Zimbabwe law on firms' ownership comes into effect

[jetsetter]

Zimbabwe law on firms' ownership comes into effect
Page last updated at 11:01 GMT, Monday, 1 March 2010
A new Zimbabwean law that forces companies to sell a majority stake in their businesses to indigenous people has come into effect.

Firms worth more than $500,000 (£332,000) run by non-indigenous people have five years to sell a 51% stake, upon the threat of jail sentences.

Harare-based economist John Robertson told the BBC's Network Africa programme that it was "a very bad idea".

He said it would only deter further badly-needed foreign investment.

"The government appears to have no wish at all to make the country attractive to the [overseas] investors," said Mr Robertson.

Government split

The new rule - dubbed the indigenisation law - is seen as an extension of the government's seizure of white-owned farms, which started approximately 10 years ago.

That controversial programme was widely considered a failure, as many of the seized farms have remained dormant.

This resulted in Zimbabwe - once known as the bread basket of Africa - having to become a net importer of food, sparking hyper inflation.

The law on company ownership has further divided Zimbabwe's already strained unity government.

President Robert Mugabe has repeatedly defended the law, saying that firms would be "foolish" not to comply.

By contrast, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, has rejected the law, saying it was published without due process.

Investment 'needed'

Mr Robertson added that it was likely to have the same negative impact as the farm seizures.

"As soon as the skills are taken away from the businesses they now have their eye on, those businesses will also fail," he said.

He added that far from empowering the wider population, the move would only benefit those individuals that the government appoints to take control of the companies.

The main trade union group, the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), has also warned that the new law could have negative consequences.

"Although the principle of the law is good, we fear that this could lead to a creation of new minority blacks who will just replace the minority whites," said ZCTU president Lovemore Matombo.

"The law should have not been rushed, we are just coming out of a self-inflicted economic crisis.

"This law could create fears that the process could be chaotic, just like the land reform, which will affect the economic recovery of the country and we do not need this right now as we need investments."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8542966.stm

Just another stupid decision by Mugabe and his cronies. And to make everything clear, non-indigenous people = white. This law will damage Zimbabwe's already weak economy.

[msnger]

good luck with that lol.

[TheMuffinKing]

LOL Zimbabwe. We should come up with a new meme...Zimbabwe pants anyone?

[Dinges]

There is already an estimated 3 million illegal Zim immigrants in South Africa's Northern Province because of Bob's decisions. The chances are better that these companies will simply close and move south. What then Bob?

[2495]

http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/4113/zimbabwe2.jpg

................. Good luck with the investors 'Bob.

[Dinges]

................. Good luck with the investors 'Bob.

With all the money Bob and his cronies have stolen , they could buy those companies.



And o yeah.




Let them eat cake.




http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/5572/bobn.jpg

[ren0312]

Just another stupid decision by Mugabe and his cronies. And to make everything clear, non-indigenous people = white. This law will damage Zimbabwe's already weak economy.

Maybe they can put on black face and claim to be indigenous.p-) Or maybe the ZImbabweans are relying on South African or Arab investors.

[2495]

Arab investors.

........Indigineous? lol.

[ren0312]

........Indigineous? lol.

North Africans.

[Dinges]

Chinese................

[Rudolph]

ME!!! Afrikaner??

[Marmot1]

Me too... me ancestors emigrated from there just little over 100 000 year ago.

[kannon]

Check out the recently released film "Mugabe and the White African". It was released in the UK a few weeks back, there's a Facebook fan page for the movie where one can viwew the trailer. This says it all in terms of the land seizures and sets the tone for any further legal actions of the Mugabe Regime. So, as they say in the classics; "Good Luck with that one!" [i.e. fighting this new Law]

[Robert.V]

http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/4113/zimbabwe2.jpg

................. Good luck with the investors 'Bob.

Speaking of farmers. Look what's going on in SA.




Some 90% of farms redistributed to South Africa's black population from white farmers are not productive, the government has said.

Land reform minister Gugile Nkwinti warned the land might be repossessed if the farms continued to fail.

Almost 60,000 sq km (23,000 sq miles) have been redistributed under policies aimed at benefiting black people who were left impoverished by apartheid.

The land was bought from white farmers who sold up voluntarily.

The BBC's Pumza Fihlani in Johannesburg says some black farmers are likely to argue that they have been struggling to get the resources and skills to develop their land.

And repossessing the land would provide a whole new problem for the government, our correspondent says, as any move to return the land to its former white owners is bound to be controversial.

Sensitive issue

The government had set a target of 2014 to redistribute one-third of white-owned land back to the black majority.

But Mr Nkwinti acknowledged that the deadline would not be kept.

He said the focus would now shift to helping the black farmers make their land productive.

