this latest list is an update which includes people who were seen to have been responsible for the human rights abuses violated under Operation Murambatsvina. Do you not think you have to answer for what you have done as a government?

Chimutengwende: If we did anything wrong we don't answer to the European Union. The European Union is not the authority over Zimbabwe. We don't answer to them at all.

Violet: Now, we all know, and you know, that thousands of people have been made homeless. The United Nations Envoy released a report recently saying that at least 700 000 people were left homeless. Many of them are sleeping out in the cold in the streets, and some have been dumped at remote areas in the rural areas. Do you not worry about this?

Chimutengwende: They have not been dumped in the rural areas because that's where their homes are; that's where they come from. They have merely returned to their homes. And those who are homeless and want to remain in Harare, the government has a programme, called 'Garikai / Halale Khule' to build houses for them and the 5000 houses are being built by the end of this month as a first phase of that programme.

Violet: But, Mr Chimutengwende, are you not doing things in reverse? These people were given no warning and now you are saying you will build and you will help them -

Chimutengwende: They were given warning. That is not true that they were not given warning, if the European Union didn't know about the warning, but these people knew about the warning. They were like squatters.

Violet: 2.4 million people have been affected, some of them were only given a week and some of them were not even given any warning at all. So are you telling me that all these 2.4 -

Chimutengwende: They were given a warning, we passed a resolution towards this at our Party Congress two years ago that we were going to demolish them. So the people living in these shacks knew that they were living in illegal structures which one day would be destroyed.

Violet: We are not talking about the Party Congress. How much warning did you give the people that -

Chimutengwende: We gave through that ZANU Congress, as a ruling party, that was not a secret resolution it was a public resolution which was published all over the newspapers, broadcast all over that the government was going to do that.

Violet: Now Mr Chimutengwende, the police actually moved from area to area, from house to house you know, in some cases forcing people, poor people, to knock down their own homes. How does this make you feel as a person?

Chimutengwende: I'm not talking as an individual, I'm talking as a Government Minister, I think that's the context in which you are interviewing me, so I will answer in that context. They were asked to destroy the structures which were illegally built and many of them did so, and those who didn't, the government did that.

Violet: But still, I mean even if you are talking as a Government, you are also a human being and these are peoples lives that have been affected. You know, people who worked to look after their families have now been turned into beggars by their own government. How does the Government feel about that?

Chimutengwende: we have beggars in this country in the same way you have beggars in every other country in the world. The beggars may be more or less in different countries depending on economic circumstances. So we are building houses for these people. We are trying to create jobs for them; some of the were unemployed of course and some of them were just street kids, we are trying to rehabilitate them. It's an ongoing problem of the government.

Violet: How, how are you trying to do that because only last week about 300 street people were removed and where were they taken to?

Chimutengwende: They were taken to places where they can be given education. These are young people, teenagers. It's not a good thing to keep them in the streets thieving and robbing.

Violet: So where were they taken to because we know that thousands of people have been dumped at Hopely Farm with no water; access to clean water access to toilets -

Chimutengwende: Hopely Farm is another residential area which is being turned into a residential area. Government is constructing houses in Hopely Farm and many other farms as well. It's not just Hopely Farm where Government is involved in construction of houses.

Violet: At least 300 000 school children have been displaced and thousands of people with AIDS have had to stop their treatment. Are you not concerned about this?

Chimutengwende: These street kids were not school children, they were not going to school at all. They were just begging and harassing people in the streets and we have to make our streets safe.

Violet: We are talking about what Operation Murambatsvina has done to thousands of people in Zimbabwe. You know, as I said thousands have been displaced -

Chimutengwende: I am explaining to you what the objective of Murambatsvina programme was, and what its objective was. It was meant to clean our cities and towns, clean them from filth, crime and illegal structures and also to replace all that with legally built houses which are up to normal standards.

Violet: Even if you were to say that, we are talking about what's happening right now, not what you are going to do; what the government is going to do in terms of building houses. Thousands of desperate Zimbabweans are living on the streets and others have gone back to the rural areas

Chimutengwende: What is happening right now is a massive construction of houses all over the country, and next week is the end of the month and there will be and some of them will be beginning to move into the new houses and phase two will begin with more thousands of houses being built.

Violet: Why didn't you build the houses first before evicting people and putting them into the streets?

Chimutengwende: We have been building houses, it's just that we now have a more massive programme than before. The biggest ever to be mounted in the whole of Africa. We should be thanked for that rather than be denounced.

Violet: Will you be able to tell that to the 2.4 million people that have been affected, that are sleeping in the streets, that have been dumped in rural areas? You, yourself are living pretty because you've got your home.

Chimutengwende: At the moment we no longer have people sleeping in the streets, that's just wishful thinking from our detractors.

Violet: Where are they these people?

Chimutengwende: Which people?

Violet: The people that were removed from their homes?

Chimutengwende: They have settled with their relatives, some have gone to the rural areas - their original homes, and some are waiting for their new houses to be constructed.

Violet: But what is there in the rural areas for these people? How are they going to survive?

Chimutengwende: There is land for them, there are houses for them which they left to come to the city. We don't want unplanned urbanisation. These people were originally from the rural areas and when they came looking for jobs or for greener pastures we had to make a plan for them, that they cannot just all come to look for green pastures in the cities.

Violet: But, Mr Chimutengwende what about your timing? You know it's estimated that at least 4 million Zimbabweans are in urgent need of food aid and now, this is going on to increase or worsen because of the people who have been displaced as a result of the evictions. Is the government not concerned about this?

Chimutengwende: We have not asked for food aid from other countries because we are coping at the moment. When we need food aid from other countries we will say so.

Violet: How are you coping when the South African Council of Churches has actually -

Chimutengwende: We are ordering food, maize and other things from South Africa. Daily it's arriving, every day.

Violet: So what's happening to the food that the South African Churches has sent to Zimbabwe?

Chimutengwende: Not from the Churches, we mean our own food that the Government is ordering from the markets in South Africa,

Violet: Who is getting that food?

Chimutengwende: Not from South African Churches.

Violet: Mr Chimutengwende, who is getting that food that the government is getting from other -

Chimutengwende: It is going into the rural areas which were affected by drought.

Violet: And the rest of the country?

Chimutengwende: The rest of the country - the whole country was affected by drought last year.

Violet: So what about the people even in the urban areas who do not have food? You have long queues for sugar, you have long queues for maize

Chimutengwende: They also receive the food from the Grain Marketing Board.

Violet: Are you saying Zimbabwe has enough food to feed its population right now? Is that what you are telling me?

Chimutengwende: At the moment, yes. At the moment, yes.

Violet: That is a lie Mr Chimutengwende!

Chimutengwende: Well, if you - Is this an interview or you want me to interview you?

Violet: No because statistics on the ground show that you know there are thousands, millions of people

Chimutengwende: Actually it's you who is lying, not me.

Violet: Are you saying there are no people starving in Zimbabwe?

Chimutengwende: No, there are no people starving in Zimbabwe.

Violet: Where exactly are you getting the food and how are they being fed?

Phone goes dead

Violet: That was the Acting Minister of Information, Chenhamo Chimutengwende.
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