Joseph Cotterill
@jsphctrl
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Emerging Markets correspondent @FinancialTimes . This is a lot like being the Everything correspondent @FinancialTimes .
London, England
Joined August 2009
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When you realise that Palpatine’s return probably also means Vader’s/Anakin’s Force ghost will appear.
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Zimbabwean journalist Hopewell Chin’ono
@daddyhope
, who recently exposed corruption at the highest levels, says that police are at his home and harassing workers this morning. An alarming sign for press freedom under Mnangagwa.
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I had a sinking feeling all day that South Africa would once again be punished with extreme prejudice for its early surveillance of variants. It looks like that’s about to happen.
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Thanks for the mention in your speech,
@CFKArgentina
. But I fear that the bond's price is going up the less time you have left in office.
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A quick response to some reaction:
You cannot order investors to come to Zimbabwe. They're not bringing tribute. They need to see not just a return, but that they could get *any* of their money back, not be detained, so on. Out of control security forces are a huge red flag.
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On Wednesday I had a soldier raise his AK at me and threaten to shoot, on Friday a riot policeman move to shove me with his shield. In sum I’m sensing you’d be absolutely fucking crazy to come and invest here. It’s just a hunch.
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Made it from Joburg to Dublin via Zurich, no red list, my South African vaccine card being accepted all the way including into this pub. Here’s to Ireland, South Africa, and outwitting the irrational rules of a common former colonial master. Sláinte!
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This is the kind of letter I'd frame in my office to remind me why the FT doesn't ever do "a quiet word."
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I'm not saying South Africans are in a bad place nationally or anything, but it's barely an hour since the IMF loan was announced and many have already given it up as good as looted. ✊😳
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Glorious resignation paragraph from one of Zimbabwe’s vice presidents, who is clearly taking the thesaurus down with him.
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Mnangagwa’s Zimbabwe has picked lots of fights this year. This time it has essentially declared the Catholic Church an enemy by accusing it of planning genocide(??) after bishops criticised corruption and human rights abuses.
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There is a school of thought that Mnangagwa will have to remove Chiwenga in order to revive the international re-engagement strategy. It’s probably true.
There is just one small flaw - Chiwenga appears to have informal control of Mnangagwa’s own presidential guard.
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The UK red list is dead, again, after two weeks of misery. The damage - to finances (£2,285, for what?), lives, livelihoods, the UK’s international reputation, willingness by countries to disclose variants - will linger longer. Was it worth it?
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Much laughter on South African talk radio about the UK passport colour change thing, if you want to know how it makes us look as a nation.
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Jacob Zuma has looked into the Russia-Ukraine war and decided that it is about Jacob Zuma.
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There is no large scale killing of farmers, the current debate in South Africa on land expropriation without compensation (it hasn’t happened) is deeply complex, and the far-right tends to push this bile about SA when it’s bored of shit-stirring elsewhere.
I have asked Secretary of State
@SecPompeo
to closely study the South Africa land and farm seizures and expropriations and the large scale killing of farmers. “South African Government is now seizing land from white farmers.”
@TuckerCarlson
@FoxNews
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On the arrest of Hopewell Chin’ono, who exposed systemic corruption in Mnangagwa’s Zimbabwe, and whose crime appears to have been asking other citizens to speak up about it.
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“One of the reasons why there is this animosity towards renewables is that I think it’s very difficult to steal sun and wind,” Eskom’s CEO told the FT a few weeks ago. As he quits, that animosity - and the looting - may now win out in SA’s energy crisis.
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Here is an interesting case study of why South Africa's state is struggling to overcome the energy crisis around Eskom, and in particular, to procure new energy *even from fossil fuels* - not just renewables. Based on the reasons for a regulatory decision published today. 1/
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I've just spoken to
@BitiTendai
after Zimbabwean police arrested him this afternoon at the MDC's headquarters in Harare. He is at the police station with other arrested MDC figures. They have not been charged yet. "They want to destroy the MDC," he said.
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“Bankers are in discussions with Musk to replace about $3bn of expensive unsecured debt that has an interest rate of 11.75 per cent, with margin loans, backed by Musk’s stake in Tesla, according to two people close to the matter.” What.
