Monday 22 August 2016

Prophet Magaya’s Rape Accusation: Exposing the arrogance of patriarchy and religion

By LeninTinashe Chisaira

“I’m not going to censor myself to comfort your ignorance”-Jon Stewart

Prophet Magaya (centre) at Court. [The Standard]
Prophet Walter Magaya of the Prophetic Healing and Deliverance (PHD) Ministries was arrested on Friday 19 August 2016 and charged with rape. He allegedly lured and raped a female university student-cum-congregant at a Mount Pleasant house in July 2015. What has followed the prophet’s arrest has been speculation from his die-hard fanatics that the arrest was politically motivated and was stage-managed with the complicit of the rape complainant.

The politics was alluded to with the consideration that various religious leaders have been speaking out against the worsening economic injustices and authoritarianism under the current Zimbabwe government.

However, some circles have been pointing out that the law must be allowed to take its course. I am in full agreement with the later. In as much as every person has the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, the rape complainant likewise has the right to speak out and seek justice without being labelled a “whore” , “prostitute” or “conspirator”.

Acceptable Rape

The problem with the Zimbabwean society is that it remains rooted in some of the worst forms of patriarchy. It is patriarchal practice that promotes the myths that when a woman accepts an invite to a man’s house, she must have herself to blame when she is raped. That mentality is animalistic. In fact, to say so is an insult to the animal kingdom. A woman has the right to say no, and that is a right that must be defended. Civilised society should never classify certain forms of rape and sexual assault to be permissible or acceptable. In this case, the question of whether the young women having conceded to be alone with the prophet at the house (as is alleged) should have foreseen that she would be sexually assaulted, is not relevant.

Complainants have rights

Rape victims and complainants, in the present incident and anywhere, deserve to be protected by society. This is especially the case when they are standing up to so-called powerful members of the society. People like the lady complainant have the potential to break the silence and build the confidence of other young women and men who occasionally find themselves in similar circumstances.

The young woman is no villain. Even if the accusation is later found to have been politically motivated, that still doesn’t make the rape complainant a villain. That can only strengthen the voice against making young women objects of either settling political scores or sexual pawns at the hands of patriarchal elements or religious rivals.

It is also highly undesirable for religious fanatics to continue exalting an accused person. The Saturday scenes at the Harare Magistrates (Rotten Row) Court with women kneeling and singing gospel songs in support of the accused Prophet Walter Magaya, was really unsettling. It is acts such as these that continue to fuel patriarchal crimes and to scare other young victims into submission. It doesn’t help that the Minister of Women Affairs herself reportedly gave the prophet a standing ovation in solidarity after the arrest.

On top of that, the prophet has paraded women congregants (including the complainant) to ‘confess’ during a church service that they were paid to nail him. That reminds one of the scene in George Orwell’s Animal Farm where animals ‘voluntarily’ confessed to anti-animalism behaviour. The animals in the story were sadly not saved by the confessions. Rather they were immediately carried to the slaughter by NapolĂ©on’s dogs.

The law must take its course

Society and fellow congregants of both the complainant and the prophet ought to give the courts room to assess and evaluate evidence. Prophet Water Magaya and his followers are entitled to the presumption of innocence under our laws. Every accused person is presumed to be innocent until proven guilty.

Of equal importance is societal and congregants’ duty to respect the right of rape victims to seek justice without being roasted in the fires of the courts of public opinion. Religious fanatics and nightclub lawyers need to act and comment with caution and respect until the matter is resolved.

