No ZANU Card, No Mealie Meal

by hilzoy

Whenever you get depressed about our elections, just remember: it could be worse:

"The Zimbabwean authorities are guilty of denying opposition supporters access to state food supplies as part of a systematic attempt to intimidate opponents ahead of next week’s presidential and parliamentary elections, the US rights group, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday. (...)

The report compiled during a seven-week undercover trip to all of Zimbabwe’s provinces accuses officials of bribing voters with agricultural equipment and manipulating the distribution of state-subsidised maize and seed for political gain. It quotes an unnamed Zanu-PF supporter saying: “the mealie meal is only being accessed by us. It is very easy. Only those who are on the councillors’ lists can access the grain. A person who is not on the list cannot.”"

Zimbabwe is continuing its apparently endless collapse. The inflation rate is now over 100,000% per year. The country's wheat supply is projected to run out any day now, and the harvest, which will probably be utterly inadequate, is in mid-November. Zimbabwe will have to import about 300,000 tons of wheat to make it until then, and where it will get the necessary hard currency is anyone's guess. The upcoming elections have produced headlines like: "Police in polling booths can intimidate voters, say NGOs". (You think?) There's a huge exodus of Zimbabweans with marketable skills, leading to such horrifying quotes as this:

"Last year, a parliamentary committee heard that Zimbabwe's road network was crumbling because there was not a single civil engineer left in government."

But back to the use of food aid as an electoral tool:

Some background from the HRW report's summary:

"Today one-half of Zimbabwe’s population of nearly 14 million is considered food-insecure, living in a household that is unable to obtain enough food to meet basic needs. A three-year drought, international sanctions and the withdrawal of international non-humanitarian support, the government’s mismanagement of the economy, and the fast-track land reform program all worked together to cause the current food emergency. The international aid community, led by the UN World Food Programme (WFP), is currently providing relief rations to over five million people and the number may well exceed seven million by 2004. The government subsidizes grain through its own program of importation and distribution, managed by the Grain Marketing Board (GMB) and the government’s Food Committee."

With that in mind, consider stories like these (note that ZANU PF is Mugabe's party, and MDC is the opposition):

"ZANU PF politicians often sell maize to supporters at low prices. “Food is now a very big campaign tool for ZANU PF,” stated one human rights activist. During a by-election campaign in Highfield (a Harare constituency) last year, 10 and 20 kg bags of maize were delivered to ZANU PF local offices. As the news spread, people descended on the offices where the police, members of the youth brigade, and the party youth took control of the crowd. The press reported that “the youths ordered the people to queue according to their ZANU PF branches, while party officials clutching lists with the names of members collected money to pay for the maize meal.”

A similar incident took place in Zengeza in Harare in October: 10 and 20 kg packages of mealie meal were sold to supporters who reportedly ‘were asked to submit [their] names to local ZANU PF branch leaders’ the week before. Proof of eligibility was a ZANU party card. The Kuwadzana by-election was held in March 2003. There, ZANU PF candidate, David Mutasa was widely accused of providing GMB maize to people with ZANU PF cards. (...)

Interviews reveal the process of politicization of the food system: the GMB Food Committee decides where maize is to be milled, and millers have no voice about where it is sent after that. Millers may only decide how to distribute to their own staff. The GMB allocates maize meal to shops and other buyers. Buyers use lists, created by local ZANU PF councilors. Where the MDC is in charge of a council, the ZANU party structure draws up the lists, without MDC input. The lists are used to distribute grain to loyalists. One informant explained that in Mashonaland West, a ZANU PF area, those in charge “may steal four-fifths of it. But they will sell you 5 kg or so.” It is under the control of youth, she continued, and you cannot register for food if you are not a member of the party. “No ZANU card, no mealie meal.” Another noted that in Mutoko, his mother and others, whom he said no longer support ZANU PF, “are buying party cards for security, because to get GMB maize you have to have a party card.” Therefore “you buy the card, you pay the money, nothing else will do…. You can’t refuse. If you refuse you get no maize. [The card] is a must in the rural areas.” (...)