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Cyril Ramaphosa must be thrilled that on the day of his big ANC speech, international coverage of SA is all about the attempted cyanide-laced coffee assassination of the Eskom CEO who had earlier been publicly hung out to dry by his government. Can’t buy that kind of PR.
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If the country (or countries) whose four nationals arrived in Botswana on a diplomatic mission from November 7th were to come forward, it might help to shed light on the variant’s history and be a huge act of international service.
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The last time Labour won, the army didn’t shoot six people dead in the street, Conservative supporters weren’t beaten up, riot police didn’t threaten journalists, and we didn’t have to wonder who gave orders.
I’m amazed at the parochialism of Zimbabwe’s elites sometimes.
Imagine Zimbabwe issuing a statement after UK elections won by Labour that they should accommodate the Conservatives. 👇🏿🚶🏿🚶🏿🚶🏿🚶🏿
Statement on the Zimbabwean elections
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I watched the presidential guard whip, beat and shoot at unarmed civilians. It’s not about me. If investment is going to enrich an army that does that and acts like it owns Zimbabwe, and already has its pick of assets from diamonds to farms, that will be a very big problem.
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Uganda’s government is ordering 18m Oxford/AZN Serum doses at $7 per dose, not counting transport costs. That is a lot more than what rich countries are paying and more than South Africa’s roughly $5 per dose for its delivery this week. 1/2
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On Tuesday, the FT asked Pravin Gordhan: Will we ever see Stage 6 again in South Africa?
The answer: “unlikely.”
Friday:
#LoadsheddingUpdate
Friday, 24 November 2023:
It is with great regret that due to the shortage of generating capacity and emergency reserves, Stage 6 loadshedding will be implemented from 12:00 today until 05:00 on Monday.
Eskom will publish a further communication today and
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Yesterday a Bulawayo resident showed me sjambok wounds he received after soldiers beat him without explanation (he said they also stole his phone). Unusually, he did go to the police, who told him they wouldn't touch a case involving soldiers.
I was appalled by today's
@SkyNews
report. That is not the Zimbabwean way. I have instructed that the individuals behind this be arrested and encourage all those impacted to contact the authorities and file an official complaint
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A purged former finance minister - and ruling party politician - secured editorial control of a newspaper in the country's capital today.
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The UK has included the Gupta brothers and Salim Essa among 22 people to be targeted with asset freezes and travel bans under its anti-corruption sanctions regime. This is years after US sanctions on the family at the heart of South Africa’s state capture saga.
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I’m on the highway from Joburg to Durban and already you can see signs of South Africa’s mounting post-unrest military deployment. These armoured vehicles were just leaving Gauteng, heading south.
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International Bar Association: "The rule of law must be paramount. Yet, at every turn, it is being flouted in Zimbabwe... the antics deployed to intimidate Ms Mtetwa from defending her client are absurd and have no place in a modern country with a self-assured leadership."
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There is something very off about how some top South African officials are (not) responding to this unrest. The minister of police has also vanished from the media.
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Zimbabwe. Where the health minister gets fired weeks *after* being detained over an alleged Covid-19 supply scam. But it is a vindication for
@daddyhope
and activists who fought to expose corruption.
President
@edmnangagwa
sacks Health Minister Obadiah Moyo for “conduct inappropriate for a Government minister”.
Moyo is currently facing charges of abuse of office related to procurement fraud
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FT colleagues in London got mini-bottles of Moet to celebrate our one-millionth paying reader. Those of us in distant lands get £5 to put through expenses. Well the joke's on them. In rand terms, that's like 23 Negronis.
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You really picked the wrong foreign journalist to gaslight about Zimbabwe’s military being “well trained and disciplined”.
@jsphctrl
Can you please report to the Police any one who was detained, because you may be misled by those who are in the business of peddling lies. Zimbabwe military are well trained & disciplined, hence you're safe here. No terrorist threats here.
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Extremely concerning reports tonight that the Zimbabwean government is escalating its assault on journalists ahead of planned protests.