[Lenin Tinashe Chisaira is an activist and lawyer based in Harare. He writes on issues of economic justice, politics, human rights and the environment at www.cdetinashe.blogspot.com and tweets at @LeninChisaira]


Friday 12 August 2016

Responsible Investment in the Natural Resources Sector: An analytical profile of the mining sector in Zimbabwe


Download from Academia
The call for responsible investments has been rising slowly in the past four years in Zimbabwe. A number of initiatives have been placed and more need to be placed in order to respond to rising corporate failures and poor corporate governance practices by shareholders and investors especially those in the natural resources sector. Some mining companies in Zimbabwe have been accused of unsustainable business practices that ignore community rights and environmental impacts. Above all, the investment environment in Zimbabwe has largely characterised by lack of shareholder activism, unsustainable business values, poor corporate governance and corruption. In an ideal setting, investors must use their collective position to drive sustainable business values in the companies they invest in. 

This paper explores the fundamental concept of responsible investments, gives a contextual analysis of investment practices in the natural resources sector while exploring opportunities for driving sustainable and responsible investing in Zimbabwe. 

The natural resources and extractive sector remains one of the major fiscal contributors, although it is associated with high social, economic, political and environmental impacts. In early 2016, the President of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe exposed that amounts going up to US$15 billion have been externalized by diamond mining companies operating in the Marange area. This is highly significant in a country whose annual budget is a mere US$4 billion.

A nation that places people's needs as a priority above private profits should particularly ensure that investments and business decisions are done after thorough assessments of human rights and environmental justice.

However, political inconsistences and doubtful capacities on the part of the Zimbabwean government agencies and authorities have characterised the response to investment in the country. Zimbabwe's legal, policy and political environment has been characterised by glaring inconsistences and political whims. Much study is needed to constantly re-look at the impacts of the legal, policy and political environment on investments in the country.
The existing laws contain some important provisions that should guide responsible investments, however lack of capacity and sometimes lack of political will has hindered progress towards responsible investment. To determine whether responsible investment is effectively catered for and enforced, the existing legal and policy framework on investment needs to be reviewed. The review will further be aimed at ensuring that future investment initiatives result in considerable gains and benefits for the majority of the people surviving in the current set-up of an economy that has been branded as an enclave economy.


PLEASE NOTE: This is the introduction to the research paper. Download the fulldocument free of charge here. You can also get hard copies from the Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association (ZELA). Email: tinashe@zela.org Website: www.zela.org . Call/Whatsapp: +263 775678928 

Download from Academia
[Rodney Ndamba is the Executive Director of the Institute for Sustainability Africa. Lenin Tinashe Chisaira is an environmental lawyer and researcher and tweets at @LeninChisaira]







Monday 8 August 2016

A Heroes’ Day review of Dzino: Memories of a Freedom Fighter.

By Lenin Tinashe Chisaira

Zimbabwe commemorates its Heroes Day in August each year. The 2016 commemoration comes at a time when the political relations between the state, citizens and most interestingly the war veterans  are not cordial. In that regard, a review of one of the latest and most informative memoirs about the liberation struggle, Wilfred Mhanda’s Dzino: Memories of a Freedom Fighter[1] seems in order. The author, Wilfred Mhanda’s[2] nom de guerre was Dzinashe Machingura hence the nickname Dzino in the title of the memoirs. Dzino was one of the fiercest critics of the post-war Zimbabwean state for which he spent his youthful days fighting for.

Dzinashe Machingura is undoubtedly one of the most distinguished yet disinherited freedom fighters to come out of Zimbabwe. He contributed to the success of Zimbabwe’s liberation war at a time when allies of the Zimbabwean struggle such as  “(President Samora) Machel …lamented the Zimbabwean nationalist leadership, which he did not consider equally committed to a long and difficult fight to liberate the country.”(p. 94).

It was also a time when military commanders in the Zimbabwe National Liberation Army (ZANLA) like General Josiah Magama Tongogara were in incarceration in Zambia following President Kenneth Kaunda's clampdown on the ZANLA High Command in the aftermath of the assassination of Herbert Chitepo, Zimbabwe’s first lawyer and then chairperson of the revolutionary Dare reChimurenga (p62-66).

