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
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IRIN-SA Weekly Round-up 37 covering the period 18 September - 24 September 1999
ANGOLA: Conditions for displaced persons deteriorate
In its latest update on the situation in Angola, the United Nations Humanitarian Assistance Coordination Unit (UCAH) said this week that the general situation in the country remained unstable with increased military operations in several areas, resulting in the continued movement of people to more secure areas.
UCAH said that despite the constraints related to reaching people in need and the lack of security conditions, "humanitarian assistance activities continue to focus on the most vulnerable affected populations in the limited accessible locations in the country." In Kuito , about 500 km south of the capital Luanda, UCAH said that even under "precarious security conditions" humanitarian operations were still continuing. It said that humanitarian assistance was enabling internally displaced persons (IDPs) to build shelters for themselves in the camps and to get arable land. The report added that the NGO CARE had distributed vegetable seed kits to 15,178 families in Kuito and had managed to re-establish emergency health services in eight facilities and in the IDP camps, "providing a monthly average of 20,000 consultations since February."
UCAH said that on the basis of the information received by appealing agencies and compiled by the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), donor response to the revised 1999 appeal had reached 61 percent of the total requirements as 10 September.
Church renews calls for dialogue
The Roman Catholic church in Angola this week again called on the two sides in the Angolan conflict to restart a dialogue for peace. The bishop of Uige Province, Francisco da Matta Mourisca, was quoted as saying that "it should not be beyond the creativity of Angolans to find new ideas to restart peace negotiations."
Speaking on the Catholic radio, Ecclesia, the bishop said Angolans had lived in a culture of violence for nearly forty years, and now there was an urgent need for peace. He said the ordinary Angolan was not interested in amassing diamonds and petrol as has been alleged of the warring sides.
US concerned by murder of UNITA member of the Angolan national assembly
The United States government said this week that it was concerned about the murder in Luanda last week of Joao Ngolongobe Jacob, a deputy in Angola's national assembly.
"We call upon the government of Angola to investigate this thoroughly heinous crime against an elected representative of the Angolan people. Prompt action to find Mr Jacob's killers and bring them to justice will help to strengthen popular confidence in the democratic government and the rule of law in Angola," a statement from the US state department said.
Jacob was murdered shortly after attending a reception for delegates who were attending a meeting of the African Parliamentary Union which was taking place in Luanda.
ZIMBABWE: Doctors' strike hits hospitals
Government hospitals in Zimbabwe were handling emergency cases only this week after an estimated 400 junior doctors launched a nation wide strike, news reports said. News reports said that interns stayed away from work to protest poor salaries, overwork and declining health services.
Nyasha Masuka, president of the Hospital Doctors' Association, was quoted as saying: "Junior doctors are doing the work of five doctors because the health service is so short-staffed. We sometimes work 56 hours continuously. We are also watching patients die because some hospitals do not have the proper equipment. Harare Hospital has no syringes, no gloves, and sometimes patients bleed to death because there are no blood supplies," Masuka added
Masuka said junior doctors had to work in government service for two years after qualifying, where they received about US $400 a month. He said that after deductions for tax, rent and pensions the doctors take home about US $160.
NAMIBIA: AIDS forecast
Namibia's National AIDS Coordination Programme (NACOP) has forecast that the country's HIV infections are set to break through the 200,000 mark by the end of this year, media reports said this week.
NACOP, added the reports, said more than 60,000 cases of people testing HIV-positive were recorded between 1988 and June this year, while the latest figures indicate that over 7,000 new cases of HIV-positive people were recorded in the first six months of this year.
Unemployment at 35 percent
Unemployment in Namibia stood at 35 percent, or 547,000 people, the deputy labour minister was quoted as saying this week. The minister said over 216,000 youths currently enter the job market each year to compete for only 4,000 new employment opportunities that arise per annum. He added that the country's labour force grows at an average of 4.2 percent a year, while formal employment growth is less than 2.3 percent annually.
ZAMBIA: New Angolan refugees enter Zambia
More than 100 Angolan refugees have entered Zambia over the past few weeks, UNHCR told IRIN this week. Dominik Bartsch, spokesman for UNHCR in Lusaka told IRIN that there had been 90 new arrivals at Zambezi and 47 at Chavuma, two towns south of the Angolan/Zambia border. He said that once the new arrivals had been screened they would be transferred to the Maheba refugee camp in north-western Zambia. "The refugees are exhausted, but there are no major health concerns," he added.
Bartsch said that most of the refugees appeared to come from the Moxico Province in Angola. He said that the refugees were trying to escape the forced conscription by UNITA. Bartsch said that this forced conscription by the rebel movement not only affected able bodied young men, but in general "affected a cross section of the population."