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It may be only a few hours ahead at the rate things are going, but I think I will always be astonished that South Africa, given all its challenges as a country, moved to a lockdown before the UK did.
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It’s raining so hard in Joburg that sailing from here to Texas might actually be a viable prospect at this rate.
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Since this went up, Suzako, the Cape Town-based fuels provider that received millions of dollars from Sotic as a middleman on Zimbabwean commodity trades, seems to have shut more of its website (including details of its executives). 👀
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Zimbabwe's
@edmnangagwa
accuses western countries of being "the ones sponsoring the violence." If you had somehow kept believing his rhetoric about international re-engagement until now - you can stop.
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South Africa’s main opposition party loses one of its best MPs, who most recently was spearheading getting global tech titans to appear before South African lawmakers, and who exposed Bell Pottinger back in the day. Sad sign of the state of SA opposition politics.
I have today tendered my resignation as a DA MP. Thank you so much, South Africa ❤️🇿🇦
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Times I’ve been in Paris and a soldier has raised an AK47 and threatened to shoot me: 0
Times in Harare: 1
Of all the foreign journalists you could have chosen to be easier targets to gaslight over this… and you picked me. They should dock your varakashi pay. Poor effort.
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To the Americans just tuning in, Eurovision voting is basically a mechanism for mediating post-Soviet tensions
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Interesting little South African detail in the US sanctions listing for Kuda Tagwirei.
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On the anniversary of Kristallnacht no less. For South Africa’s main opposition party to cheapen the memory of Nazi persecution like this does show how far into the political wilderness it has gone.
The Nazi’s had the brown shirts that went around terrorising minorities. South Africa has the red shirts.
#BrackenfellHigh
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Can this be real? Mnangagwa says "everyone in Zimbabwe has the right to express themselves freely" - a somewhat baffling statement in the midst of an internet blackout (providing cover for a violent crackdown) that will impede Zimbabweans at home from actually reading it.
We are one nation, with one mission, and we will realise it together. My thoughts on the current situation:
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While reporting in Mbare just now (ironically on soldiers forcing away vendors yesterday) I saw several army trucks and lorries of city workers. Traders said they were making people tear down stalls. Tense situation, not safe for me to stay, but it’s a large operation.
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When an Eskom power station burns not just coal, but also financial documents before the auditors can get to them. A snapshot of corruption and impunity in South Africa's state power monopoly, from annual financial statements which are finally out.
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Even in Southern Africa, all good things must come to an end, and after seven years, I'm moving on as the FT's correspondent. Thanks to everyone who has made it so great; I hope I did the region justice. Why not apply for what is clearly the FT's best job?
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“Cipla, a major manufacturer of generic medicine, had its factory in Durban burnt down.” Another sign that - whether it was criminal syndicates, political insurgents or both - there was targeting of major infrastructure. This is an unusual target to loot.
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The premier railed against foreign interference by western governments in elections widely expected to rubber-stamp her hold on power.
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Robert Mugabe, a hero turned despot who presided over the ruin of one of Africa's most promising nations, has died aged 95.
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The English People's Congress promised a firm line over a power-sharing deal with northern separatists today.
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Yeah… on the left is Lindiwe Sisulu’s latest op-ed. On the right is a 2013 speech by the former UK attorney general. Maybe it’s positivism. Maybe it’s another P-word.
Lmao not Joseph Raz being quoted in an IOL opinion piece. The scream that I have just scrumt! 😂🤣
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Firstly, that sure is a lot of catering. Secondly, this statement will matter a lot to African debates on the ultimate responsibility for Wagner's activities on the continent, both military and (further afield) political/influencing.
Putin says Wagner was entirely financed by the Russian state through the MOD and the state budget.
From May 2022 to May 2023, the state paid Wagner 86 billion rubles and Prigozhin's catering company earned a further 80 billion, Putin says.
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Why is South Africa’s transport minister issuing a statement by a private family in the middle of a national crisis?
The Gcaba Brothers & Family refute and reject all allegations that they are in any way involved in the current acts of anarchy that are happening in the country.
