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Last Updated: Feb 25, 2009 - 10:26:44 AM |
In a deal stretching from Nairobi to Zurich, one of the richest and
most powerful people in Zimbabwe has been accused of allegedly trying
to sell gold in Europe - in defiance of international sanctions. The
vice-president of Zimbabwe, Joyce Mujuru, with her husband Solomon, are
among a small elite who have prospered in Zimbabwe as the rest of the
country plunges into ever-deeper economic chaos. As most of the country
suffers - UN estimates suggest up to 75% of Zimbabweans need food aid,
while unemployment is put at more than 90% - they and their ilk have
become very wealthy. Despite EU sanctions against Zimbabwe being in
place since 2002, and extended this year, Mrs Mujuru has been accused
of trying to fund a multi-million gold deal in Europe, the BBC has
uncovered. She was involved in a planned deal to sell almost four
tonnes of Congolese gold to a company called Firstar.
Mrs Mujuru is one of more than 200 senior officials linked to President
Robert Mugabe who remains subject to a travel ban and an asset freeze
in the European Union in spite of the creation of a power-sharing
government with the opposition earlier this month. They are accused of
undermining democracy, human rights and the rule of law. The proposed
gold deal focused on Mrs Mujuru's daughter, Nyasha del Campo, a
commodities trader based in Spain. Firstar says that although the
offer, made in November 2008, to sell 3.7 tonnes of gold came from
Nyasha Del Campo, it was the Zimbabwean vice-president who was central
to the deal. Felix Eimer, who works for Firstar and is based in
Frankfurt, told the BBC: "She promised us that in order to complete
this transaction, her mum would pay the total amount necessary to
transport gold from Nairobi to Zurich. "This is equivalent to 150,000
to 200,000 euros (£130,000-£175,000). The person behind the deal and
the person that organised the funding for the deal was her mother."
The BBC has seen copies of e-mails indicating that Mrs Mujuru was also
paying the legal costs. Firstar says it pulled out when it realised who
Mrs Mujuru was. It also placed the mother and daughter on its own black
list, deciding it did not want to do business with them. The
certificate of origin of the gold states that it comes from the
Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The Zimbabwean vice-president has
been unavailable for comment. Her daughter in Madrid says she is
consulting her lawyers. While the sanctions were not breached in this
instance, it does suggest that those at the top of Zanu PF are trying
to use others, including relatives, to get around them. Mrs Mujuru's
husband Solomon was head of the army after independence in 1980 and is
believed to retain some influence within the military. The couple have
extensive business interests in Zimbabwe and beyond. "Within the DRC
there are huge mining exploits which are being made by Solomon Mujuru
and Joyce Mujuru," says John Makumbe, associate professor of politics
at the University of Zimbabwe. For a select few, the economic decline
in Zimbabwe has helped them to become very wealthy. "If you were to
visit some of our upmarket residential areas you would think you'd
landed in Beverly Hills. There are some magnificent properties," says
John Robertson, an economic analyst in Harare. Privileged access to
hard currency from Zimbabwe's central bank at unusually favourable
rates is the key to much of this conspicuous consumption.
"Gideon Gono, the reserve bank governor, is Father Christmas," says Mr
Makumbe. "The revenue that comes into the Zimbabwe government is kept
at the central bank, and he dishes it out willy-nilly to individuals
within the party, to Mugabe and his family without any accountability
whatsoever." Mr Gono is referred to as 'Mr Inflation'. He has presided
over a policy of printing ever more worthless Zimbabwe dollars in order
to keep pace with rising prices. The new finance minister, Tendai Biti
of the long-time opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), has
described the central bank as "totally discredited" and "at the core of
economic decay." Sanctions, first imposed by the EU, the United States
and others in 2002, have been condemned by President Mugabe and his
supporters as being at the root of the country's problems. There are
now 203 individuals and 40 companies banned from travelling to the EU's
27 member states and doing business there. "The problem we have had is
a problem created by a former colonial power wanting to continue to
interfere in our domestic affairs," said Mr Mugabe last September, when
signing the power-sharing accord with the MDC.
But critics of the sanctions say they have been too narrow and poorly
enforced. "These sanctions are just not worth the paper they're written
on," according to Norman Lamb, an opposition Liberal Democrat Member of
Parliament in Britain. "We [in Britain] stand charged of complicity and
of failing to take any effective action to bring to an end a despicable
regime which has caused such horror for its population." The Foreign
Office minister, Mark Malloch-Brown, rejects the criticism, saying they
contributed to forging a hard-fought power-sharing deal. He says of the
sanctions: "They have been pinching a nerve, I think they have
contributed very significantly to him [President Mugabe] feeling he had
to do a deal with [MDC leader] Morgan Tsvangirai." Despite calls from
several African countries for the measures to be removed, he says they
will remain in place until Mr Mugabe and those around him show they are
truly committed to implementing the deal with the opposition.
Source:Ocnus.net 2009
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