U N I T E D   N A T I O N S
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Integrated Regional Information Network for Southern Africa

Tel: +27 11 880 4633
Fax: +27 11 880 1421
e-mail: irin-sa@irin.org.za


SOUTHERN AFRICA
IRIN-SA Weekly Round-up 68
20 - 26 April 2002


CONTENTS:

SOUTHERN AFRICA: WFP warns of critical food shortages
ANGOLA: Prospects brighten as war fears ebb
ZIMBABWE: Veterans threaten Asian community
ZAMBIA: Mwanawasa struggles with economic challenges
MADAGASCAR: Rivals delay implementing peace accord
BOTSWANA: Basarwa lose court bid for land
COMOROS: Special committee to review Comoros election dispute
MOZAMBIQUE: Army hopes to destroy stockpiles by next year
LESOTHO: IRIN Focus on May election
MALAWI: Focus on the fight against poverty
SWAZILAND: Environmental protection versus development
SOUTH AFRICA: Focus on the virgin myth and HIV/AIDS

SOUTHERN AFRICA: WFP warns of critical food shortages

The World Food Programme (WFP) warned this week that harsh weather
conditions, economic and political instability and HIV/AIDS could see the
2.6 million people it is currently struggling to feed in Southern Africa
double when regional assessments are completed in May.

"The situation is extremely critical," said Judith Lewis, WFP regional
director for East and Southern Africa. "We are helping 2.6 million people
now in five countries, but I am sure that will double," Lewis told
journalists in Johannesburg as a WFP team moves through Southern Africa to
conduct urgent food assessments.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27474

Among the countries targeted for WFP aid is Lesotho, where Prime Minister
Prime Minister Pakalitha Mosisili on Monday formally declared a state of
famine in a bid to trigger further donor assistance to his impoverished
mountain kingdom.

The devaluation of the local currency against the US dollar, and bad
weather, has meant basic commodities are in short supply and often beyond
the means of ordinary Basotho. The country has a high unemployment rate
and official figures say that half of the population of two million are
living in poverty.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27429

ANGOLA: Prospects brighten as war fears ebb

As Angola heads from war to a hopefull peace, a range of new challenges
are confronting the government. In terms of the country's humanitarian
crisis, the ceasefire agreed with UNITA rebels this month has opened up
areas of the country which were previously inaccessible and thousands of
sick and hungry people are being encountered by aid workers.

The international medical aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said
in a statement on Wednesday that one of their teams found "extremely high
mortality rates" in Bunjei, 116 km from Caala in the southern province of
Huila when they arrived last week.

Thierry Allfort-Duverger, who led the assessment team, was quoted as
saying: "We counted 14 deaths per day over a population of around 14,000
in Bunjei. We found more than 1,050 freshly dug graves. Bunjei is a ghost
town where displaced and destitute people have been settling since last
September."

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27473

Observers have warned that Angola's peace agreement hinges on the success
of the demobilisation and reintegration of rebel troops over the course of
this year.

In the memorandum of understanding signed on 4 April, the government
undertook to provide assistance to UNITA soldiers in designated quartering
areas where they would be demobilised under the supervision of a joint
commission. The process was estimated to take 262 days from 4 April.

"The peace process is working, I don't think there is a danger of the war
resuming," UNITA spokesman Jaka Jamba told IRIN on Wednesday. "Our concern
is that it is necessary to provide the basic needs in each of the
quartering areas, otherwise the guys will abandon them and the process can
derail."

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27451

The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said this week that land
reform should also be a priority for the government as it moves into a
phase of reconstruction and development. The agency noted that secure land
tenure was "fundamental to food security and sustainable development".
Without it, farmers cannot get access to credit, and there is no incentive
to improve the land.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27488

As Angola's peace process begins to take shape, South Africa's business
community is beginning to eye the opportunities that could emerge as the
mineral-rich neighbour rebuilds after close to three decades of civil war.

"It all depends on what happens in the next few months," Angola researcher
Neuma Grobbelaar at the South African Institute of International Affairs
said. "Business is certainly looking at Angola with huge interest, but
would probably want to see a lot more movement on the political front
before committing themselves."

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27432

ZIMBABWE: Veterans threaten Asian community

Threats of property confiscations made towards Zimbabwe's Asian community,
the arrest of anti-government demonstrators and news that Zimbabwe had
bought much-needed grain stocks dominated the news this week.

On Wednesday the official Herald newspaper quoted war veteran leader
Andrew Ndlovu as saying: "Nothing will stop us from reclaiming commercial
land from Indians. If they do not stop looting our economy they will leave
us with no choice but to go door to door making sure all Indians in the
cities are complying with instructions from war veterans."

The newspaper said Ndlovu had given the Asian community an ultimatum to
reduce rents, stop trading in currency on the black market, bank their
money locally and raise wages.

War veterans are already surrounding many of the over 5,000 farms
earmarked for the government's land acquisition programme. While the
evicted farmers are reported to be living with friends and relatives, most
of their now unemployed farmworkers have remained in their homes on the
farms but they have no income.

An organisation called the Farm Community Trust of Zimbabwe (FCTZ) is
currently feeding about 2,000 farm workers' children. The organisation
hopes to reach 10,000 children by May.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27431

In addition to a drought and future predictions of poor rainfall, the land
acquisition programme left many commercial farmers unable to plant new
crops.

Peter Wells, chief executive officer of the Zimbabwe Cereal Producers
Association said current wheat stocks of 170,000 mt would probably only
last until the end of August at the current consumption rate of between
32,000 to 35,000 mt per month.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27431

To help alleviate shortages, the government announced this week that it
would import stocks of yellow maize, PANA reported. An official of the
Grain Marketing Board (GMB), said the country would import that maize from
Kenya, and had also ordered some consignments from Brazil, South Africa
and China.