People manage to circumvent the politicized system of distribution in a number of ways. “The whole thing started when I joined the MDC” in 1999, a grandmother in a provincial town explained. Authorities destroyed her house and beat her. Even today “it is not safe to move freely.” When asked if the government allows her to collect GMB maize, she said “they don’t like to see my face” so she sent a friend to get it for her. But, “corrupt youth” sell maize in a “racket”, she explained. After she confronted the racketeers, and paid a Z$100 bribe, they added her name to a ward distribution list. Her friend, another elderly woman activist, said that as an MDC member she is also unable to access GMB maize, but her friends on the local ZANU PF committee get it for her. Another MDC activist agreed: he cannot buy maize from the GMB: “They do not want to see us [MDC members].” So, he asked someone else to buy GMB maize for him under that person’s name.

The government’s cash-for-work program and its agricultural inputs program appear similarly politicized. For instance, one old MDC supporter east of Harare explained that cash-for-work is available in his area but “only for ZANU supporters.” “If you join and they find out that you are MDC they will beat you. Generally it is the local councilors who select who can work on public works projects,” he said, “and they only select ZANU supporters.” Another man complained to a government official about a similar situation:

[During] the planting season of 2002 the government gave people seeds for planting through Chiefs and Headman, people were written down [and] each village had its own list of villagers. Mr. K [name provided] struck off Mr. M [name provided] from the list on the grounds that Mr. M was an MDC party member. In the current Drought Relief Program, where families buy subsidized maize from the GMB, Mr. K again cancelled M’s name from the list…. Before these sad incidents, Mr. M’s property i.e., granary and chickens, had been burned for what was suspected to be politically motivated [reasons]."

Half the people in Zimbabwe don't have enough food. The government isn't just beating its opponents, burning their houses down, and so forth; it's using access to food as an electoral weapon, all to keep an 84 year old dictator in power after he has devastated his country.

Change cannot possibly come too soon to Zimbabwe.

Comments

[Johnny Pez]

Meanwhile, Dick Cheney looks longingly at Zimbabwe and sighs. "If only I could starve the Democrats into submission," he says wistfully. Then he shrugs. It's something for his successors in the GOP to work on.

[Jon H]

There's a certain resemblance between Bush's rhetoric and Mugabe's rhetoric, these days.

Not that Bush is likely to engage in Mugabelike tactics, but still. That sort of hopeless, victory is just ahead, everything I did has been for the good of the country stuff is similar.

[togolosh]

The refugee problem in neighboring countries is becoming acute. Last year I visited family in Botswana, and there were Zimbabweans everywhere, desperate for work. Many are turning to crime, which means that every house outside the shanty towns is ringed with barbed wire and has electronic security systems.

Zimbabwe has more than enough resources to feed its people and provide a decent job for anyone who wants it. These problems are not knock-on effects of a drought (as in Darfur). The blame lies completely at the feet of Mugabe.

[Keir]

Togolosh, mightn't some of the blame lie at the feet of the whites who stole the blacks' country, then proceeded to engage in the sort of evil things white colonists in southern Africa tended to do?

I mean, I don't want to say Mugabe's anything over than a tosser, but blaming everything on Mugabe without also talking about the colonial legacy is a bit disingenuous.

[nu]

"I don't want to say Mugabe's anything over than a tosser, but blaming everything on Mugabe without also talking about the colonial legacy is a bit disingenuous"

With South Africa, Namibia and Botswana doing quite well for themselves next door ?
With the fact that Zimbabwe was doing quite well in the 80's ?

[Keir]

You can hardly say that colonialism had no negative effects on Zimbabwe's politics, economy, and society, that the Smith government is utterly blameless for creating modern Zimbabwe, that a history of violence and repression going back generations isn't contributing to the current disaster.

Apart from anything else, Mugabe came to power as a man fighting against the white supremacists. That's where a large part of his legitimacy derives from. His land seizures also are claimed to be directly justified by the colonial land seizures -- which were, after all, just as vile.

[Quiddity]

100,000% per year comes out to a little under 2% per day.

[Anthony Damiani]

This horrific spiral of national destruction has been going on for so many years-- at what point does the machinery of state atrophy to the point where it is no longer sufficient to maintain control of the country and keep Mugabe in power?

[Mike]

to Johnny Pez and Jon H.

Mugabe is a communist who has brought his country to ruin by following communist economic methods and a system of one party rule rife with endemic corruption, therefore he's just like a republican?

Are you people nuts?