In those troubled times, Dzinashe Machingura reveals how he and other commanders on the ground formed the ZIPA on 25 November 1975 to carry on the armed struggle .The army was a merger between ZANLA and the Zimbabwe People’s revolutionary Army (ZIPRA). The Military Committee of ZIPA included Solomon “Rex Nhongo” Mujuru , Dzinashe Machingura, Elias Hondo, James Nyikadzinashe, Saul Sadza, Parker Chipoera, Webster Gwauya and Tendai Pfepferere from the ZANLA side. The ZIPRA contribution consisted of Nikita Mangena, John Dube, Enoch Tschangane, current Vice President  Phelekezela “Report” Mphoko, Ambrose Mutinhiri, David Moyana and Dr Augustus Mudzingwa (p. 96-97). ZIPA was the entity that was to open military fronts and to resuscitate the liberation war in earnest (p. 100-107). However its role in history seems to have been officially blacklisted.

 Dzino’ memoirs honestly admit the crucial role of the  Marxist/socialist ideology in being  the lifeblood of the Zimbabwean liberation  struggle. This ideology was sin instilled in the freedom fighter from the training stage. Dzino indicates that “At the end of the formal training programme, before proceeding to the transit camp in Kongwa in the Dodoma region, most of our time was spent on productive activity and on extra political lessons. A voluntary group of about eight, headed by Dick Moyo, was formed to study the basic tenets of Marxism-Leninism. I was part of that study group.”(p. 24). In that regard, the current neo-liberal cum nationalist capitalism models the nation finds itself in is the mere result of a struggle betrayed and a very Zimbabwean model of state capture.

The revolution devours its children


French royalist journalist Jacques Mallet du Pan’s[3] adage that “the revolution devours its children” is well known and well documented and has already been proved to be true in most revolutions that have occurred around the world through the history of humanity. Of particular interest are the French Revolution with its Reign of Terror[4] and the Russian Revolution with the Stalinist Purges[5]. For Africa, Chinua Achebe[6] creatively narrates about that kind of dog eat dog politics in post-revolutionary Africa in his novel, Anthills of the Savannah[7].

The book under review , Dzino, exposes the origins of persecution that took place in the liberation struggle. These were the  roots to most of the problems that face Zimbabwean politics in the present times. These political problems include the politics of using disciplinary hearings to settle political/personal scores  as well as to boot out dissent even from former comrades in arms.

Wilfred "Dzinashe Machingura" Mhanda aka Dzino
With independence getting nearer again,  Dzino and other were suspected of harbouring political ambitions using ZIPA and they were lured into an underground prison in Maputo (p. 186-193). President Robert Mugabe , in July 2016 confirmed the incident whilst issuing warning against the dissenting leadership of the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association (ZNLWVA). He warned that  “During the war, we would punish defectors severely . . . we kept them underground like rats, in bunkers”[8], highlighting the truth in Dzino’s memoirs.

A history distorted


The book, most importantly, serves to provide an additional picture to those that have been presented  by the other few Second Chimurenga historians like David Martin and Phyllis Johnson, whom Dzino himself accuses of being biased towards President Mugabe in their book, The Struggle for Zimbabwe[9].

 Dzino: Memories of a Freedom Fighter also exposes the often told lie that freedom fighters fought for the struggle selflessly and without payment. The selflessness has already been  demystified by war vets’ self-centred demands of the late 1990s and at the 2016 War Vets Meet Patron indaba. In the book, Dzino writes of freedom fighters receiving a weekly stipend, in  addition to cigarettes  (p. 28)

The only blight in Dzino’s book is the last third of the book, written as “Reflections on Post-Independence Zimbabwe” and the conclusion. This section is so different from the tone of the early ideologically coherent parts that is appears as if it was inserted by someone else. The section goes into overdrive to reflect ordinary Zimbabwean civil society’s neo-liberalism. These include attacks on the Fast Track Land Reform Programme (p. 228). However it is up to each reader’s perspective to interpret the book.