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"This wasn't a social occasion, it was staff having a drink after meetings"
Deputy PM Dominic Raab defends a new photo showing the PM and colleagues having a gathering in the No 10 garden during lockdown.
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Ramaphosa's presidency has been so behind on communication in this crisis it's not even funny.
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A very happy birthday to Sihle Mpofu of Nkayi, Zimbabwe, who is 134 years old today - and whose inclusion on the voters' roll is not at all a worrying sign for the propriety of the first post-Mugabe election this month. (From this report: )
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Sunak’s letter is very ‘EM finance minister’ in that it’s all ‘I regret we differ on these structural reforms’ after the president was caught smuggling the FX reserves on a private jet or something.
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Hopewell's release on bail today - with Jacob Ngarivhume also released earlier - appears to have come not a moment too soon given worries about his health. The damage has been done to the Mnangagwa government's international reputation over his arrest in the first place.
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South African MPs vote 275 to 40 (one abstained, which entails 84 were not present) for an inquiry into the public protector's fitness to hold office. Of 230 ANC MPs, 168 voted - both a sign Ramaphosa has a lot of support but also how big a disaffected ANC minority seems to be.
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Tonight South Africa will have its first night since March 2020 without some kind of curfew. Curfew (which was midnight to 4am in its latest iteration) is gone with immediate effect after all indicators are that SA has passed the peak of the fourth wave, the government said.
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If there’s one thing that unites what I’ve seen in Durban this week - from industrial clusters to townships and shack settlements - it’s the absent state, whether for security or social protection. And it’s a lot harder to fix than debating what is and what isn’t an insurrection.
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Abroad, Zimbabwe's government has been begging for money and for "mistakes" including systemic corruption to be excused. At home, this is how it responds to yet another - but especially grim - unexplained political abduction.
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A liberal opponent of the premier within the ruling party stepped down as a legislator. He will retain editorial control of a mouthpiece.
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When you start reading this by
@tomburgis
- on the dead men piling up around the African mining empire of ENRC - you won't be able to stop.
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Mapobane to Pretoria is about 40km. Four hours. Another illustration of South African urban inequality. It's also another episode in an ANC election campaign that seems oddly focused on cataloguing its governance failures in lurid detail.
We reached our destination, the President arrived at 06:30 at Mapobane station and arrives at Pretoria station at 10:40.
This again affirms government’s need to clean our SOEs including PRASA for the benefit of all our people.
#GrowSouthAfrica
#ThumaMina
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Sakunda, Trafigura's business partner in Zimbabwe that has been linked to state capture under
@edmnangagwa
, didn't show today at a parliamentary committee under
@BitiTendai
that is examining alleged improper state payouts to the company. Fancy that!
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That screaming you hear is a Times picture editor being taken to the Tower
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“You’ll die if you ask a soldier his name.”
“Everywhere they are spying.”
“They took the barber at 7pm last night. No one’s heard from him. If you go and ask at the police station, you’re the next victim.”
- Voices from Harare’s high-density suburbs today.
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There were calls to charge the finance minister, a moderate, with treason, and come on guys you’re making this thread too easy
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The ANC does not appear to know that De Ruyter was reporting Eskom corruption to authorities. He said in the interview that he was sharing “chapter and verse” with police and SSA, and with ministers and presidential officials. “Which, by the way, I'm obliged by law to do.”
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Misinformation being pumped out by officials close to Mnangagwa is extraordinary. I was there downtown as the soldiers were giving out the order.
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Chamisa presser now about to convene. Police have gone along with their water-cannon truck, leaving big questions about who gave the order to send them.
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The Trips waiver was a huge uphill battle for South Africa and India when they started their push - you just have to go back and look at transcripts of debates on it at the WTO. This is quite a moment.
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Granting 'Senior Conservative Source' anonymity just to confirm the party leader won't turn up to an interview is maybe also an illustration of what's wrong with political accountability in the UK. That's a spokesperson's job.
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Mnangagwa will not be going to Davos - underlines his growing isolation on the world stage. No mention of the crackdown as a factor, rather “in light of the economic situation”.