Reports of human rights abuses continued when Lovemore Madhuku, leader of
the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) was arrested with two other
officials on Monday ahead of countrywide anti-government marches. They
were released on Wednesday when the court said the state had failed to
back up its case but on Thursday the organisation's offices were raided by
police who went through their documents, AFP reported. Thirty-eight people
were eventually arrested during the countrywide protests.

On Thursday a Zimbabwean widow alleged in a United States court that
ZANU-PF militants doused her husband with petrol and set him ablaze as
police stood by doing nothing. Adella Chiminya said authorities never
intervened to save her husband, trade union activist Tapfuma Chiminya,
after he was ambushed on 15 April near Murambinda Growth Point.

Chiminya is one of six Zimbabweans suing the ruling party for US $400
million. The MDC activists sued under a 211-year-old law that allows
foreigners to claim damages in US courts over violations of international
laws.

Meanwhile, visiting Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa on Thursday endorsed
last month's presidential election result and urged Zimbabweans to bury
political rivalry and unite to fight the hunger facing the nation, the
Herald reported.

"After all is said and done, you must know that you are Zimbabweans and
that Zimbabwe should advance as one to the final victory of the revolution
of the country. Instead of paying too much attention on issues that divide
you as a nation, you must come together and unite in fighting the hunger
that has hit your country and the whole region," Mwanawasa was quoted as
saying.

ZAMBIA: Mwanawasa struggles with economic challenges

Back home, an attempt by the Zambian government to restore economic
stability and stimulate growth appears to have backfired, throwing
investors into a flurry of concern and stimulating the underground
currency market, analysts said on Thursday.

They said recent significant gains in the exchange rate of the kwacha, a
unit well known for its propensity to slide, were a response to official
controls rather than a return to macroeconomic stability.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27471

MADAGASCAR: Rivals delay implementing peace accord

An Organisation of African Unity (OAU) envoy expected in Madagascar "soon"
will have to pull out all the stops to prevent the island's rival leaders
from violating last week's peace accord signed in Senegal, analysts told
IRIN.

President Didier Ratsiraka and millionaire opposition leader Marc
Ravalomanana reportedly signed the accord under pressure from the OAU on
the sidelines of a New Partnership for African Development conference. It
was hoped that the agreement would end their three-month crisis over the
presidency.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27430

The impact of Madagascar's political crisis is being felt most severely by
the country's urban poor. Already one of the world's least developed
countries, a political standoff between government and opposition
supporters has seen a further slide in people's standards of living.

The opposition-held capital Antananarivo has been blockaded for the last
two months by government supporters as the country split over the disputed
results of presidential elections held in December. The impact of the slow
strangulation is increasingly visible on the streets.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27456

BOTSWANA: Basarwa lose court bid for land

The Basarwa hunter gatherers may have lost the first round of their court
bid to remain in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, but they still have
another chance to fight their removal, one of their lawyers said on
Monday.

The Basarwa, also known as the San, are contesting their removal from the
reserve - their ancestral land and burial grounds - to resettlement camps.
They also want their hunting rights back.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27405

COMOROS: Special committee to review Comoros election dispute

A special committee will be formed in the Comoros to review events
surrounding the controversial 14 April election which saw only one
candidate run for presidency, a diplomatic source said on Friday. The
independent committee would have five legal specialists familiar with
constitutional matters.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27490

MOZAMBIQUE: Army hopes to destroy stockpiles by next year

The Mozambican army hopes to destroy the more than 30,000 landmines it
still has in stock by next year, the National Institute for Demining (IND)
said on Friday.

A batch of 2,500 of the killer devices was destroyed on 19 April and
immediate plans are to destroy another 10,000 in the central and southern
regions, IND national director Artur Verissimo said.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27492

LESOTHO: IRIN Focus on May election

Lesotho's general election next month, the first since the disputed poll
of 1998 which plunged the country into chaos, will be a test of the extent
to which the electoral system has been democratised.

Nobody in Maseru wants a repeat of the anarchy that followed the 1998
election. Businesses in the capital Maseru were looted and burned, chaos
replaced law and order. The country's economy took a huge knock from which
it has still not recovered. Official statistics are that unemployment is
at 30 percent while 50 percent of the population, estimated at two
million, live in poverty.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27457

MALAWI: Focus on the fight against poverty

Weighed down by a critical food shortage, limited access to land,
unemployment and poor education and health services, Malawi is one of the
world's poorest countries.

In a bid to win international financial backing to reverse its dismal
record, the government this week launched a Poverty Reduction Strategy
Paper (PRSP) - a first step to gain unqualified relief on its US $2.5
billion foreign debt under the controversial Highly Indebted Poor
Countries (HIPC) initiative.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27496

SWAZILAND: Environmental protection versus development

What can a small impoverished nation do to preserve its environment when
faced with a destructive population growth rate and an imperative to lure
industrial investment to create jobs? While Swaziland, a landlocked
kingdom of less than one million people, struggles with these questions,
conservationists are heartened by the first major victory of an
environmental monitoring body whose success is by no means assured.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27481

SOUTH AFRICA: Focus on the virgin myth and HIV/AIDS

In a country long-sickened by the level of sexual violence, a shocking
series of child rapes has stunned South Africa and left people grasping
for answers.

Among the theories advanced to explain the phenomenon is the apparently
accepted myth that sex with a virgin cleanses one of HIV/AIDS. But that
has ignited a renewed controversy over whether the folk tale alone is
behind the sexual assaults against children that in some cases have been
literally babies.

More details: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27463


IRIN-SA
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Fax: +27 11 447-5472
Email: IRIN-SA@irin.org.za

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