Saturday (29-04-2006) Bulletin

Each blue headline below is a link that will take you to the relevant article...

• Opposition Gangs Up TBM speaks: "Opposition political groups and civil society movements have started consultations to form a united front to support one candidate in the 2008 presidential election, 23 months ahead of the crucial poll." I like the idea of one candidate to respresent both faction for a couple of reasons - it shows that the two factions can work together, and it does not dilute the vote potential. While there are, in essence, two opposition parties, the voting population is split in their decision to vote for any candidate and this would split the potential to unseat Mugabe... or whoever ZANU PF is intent on fielding, who at this stage looks like Vice President Joice Mujuru.

• Govt Prints $60t To Meet Salary Bill TBM speaks: "Government will have to print large sums of money to fund the bill for soldiers’ and teachers’ salary increments in view of its limited $30 trillion budgeted for civil servants this year. Experts say government will need to print close to $60 trillion to fund the salary hikes announced on Wednesday which they say will see inflation going through the roof. The move is widely seen as an attempt to pacify restless soldiers and an army of civil servants who have been complaining about low salaries and poor working conditions. They said the timing of the increases was suspicious. It appeared designed to prevent civil servants and members of the uniformed forces from supporting a possible call for mass action by the MDC." Injecting huge amounts of money into the already floundering economy may get the salaries paid, but it will drive up inflation, already the highest in the world and will have the opposite intended effect - the earners may get the promised increases, but the prices will go up because of the increased money in the market, and they will find themselves further divorced from the poverty datum line, which currently stands at ZW$32 million per month for a 5 member urban family.

• Coltart Might Go Solo If MDC Fails To Unite TBM speaks: "The self-appointed mediator in the crisis-ridden opposition MDC, David Coltart, has said that if he fails to solve amicably the problems affecting the fractured party he will consider standing as an independent." This is the result of having two factions of one party - losing people to an independent standing in the political dias. Coltart has indicated that he still has four options open to him. "If the negotiations towards a reunification or amicable separation of the party fail, then I will have to look at other political options and the options include deciding whether to join the Tsvangirai or Mutambara faction or to join Zanu PF which is highly unlikely or to stand as an independent or quit politics altogether,” Coltart said. The worst of it is that here we have a potential further split, with the possible loss of a political activist who finds himself in a rather difficult position, not through any fault of his own.

• Zimbabwe Power Firm Seeks US$900 MillionTo Refurbish Power Stations TBM speaks: "The Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA) says it requires nearly US$900 million to refurbish its archaic power stations at Kariba dam and Hwange coalfields. Hwange, the biggest thermal power station in the country, required about US$600 million while Kariba required US$300 million, all money the hard cash-strapped Harare government does not have. "We have applied to the RBZ for funding of the two projects that are aimed at improving our power outages from the two power stations as we are failing to meet national demand, the demand for electricity has been growing at three percent per annum," said ZESA spokesman James Maridadi." It's all very well applying for this sort of financing, the problem being, where do they expect the RBZ to lay their hands on this sort of money? I suppose that they could print enough Zimbabwean currency to buy the required foreign currency, but the knock-on effect on Zimbabwe's economy would be so lasting, so final that the country would implode overnight. That being said, it is very important that something be done, and rather quickly, as the country is running on about 50% electric power and that is failing by the day. I remember in the very early 1990's when the whole country had a power failure - that was an extremely difficult time, and I don't envisage the immediate future of Zimbabwe being much easier power-wise (excuse the pun).

• Council Workers On "Go Slow" TBM speaks: And I always thought that if the Council if went on a 'go slow' strike that no one would notice...

'debvhu