Every person must read Dzino: Memories of a Freedom Fighter


In conclusion, every person interested in Zimbabwean politics and liberation must read Dzino: Memories of a Freedom Fighter. It has been said that socialists are the memory bank of the revolution, because they read and know how to pursue revolutionary actions backed by revolutionary theory and vice versa. In the same vein, activists  and politicians on Zimbabwe should , as the nation makes reflections on its  Heroes’ Day, make a habit of learning from the works that touch on Zimbabwe’s past as this  possibly shapes the future political and economic structure of the country. In addition to books like Martin and Johnson’s The Struggle in Zimbabwe, Maurice Nyagumbo’s With the People, Didymus Mutasa’s Black Rhodesian Behind Bars, Ian Smith’s The Great Betrayal, Munyaradzi Gwisai’s Revolutionaries , Resistance and Crisis in Zimbabwe, Joshua Nkomo’s The Story of My Life and Edgar Tekere’s A Lifetime of Struggle, people must definitely read Dzino: Memories of a Freedom Fighter.

Lenin Tinashe Chisaira is an activist, socialist, lawyer and writer based in Harare, Zimbabwe. He tweets at @LeninChisairaand blogs at www.cdetinashe.blogspot.com




[1] Published by Weaver Press, Harare, 2011
[2] (b. 1950 - d. 2014)
[3] (b. 1749 – d. 1800)
[4] (6 September 1793 – 28 July 1794
[5] (1936 to 1938)
[6] (b. 1930 - d. 2013)
[7] Published by Heinemann, 1987.
[8] Newsday, “Mugabe in brutal crackdown threat”, 28 July 2016, accessed 8 August 2016 at https://www.newsday.co.zw/2016/07/28/mugabe-brutal-crackdown-threat/
[9] Published by Faber and Faber, London, 1981

Friday 5 August 2016

The scary politics of fighting against someone instead of fighting for an alternative

By Lenin Tinashe Chisaira

Wednesday anti-bond notes and anti-unemployment march (263chat)
Zimbabwe still continues to be every activist’s dreamland by each passing week. People are courageously taking to the streets and they know what they are fighting against: rampant unemployment, some undemocratic leaders and some corrupt politicians.

Sadly, when trying to fix the economy and the politics, it is not enough to say the struggle being waged is a mere fight against one or two corrupt leaders or the rampant unemployment of university graduates. What is wholesome is to state the clear nature of the economic and political alternatives being fought for.

In economics, there is growing danger that people will easily fight on behalf of foreign capital for the latter to come and invest. But the same people run the risk of being blind to the ordinary worldwide investor tradition. That is a tradition of wage slavery, exploitation of labour and abuse of environmental rights. No group has come out fighting for an alternative employment culture that will be buttressed by workers’ empowerment, just labour practices and full workers’ democracy in the workplace.

Likewise, the struggle against authoritarian rule and human rights violations must be complemented by the fight for a clear political alternative. The struggle must clarify what kind of democracy is being fought for. Is it the same old bourgeoisie democracy or its social democracy or its wholesome socialist democracy? Ignoring these terms as academic or abstract norms can be another recipe for confusion.

Most messaging in opposition politics and protest groups in Zimbabwe and indeed most countries, is heavily obsessed with the “Down with X” and ‘President X Must Go” mantra. Rarely do you find groups knowing exactly what they are fighting for as much as they know who or what they are fighting against.

Protesters and opposition should be about alternatives, mostly ideological to the ruling system. They should be frameworks on economic and political structures to be utilised after victory. Otherwise the struggle will be futile.

In the #FeesMustFall days, South African students did not just fight against fee increase, they fought for Free Education. In Zimbabwe everyone knows ‘who must go’, but sadly the opposition and protest narrative lacks a viable alternative. There is lack of impetus or support for alternative economics. Politics don’t just start and end at institutions of government, but also on the economic drawing table.

