ZIMBABWE - HARARE - VICE President Joice Mujuru and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai returned home yesterday aboard the same flight from South Africa raising further questions of the VPs close relationship to the PM.

 

VP Mujuru is being persecuted by some high-ranking Zanu PF officials for allegedly working with the Movement for Democratic Change.

 

 

The accusations stem from the Mnangagwa faction which has roped in the services of Oppah Muchinguri who will challenge Olivia Muchena (a Mujuru ally) for the leadership of the women’s league.

 

VP Mujuru was in New York to attend a United Nations world summit of First and Third World leaders to discuss the current global economic recession.

She said developing countries had called for the reform of multilateral agencies for them to be accountable to the world body than to their boards of directors.

Briefing journalists soon after her arrival at Harare International Airport, VP Mujuru described the conference, where 192 countries were represented, as successful.

“Developing countries were not happy with institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund as they said the UN, a universal body, was best placed to co-ordinate global economic policies for member countries,” she said.

There was a divergence of views between developing countries and developed countries as the latter were comfortable with the status quo in which institutions they dominate such as the G7, G20, International.

Monetary Fund and World Bank ran the show regarding global economic issues, she said. Developing countries, on the other hand, accused developed countries of causing the global economic recession and argued that they should not be allowed to dictate direction, in particular formulation of world economic policies.

 “A sub-committee was set up to advise the UN membership on how to deal with the recession,” VP Mujuru said.

Sources close to deliberations at the summit said the argument by developing countries was that it was not prudent to continue allowing multilateral agencies like the IMF and World Bank to formulate global economic policies because they were influenced by developed countries as they wielded more voting rights.

Developing countries raised issues of conditionalities demanded by the IMF and World Bank, most of which had the effect of undermining their sovereignty.

Developed countries had, on the other hand, argued that global economic policies should be left to the boards of these financial institutions whom they said had best expertise.

This was strongly resisted by developing countries who argued that Western countries influenced voting and attendance to G7 and G20 summits, and conferences were by invitation and not by right for those countries who were not members.

It was agreed that issues of financial packages and debt for developing countries were already on the table and ought to be followed upon using the UN system, a development that was viewed as a major success by the developing countries.

The UN conference attended by the Vice President ran from June 26 to 29 in New York. VP Mujuru addressed the summit and called for the international community to support Zimbabwe by providing a stimulus package to offset the financial challenges.

PM Tsvangirai, who was on a three-week tour of the US and Europe after being tasked by President Mugabe and Cabinet to seek financial aid for the inclusive Government and the lifting of sanctions, described his trip as successful.

“It was quite successful, we were quite happy with the engagement we had,” said PM Tsvangirai before he was whisked away.

He, however, said he would give a comprehensive statement on his tour in due course.
PM Tsvangirai was welcomed by MDC ministers who boycotted yesterday’s Cabinet session.

 

Addressing reporters in Johannesburg, South Africa, at the weekend where he made a stopover, he said his tour to drum up support for the “new” Zimbabwe was a success despite criticism from Western leaders of alleged continued human rights abuses and he insisted that political and economic reforms were gathering pace.

 

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JOKE OF THE DAY - A man with a piece of paper in his hand comes into an office where another man is sitting next to a shredding machine.

"Do you know how to operate this thing?" he asks. "I have an important paper here and I want to make sure this is done right."

"Sure," the other man answers. "Just put the paper in here and press this button."

The first man does so, saying, "Great. And where do the copies come out?"!.”

 

 

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