BOTSWANA: More Caprivians cross into Botswana
About 20 more Namibians from the Caprivi Strip have crossed the border into Botswana since the outbreak of an armed attack in the strip last month, joining the 1,055 other Namibian refugees in the Dukwe camp, 'The Namibian' quoted a Botswana presidential spokesman as saying.
The spokesman, said of the 1,055 Namibians in Dukwe, 175 have applied through UNHCR to be repatriated to Namibia. However, UNHCR has since suspended the repatriation exercise following the attack on Katima Mulilo. The exodus of Caprivians started last October when a group of about 100 people, led by Mishake Muyongo, a former opposition party politician, crossed into Botswana and asked for political asylum claiming they feared for their lives because of their association with the pro-secessionist Caprivi Liberation Army.
BOTSWANA-ZIMBABWE: Botswana rail under pressure
The imposition by the National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) of tariff charges of up to 300 percent per metric tonne on cargo to and from Botswana might lose the Botswana Railways (BR) up to US $3.5 million in revenue this financial year, a BR source told IRIN this week.
The BR source said: "For the past two months, the NRZ crew at the Plumtree border post have been prioritising cargo of the new Beit Bridge-Bulawayo Railway (BBR) at the expense of our own cargo while at the same time rail traffic has been deliberately diverted away from BR to BBR."
The source added that the deliberate slow pace in offloading BR's cargo is costing the parastatal about US $10.000 a day, which could eventually amount to losses in revenue of up to US $3.5 million for the 1999/2000 financial year if the situation is not improved.
Botswana's rail company has been the carrier of goods headed north or coming from that direction destined for South Africa, before the new BBR line was commissioned in July. It operates from Beit Bridge to Bulawayo. The new line, according to its operators, BBR Limited, has cut the distance between Beit Bridge and Bulawayo by more than 200 km and has made rail access to and from South Africa quicker and more efficient.
This has, however, undercut Botswana's share of the rail business by up to half, said the BR source, who added that meetings between the representatives of the two governments are continuing on resolving the situation. "The BR is exploring survival mechanisms for the rail company and will advise our government accordingly," said the BR source.
Meanwhile, an NRZ official told IRIN there was no deliberate plan to undercut BR's rail cargo: "The NRZ, BBR and BR all accepted an agreement on the implementation of the shortest route principle between the three rail administrations, although it now seems Botswana has now reneged on the agreement."
MOZAMBIQUE: Projected 15 Percent Rise In Grains Output
Mozambique expects to produce a total of 2.1 million mt of grain in the coming harvest season, representing an increase of 15 percent over the figure for 1999, Agriculture Minister, Agostinho do Rosario was quoted in news reports as saying.
Speaking to the national AIM news agency, Rosario said rice contributed substantially to the increase in production addition to maize. A 15-percent expansion would bring rice production to 214,000 mt. "This increase in grain production is very significant for Mozambique. It means a large reduction in imports and an increase in the export of foodstuffs," he said.
Mozambique has now achieved self-sufficiency in maize production, and this recorded a surplus of 180,000 mt this year that could be exported to other countries in southern and eastern Africa, he said. According to Rosario, the total area under cultivation will rise to 3.9 million hectares, an increase of four percent over the acreage covered in 1998/99 agricultural season.
Business confidence index stronger
Meanwhile, business confidence in Mozambique rose slightly in the second quarter of 1999, media reports said this week. News reports quoted the latest findings of the international firm KPMG, which publishes a quarterly Mozambique business confidence index. The overall business confidence index was 95 in the first quarter of 1999, and 95.4 in the second quarter, using a benchmark of 100 points. Forty percent of the companies surveyed were foreign-owned, 20 percent jointly owned, while the remaining 40 percent belonged to Mozambicans. The most positive economic sectors, in terms of business confidence, were those of communications, construction, energy and natural resources, and tourism. The least positive were manufacturing, agriculture, and the wholesale and retail trade.
COMOROS: Separatists reject peace agreement
Leaders of a secessionist movement in the Indian Ocean Comoro Islands this week rejected a peace deal which is aimed at bringing to an end two years of political upheaval, news reports said.
The small island of Anjouan declared independence from the Comorian federation in 1997, which was followed by an unsuccessful government invasion. Violence erupted on the island soon after, as rival separatist groups took up arms against each other.
In terms of a peace agreement drawn up in Madagascar in April, the islands of Anjouan and Moheli were to be given greater autonomy from the main island of Grand Comoro. Earlier this month, Anjouan separatist leader Colonel Said Abeid forced his main rival off the island and hardened his secessionists' stance.