Worthwhile struggles and allies


The only worthwhile struggle in the political environment is one where people are conscious of the way the economic, political and social structure will be organised after the so called ‘revolution ‘or revolt. Otherwise there is grave danger that such struggle effort will either wane with time, lead to disastrous consequences or be hijacked by opportunist elements.

In the same vain, it is futile to build alliances for the sake of building them. United fronts should be built on shared visions for the future. Building alliances with anyone and everyone, and yet lacking any tangible shared goal is unfortunately to be expected whenever people are just angry at the visible target but do not know what the struggle seeks to build as an alternative. Will some of these allies be strategic in the building of an alternative economic and political system in the country?

In conclusion, during the early days of independence in the African colonies, there rose a system known as neo-colonialism where the people got voting right and black leaders but the economic superstructure and exploitation remained the same or even got worse. People must be wary of that.

 One can only salute the fearless people who are exercising their democratic rights to protest and to communicate their messages to the government of the day in various creative ways. What is unsettling is the realisation that such efforts can easily be in vain if people don’t shift from merely fighting against someone and become consciousness of the alternative Zimbabwe they are fighting for. Aluta.

[Lenin Tinashe Chisaira is a lawyer, activist and former student leader based in Harare. He tweets at @LeninChisaira and blogs at www.cdetinashe.blogspot.com ]


Monday 1 August 2016

On Relations between Mines and Mining Communities in Zimbabwe (My Radio VOP interview transcript)

Lenin Tinashe Chisaira in the Radio VOP studio
The transcript is from a Radio dialogue focusing on “Relations between Mines and mining communities in Zimbabwe’ broadcast on 19 July 2016. The show features Lenin Tinashe Chisaira, an environmental lawyer and researcher representing the Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association[1]. The interviewer’s name is Tafadzwa Muranganwa from Radio Voice of the People (VOP)[2], an independent radio station. Radio VOP broadcasts via satellite on the channel called ChannelZim.  The radio broadcasts on the internet as well, on www.channelzim.net. The audio of this interview recording can be accessed on these YouTube links [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzTGWG0V1-k  and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JogBxIPyryM ]

Tafadzwa (Radio VOP):       Welcome to the programme, Mr Chisaira. Sorry we delayed a little bit. We were failing to get connected, but now we are on. Thanks you, Mr Tendai [sic] Chisaira for gracing Radio VOP...Radio Voice of the People and we want to discuss the relations between mines and the mining communities. Of late we have had reports...I was reading The Manica Post[3] where there was suspected diamond miners who were nabbed. But we have seen over the years the mining communities who were around Chiadzwa[4] were crying foul that the government gave them a raw deal with the Community Ownership Trust that was launched, it never came to fruition…a whole array of problems they were saying they were facing even when we know that the diamond fields in Marange were so much richer and we suspect this US$15 billion which went missing was from Marange. Welcome to the program, Mr Chisaira.

L. T. Chisaira:     Thanks a lot, Tafadzwa. Well, this is a very interesting discussion especially if we look at our economic status as Zimbabweans. You know it's barely a month since the President of the nation himself faced the nation and informed them that up to $15 billion have been lost[5]. Most of it obviously was a result of illicit financial flows whereby money just leaves the country on channels that are not even known to the people who are responsible for the national budget, the national fiscus, and revenue collection. Some of the money gets lost through what are called transfer mispricing and trade mis-invoicing where they fake these amounts of prices that they would have sold their minerals to their fellow subsidies of the various multinational companies.
So it is a very interesting discussion, the issue of mines and mining communities because if we look at the issue in a very frank manner, basically our economic status, the mining economic environment in Zimbabwe is not divorced from the entire economic strata, from the entire economic system in our society whereby we have big business, we have multinational companies, we have big mining companies that are mostly focused on profit-making at the expense of people and environmental rights. So it is a very really... i don’t think I should say interesting, but it’s a very scary discussion to conduct in that whilst we are conducting this discussion, people are really suffering from environmental injustice, from economic injustice as a result of the faults of these mining companies.
Tafadzwa (Radio VOP):   But Mr Chisaira, there are some allegations from the mining companies' management where they are saying that some of the demands by these mining communities are not justified...where they want their own folk in the mining areas to be employed. And some of them would be saying the people do not have requisite skills so that they can be employed. If you heard from those clips from Marange, some were saying there are not giving them even those jobs that are for the less skilled. What’s your take regarding the management of some of these mining companies who are saying some of the demands are not justified?
L. T. Chisaira: I think that really is a very dishonest accusation coming from mining companies. Because when you see...most of the demands that come from mining communities may be classified mainly under three main demands. One, because we have this issues that we call Local content whereby as civil society, for example my own organisation, the Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association, we really fight, we really campaign for these organisations to respect issues of local content development and this has three main components.

