 Zimbabwe:
Continue Producing, Manufacturers ToldMANUFACTURERS should continue producing goods and those who fail to do so risk having their companies taken over by Government, President Mugabe has said. The President castigated those suggesting the crackdown on unscrupulous businesspersons was illegal. He said the move was aimed at saving people's lives. "Some people are saying it's illegal, it's illegal ivo vanhu vachifa munyika, iwe woti it's illegal unenge uchitaura palaw ipi iyoyo kana vanhu vachifa. Ngatiite zvinhu tine tsika kuti tese tipunduke. "We want law-abiding companies. Haikona kuzadza matumbu nehurombo wevanhu. Kuti ivo vagute vaite matumbu," he said amid applause from the crowd. "In the past three years, we have seen nhafu inokunda nhafu. Vanoda kuzvigutsa vachiita vamwe vavevarombo." The President said some manufactures have since stopped producing goods in protest at the Government directive to lower prices. He was addressing war veterans, war collaborators, ex-political detainees and restrictees, university and college students and Zanu-PF supporters at the party headquarters in Harare yesterday. The groups gathered at the party headquarters at the end of a solidarity march to thank the Government for putting an end to runaway prices and profiteering. "Some are saying hakuna kwazvinosvika, mumashelf hamuchina chinhu, zvino tinoda kuti kune vemafactory, you must produce, we will take the factories if you are not producing. If you don't want to use these factories we will take them. We haven't as yet been satisfied that things are okay, we need your eyes and ears to assist those enforcing the directives," Cde Mugabe told the gathering. He said greedy people pursuing a political agenda were driving the recent spate of price increases but Government would do everything to preserve the lives and dignity of the people. He blasted MDC faction leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai for globe-trotting seeking the attention of Britain and her Western allies in her bid to have illegal sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe. Cde Mugabe said South African President Thabo Mbeki told former British prime minister Tony Blair to back off from meddling in the affairs of Zimbabwe as Sadc was handling the matter. This was after Mr Blair went to South Africa last month in his bid to seek support for the opposition in Zimbabwe. "Kuchema kwaTsvangirai anoda kuti Africa ipukute misodzi yake, mukadzi wake watadza kumupukuta? Why do you go to the West in Britain, ndiani anemutupo wako ikoko?" said the President. Cde Mugabe later chronicled to the Zanu-PF supporters the support Zimbabwe was getting from the international community including Sadc and the African Union. He also told them about his recent visit to Ghana to attend the AU summit, the resounding support he got there and the debate about the formation of the United States of Africa. He said it had been agreed that Africa's regional blocs should first unite before a Union Government could become a reality. Later in his address to the 70th session of the Zanu-PF Central Committee, Cde Mugabe said Government would endure people got basic commodities at affordable prices despite machinations by the country's detractors to increase prices of goods and services ahead of next year's elections. He said Britain and her European imperialist allies would not succeed in their efforts to topple the Government by attacking the country's economy hoping that it will lead to the collapse of the system. "As a party of the people, our unfailing duty is to defend our people and their welfare, which currently is under attack. They need their daily bread, their relish, cooking oil, mealie-meal and they need soap. In short, they need all these basics that make life livable in dignity," he said. "We pledge today that they shall have their basics, and have them affordably. That is Zanu-PF's compact with the people. The game is clear. It is one of ensuring that we go to the polls in March with a bitter and disaffected people in the hope that their unhappiness ousts Zanu-PF precipitating the installation of their puppets." President Mugabe said businesspersons should engage themselves in honest and clean business practices and warned them against straying into politics. He said Government was aware that the current "war" was not about prices or supermarkets but went much deeper, which was why the ruling party had decided to focus on the "real game". |
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"Our economy is under siege. Our people's welfare is under attack. There is a mad run on our national currency, frenzied attack on the Zimbabwean dollar in the hope that its collapse precipitates the demise of our whole system. "There is rampant, politically motivated profiteering, with prices of essential commodities changing practically on an hourly basis, putting livelihoods in utter turmoil. "Again the idea is to erode incomes and welfare in the hope of creating generalised disaffection which will bring people on to streets. The overall goal remains that of regime change," said President Mugabe. Several companies headquartered in the Western countries, said President Mugabe, have been instructed to cut back on production or, worse still, close shop entirely and Government was fully aware and followed these developments closely. Government, said President Mugabe, was impressed that Sadc and the African Union was now aware of the British machinations and the true picture prevailing in the country. The President said he had briefed AU leaders during his recent trip to Ghana and said Ghananians had demonstrated their unwavering support to Zimbabwe as evidenced by the huge turnout at the rallies he addressed. Zimbabwe, he said, was registering many diplomatic victories regionally and internationally including its recent assumption of Comesa deputy chairmanship, coupled by the departure of former British prime minister Mr Blair. Cde Mugabe expressed hope that the new British leader, Mr Gordon Brown, will realise that Zimbabwe was a sovereign country with rights that are as sacred as those of the British people. He said it was strange that the West started criticising Zimbabwe's political and economic policies when it took away land from whites when all along the country's leadership had been hailed as pragmatic and reasonable. "Are we being told that the current runaway prices merely coincided with decisions in the West to oust Zanu-PF? Mere neat coincidence or intimate causality?" he said. The President said the present challenges
should convince Zimbabweans that the struggle they had embarked upon
should extend to other spheres of the economy as a people with no
economy of their own were not a sovereign people.
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