SOUTH AFRICA: Mbeki calls for UN reform
South African President Thabo Mbeki this week called for reform of the United Nations (UN), saying that the world body needed to reflect the "changing times."
The first African leader to address the 54th session of the General Assembly, Mbeki said: "If we are indeed seriously committed to these critical objectives of peace and democracy in the world, then we have no excuse to permit the further postponement of the meaningful restructuring of the United Nations."
In his speech this week, Mbeki also said that with the end of the cold war, the overwhelming majority of countries had opted for democratic forms of government. He cautioned, however, that the maintenance of democracy across the globe required that "in every democratic country the ordinary people should feel that they actually do enjoy the right to determine their own destiny." He added that there had to be a "democratisation of the system of international relations."
Mbeki said the time had come for the world to work together to reconstruct a human society that consistent with the Declaration of Human Rights. "Only time will tell whether we have the moral and intellectual courage in fact to rise to this challenge. But this we feel we can say, that the conditions exist in the world today for us successfully to pursue the vision contained in the UN documents to which I have referred (the Declaration of Human Rights). What may be in short supply is the courage of the politicians, as opposed to an abundance of good-sounding rhetoric."
South Africa aims for regional free trade deal by next year
Members of parliament were asked Wednesday to ratify a regional free trade deal so it could come into effect at the start of next year. Reuters quoted Sifiso Ngwenya, director of Southern African trade relations, as saying: "Our objective is to implement the free trade agreement on 1 January, 2000." The proposed agreement which was tabled in parliament earlier this month, covers an estimated US $6 billion of trade between South Africa and the other 13 members of the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
Competition brings job losses
The South African textile, clothing and leather industry has shed more than 20,000 jobs over 18 months to June this year due to cheaper imports and the illegal importation of second-hand goods, trade unionists told IRIN this week.
S'bu Ndawonde of the Southern African Clothing and Textile Workers Union (SACTWU) told IRIN that the flooding of the local market by cheaper imports is made possible by the ease with which illegal and second-hand goods are imported into the country.
"Retailers buy the goods from countries who use cheap labour, such as children, and can therefore afford to sell these cheaply in the country, thereby undercutting local manufacturers," said Ndawonde, who added that this has directly contributed to job losses. Ndawonde said the 127,000-strong member union has embarked on protest action which might culminate in strike action to highlight the threat to job losses. "The possibility of a reduction in tariffs on textiles as proposed in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) free trade protocol poses a further threat to jobs in the industry," Ndawonde said.
SWAZILAND: Clampdown on media
The Swazi government said this week that it would review its press laws to restrict newspapers from publishing material deemed defamatory to the royal family or government officials, media reports said this week. According to media reports the intended restrictions came after an article in 'The Times of Swaziland' which was allegedly defamatory towards King Mswati's fiancee. The newspaper's editor, Bheki Makhubu, was reportedly questioned by police and asked to explain why he published the article.
SOUTHERN AFRICA: Retrenched miners face a bleak future
The mining industry is to shed another 28,000 jobs by the end of this year, forcing those facing retrenchment to go back to the rural areas of South Africa and neighbouring countries where they face an uncertain future with no prospect of finding other employment, trade union officials told IRIN.
"The bulk of the miners to be retrenched come from the rural areas of the Eastern Cape and Northern provinces and from neighbouring countries of Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland, Namibia, Mozambique and Malawi," Archie Phalane, the assistant general secretary of the South African National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) told IRIN. "There are no jobs that the retrenched miners can take up once they have been axed, thereby condemning them and their families to a life of destitution," said Phalane.
Phalane said although the gold mining industry was the most affected, the retrenchments cut across the entire mining industry, among these the platinum, chrome and coal mines. "The decline in the price of gold is used by mine owners as a scapegoat to restructure the mines in order to maximise profits," Phalane said.
He added that the mines tend to replace retrenched miners with sub-contracted labourers who are paid low wages, enjoy no benefits and work under bad conditions. "There has been no benefit for workers when the selling price of gold was high," said Phalane, "however, miners are the first to suffer when the price drops."
The price of gold has dropped to about US $255 an ounce from its usual high of US $350 and above, the major reason being the recent sale of the bullion's reserves by Western countries to fund debt relief for poor countries.
AFRICA: Defence chiefs discuss measures to curb wars
African defence and security officials met in Swaziland this week to discuss conflicts in the region and measures to contain them. According to media reports the conflicts in Angola and the DRC were among those issues that topped the agenda.
Johannesburg 24 September 1999, 10:00 GMT
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