One is that mining companies should have... should adopt a policy of employing locals, which is local employment.
They should also develop a policy of procuring some basic items, you know a mining company has many workers but they can even go as far as buying their basic vegetables from far-away communities instead of the people who are in the immediate locality.
Then there is also the issue of infrastructure development , for example if you are a mining company in rural setting, you also needs to use roads which you use to transport your  minerals, your raw materials , your people etc. etc. So it’s just a matter of saying, if we have Murowa Diamonds in rural Zvishavane which uses a dust road to transport its minerals up to now, I think that’s really unfair. So by developing their own roads, it will also benefit the communities, so I don’t think these are not justifiable demands. Because when a company builds a road, it benefits the company itself as well as the community.
When a company employs locals, it also benefits in terms of maintaining good relations between the company itself and the people whom they would be neighbouring with. And most of these jobs that they demand or ask for from the mining communities. They are really maybe unskilled jobs or those that require very low levels of skills. Indeed when it comes to skilled labour or those that really need very much technical people or highly qualified or highly educated people...yeah the companies there have the liberty to, and I think the right to employ people who are from outside the communities. But for basic jobs, so the most important thing is that these companies should be able to provide records and justifications that shows that for these menial labourers we have taken people from the communities, but for those that require much technical or require much expertise, we have outsourced labour .So I don’t think the demands by mining communities are unreasonable.
Tafadzwa (Radio VOP): I don’t know from our listeners, what you think. You can do so by writing to us on our number 0774 214 539 or you can phone us via our landline number. If you are outside of Harare prefix that number with 04 748 766. If you are in Harare dial the number directly ...748766. But coming to you, Mr Chisaira, that impasse between the mines and the mining communities, I think the policy...the decision makers you know could be a factor in trying to bring that impasse. But what are your observations regarding the policy makers in making sure that there is a cordial relationship between the mines and the mining communities. So far as an organisation what do you make of policy makers in regards to this issue?
L. T. Chisaira: I think that's also in three phases because, first, I think...just in brief, there are some very painful personal stories especially from the communities we work with around Chiadzwa. There is this one lady who lost up to fifty head of cattle after they drank polluted water that had been polluted by these diamond mining companies. On top of that, you see that i itself is an example of an impasse between mines and mining companies.
                      Then when it comes to policy makers, recently[6] we were talking of the Mines and Minerals Amendment Bill which is before parliament. One of the most unfortunate things about that bill, though it has some progressive provisions, the most unfortunate thing is that it doesn’t provide for adequate Free, Prior and Informed Consent whereby a mining company, when they intent to embark on a major project, the community members around that area are supposed to be informed freely, thy should be informed prior to the project takes place and they should be informed so that they don’t just go to meetings and be spoken down to but they also attend those meetings with some basic knowledge about what impacts the mining project will have on their environment, will have on their livelihoods, will have on their families. But that is not being done and the policy makers have not really done a good job with the Mines and Minerals Amendment Act.