In light of the economic situation, I will be returning home after a highly productive week of bilateral trade and investment meetings. We will be ably represented in Davos by Minister of Finance, Mthuli Ncube. The first priority is to get Zimbabwe calm, stable and working again.
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South Africa has mostly reacted with calm and diligence to Covid-19, but one opposition party is calling for patients to be consigned to the old apartheid prison, Robben Island. Something that will probably only spread fear and stigma, not help genuine testing and quarantine.
EFF Calls for All Coronavirus Infected Persons to be State Quarantined.
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With the grim news, quite an ironic day for the party of Nelson Mandela to have been in Moscow and endorsing this United Russia freakshow.
Today the ANC delegation, led by the Secretary-General, Comrade Fikile Mbalula and the SACP participated in day 2 of The Forum Of Supporters Of The Struggle Against Modern Day Practices Of Neocolonialism “For The Freedom Of Nations”, which is taking place in Moscow, Russia. The
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For years, Zimbabweans have wondered about the 'Queen Bee' perceived to have captured the state and key assets. Here's a look inside the hive, including offshore and in particular South African companies that have channelled millions of dollars.
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Also hello to new followers from Argentina - you might enjoy these 79 posts on the pari passu saga!
http://t.co/RR5S1ceKl3
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A chilling moment even in the depths where Zimbabwe currently finds itself. Mtetwa is one of the country's most formidable lawyers and human rights defenders.
Magistrate Nduna removes & bans Beatrice Mtetwa from representing freelance journalist Hopewell Chin'ono & has ordered that Prosecutor General institute contempt of court proceedings against her & for
@lawsocietyofzim
to be provided with copy of his judgement
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Zimbabwe’s government is very clearly rattled by the international attention to Hopewell’s case if they’re trying to defend themselves like this while he’s still in jail. Usually they let their pet courts do the talking and the obfuscation.
Hon, Monica Mutsvangwa: "Government would like to set the record straight, Hopewell Chin'ono was not abducted but lawfully arrested."
#OpenParlyZw
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The FT has reconstructed the Lady R’s journey, including Spire Global data that shows no signals from the vessel’s transponder over the critical dates of its Cape Town mooring - implying it switched off the device that allowed tracking of its position.
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I’ve seen soldiers including presidential guard unit moving into position outside the election result centre, situation deteriorating in Harare fast
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The transcript of the FT's interview with Trump, as you sort have to read it to believe it.
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The Botswana government’s response to alleged abuse by police during its pandemic measures is markedly different to how South Africa has handled it.
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Some of the more obvious Zimbabwean varakashi Twitter accounts seem to have suddenly disappeared. What’s up?
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Hopewell Chin'ono has been consigned to weeks more in jail, well beyond the planned 31 July anti-corruption protest that has the Mnangagwa government so rattled. An even more foreboding picture for the future of freedom of expression in Zimbabwe.
Hopewell Chin’ono has been denied bail and remanded in custody until 7 August by Magistrate Ngoni Nduna on the basis that he is a danger to the public because he has not yet completed his mission of inciting people to demonstrate on
#31July
. We will be appealing.
#FreeHopewell
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As South Africa enters Stage 6 power cuts, the minister responsible for Eskom is currently showing slides of the petrol-bombing of the homes and cars of power station staff, and of coal being dumped on the roads to plants during unprotected strikes. Wild times in SA.
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Some of the less able South African ministers in this crisis are trying to hide it with talking tough and insults, as here. It’s not a good international look for Ramaphosa’s government, which risks fumbling this lockdown on key things like transport provision for the poorest.
So cute, you are upset because the most upsetting thing said to you today is that you can’t walk your dog or jog.
Sembi !
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Everyone who believed the ‘Zimbabwe is open for business’ slick PR - well, it seems open for bootlicking at least. (And if this is how they treat locals who returned to invest, what security is there for international investors?)
If Trevor Ncube continues with his thoughtless rants against licensing authorities, gvt will be forced to instruct all its departments, parastatals & associated companies to stop adverts & subscribing AMH products. You are just Trevor Ncube not Clever Ncube.
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What South Africa's ‘active non-alignment’ policy lacks in coherence, it makes up in comic timing.
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