Then on the other hand, we also have some policy makers who seem to know that they are doing, who seem to know their jobs very well. For example, recently we had the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee (on Mines and Energy)taking the Permanent Secretary , Prof Gudyanga over the way he was handling the Zimbabwe Consolidated Diamond Mining Company issues[7] which is one of the most touchy issues for people in the diamond mining areas. They seem to be doing their jobs very well. Then also as the Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association as an organisation we provide a platform each year, what we call the Zimbabwe  Alternative Mining Indaba , first we conduct them at provincial stage then at the national stage. The 2016 one will be held in Bulawayo. I’m sure you will be there.
Tafadzwa (Radio VOP): You are inviting me?
L. T. Chisaira: Yeah, we really partner with various radio stations. We have partnered with Ya FM[8], then with Diamond FM[9], when we conducted our provincial ones. But so, that’s another platform where we try to resolve that impasse, where we bring together community members, we bring together legislators, even up to cabinet members, Minsters and the mining companies themselves. We try to provide those platforms so that they engage. But you know very well that Mining companies are not really honest on their engagements with community members. They seem to look down upon them.
Tafadzwa (Radio VOP):     We have one comment from one of our listeners and she says, “Mining companies are unfair to community members.” I don’t think there is anyone…Most people are pointing accusations to the mining companies. But they are some communities where other people there are onto artisanal mining. Some are saying they are not willing to regulate their operations. What do you think about these?
L. T. Chisaira: About artisanal mining?
Tafadzwa (Radio VOP): Artisanal mining.
L. T. Chisaira: Well, artisanal and small scale mining in itself...it’s also a very strategic sector for the Zimbabwean economy. Because as you know, well, due to our economic situation...unemployment, drought, etc. The mining sector, especially artisanal and small scale mining can provide some adequate livelihoods for most of our people especially in the rural areas. But then the problem, like you have rightfully pointed out, the problem is lack of formalisation. It is a sector that has not been adequately formalised, though obviously this Mines and Minerals Act, for the first time provides some very little benefits for artisanal, sorry, for small scale miners but we still have problems with artisanal miners. Because at one time the government , the RBZ[10], they came up and said “We have a No Questions Asked Policy”[11] whereby if someone is an artisanal gold miner , he can approach gold buying centres and sell his gold without questions being asked about the legality of his operations, but still it’s not a clear field. As an organisation and as people we really need to urge the policy makers, the government, etc., to really look into the issue of artisanal miners with the seriousness it deserves.
Tafadzwa (Radio VOP):     The listener went on to say “You will be shocked to know someone from Victoria Falls getting a sweeping job in a mine in Mutare, but the locals can’t”. Listeners if you want to input into this program you can do so by texting us or Whatsapping. Our number is 0774 214 539. 0774 214 539. You can also place a call on our number 748 766. 748 766. If you are outside Harare, you can prefix that number with 04.
                        Thank you, Mr Lenin Tinashe Chisaira for gracing our radio. Time is not on our side. I think you did a wonderful job in trying to make sure some of our listeners get a picture of what’s really happening between mines and mining companies and we have seen that the picture is not looking good. Mines are being accused of failing to develop the mining communities. Thanks you, Mr Chisaira.
L. T. Chisaira:           You are welcome, Tafadzwa. Thanks you for inviting me to Radio VOP.



[3] State-owned newspaper from Manicaland Province
[4] Diamond mining area
[5]The Herald, “Miners robbed us, says President” , accessed at  http://www.herald.co.zw/miners-robbed-us-says-president/
[6] Newsday, “Bill should plug leakages in mining sector: Zela”, accessed at https://www.newsday.co.zw/2016/05/21/bill-plug-leakages-mining-sector-zela/
[7] The Herald, “Parly Grills Gudyanga” , accessed at http://www.herald.co.zw/parly-grills-gudyanga/
[8] Radio station based in Zvishavane, Midlands Province
[9] Radio station based in Mutare, Manicaland Province
[10] Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe
[11]The Herald , “Artisanal miners embrace new RBZ policy” , accessed at http://www.herald.co.zw/artisanal-miners-embrace-new-rbz-policy/