"The farms - which were active accruing revenue for the state - were handed over to people, and more than 90% of those are not functional," he said.

"They are not productive, and therefore the state loses the revenue. We cannot afford to go on like that... No country can afford that."

At the end of apartheid in 1994 almost 90% of land was owned by the white community, which made up less than 10% of the population.

Land reform is a sensitive issue in South Africa and has been brought into sharp focus by the decline of agriculture in neighbouring Zimbabwe, where many white commercial farmers have been violently evicted.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8547621.stm

[jetsetter]

Bitterness and unease in bankrupt Zimbabwe
Page last updated at 12:11 GMT, Saturday, 6 March 2010

After 30 years in power, Zimbabwe's veteran leader Robert Mugabe said this week he was ready to stand for another term as president. BBC Africa correspondent Andrew Harding finds Mr Mugabe's party in angry mood, and others - the white minority and the former opposition MDC party - full of foreboding.

It has been a grey, drizzly week here.

In the wealthier suburbs of Harare, Zimbabwe's shrinking white population is once again feeling nervous.

Pat, who runs a small hairdressing salon, and whose family has lived here for four generations, is finally planning to leave.

They don't want us "whiteys" here any more she says. The writing is on the wall.

Pat has been spooked by a new law, introduced this week, which is supposed to correct the enduring economic legacies of colonialism, and give black Zimbabweans a controlling stake in almost all companies.

The main focus is Zimbabwe's rich mines and its industry.

But the indigenisation law also seeks to prevent white people from owning things like hairdressing and beauty salons.

In a few years, says Pat, we will be like an extinct species. They will come for our houses next.

The reaction may well be extreme.

Many white Zimbabweans have been slow to acknowledge the debt they owe to the black majority here. Economic empowerment is clearly necessary.

But after a decade of economic chaos, horrific violence, and the brutal seizure of white-owned farms, it is easy to understand why so many Zimbabweans - of all colours - are hair-trigger tuned to expect the very worst.

Bitter words

Saviour Kasukuwere does not exactly try to smooth the waters.

"You people," he almost spat at me, as I sat in his office on the ninth floor of the squat grey building that houses President Mugabe's Zanu PF Party.

Mr Kasukuwere used to be a member of Mr Mugabe's notorious state security.

He is a hardliner and a rising star.

"You British, you could learn a lot about democracy from us," he says with a thin smile.

Mr Kasukuwere, a tall, heavy-set man, was at primary school when his country won full independence from Britain 30 years ago.

Unlike Mr Mugabe's generation, he did not fight and suffer for freedom. But, full of passionate intensity, he seems to wallow in his bitterness.

In his eyes, and words, everything can still be blamed on what he calls the "genocidal" West.

Zanu PF's current preoccupation is with what it calls "Western sanctions".

The state media makes it sound like some overwhelming economic blockade.

"Our children are dying because of sanctions," says Mr Kasukuwere.

But as diplomats and economists here point out, the reality is less extreme.

The European Union is currently imposing a travel ban on 198 individuals. Thirty-five companies are also frozen out.

"This is about Mrs Mugabe not being able to shop in Paris," one diplomat put it. "Zimbabwe can't borrow money, not because of sanctions, but because it owes $6bn, and can't pay it back because it systematically wrecked its own economy."

Train smash

Within Zimbabwe's unity government, sanctions are a poisonous issue - one of many.

The unity government, formed after bitterly disputed elections, has survived a year now - President Mugabe's Zanu PF sharing, or at least pretending to share power with its enemy, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

"It's a train smash, warfare every day," one MDC minister told me.

But the government has survived and on some issues is clearly making progress.

The MDC is hoping now to water down the new indigenisation law in order not to scare away foreign investors and potentially plunge the economy back into chaos.

Both parties are now gearing up for new elections - possibly next year. It is the only way to settle Zimbabwe's political deadlock once and for all.

The sanctions issue and the indigenisation law, are key campaign themes for Zanu PF.

If the MDC tries to question either of them - it is accused of being a stooge for colonial Western interests.

The MDC can probably handle that sort of criticism. It has got a strong support base, and at least one recent opinion poll showed it would crush Mr Mugabe and his party at the polls.

Any credit for the economic stability achieved here during the past year, seems to have gone to the MDC.

But the party is not nearly as well organised or ruthless as Zanu PF.

We are floundering, one MDC insider told me dejectedly. And of course, past experience in Zimbabwe shows that elections here are won by intimidation, not popularity.

In 2008, Zanu PF orchestrated a campaign of terror - killing and beating MDC supporters - in order to hold on to power.

Now at the age of 86, after 30 years in office, President Mugabe has announced he is planning to run for yet another term.

Elections could be held next year, he says.

Mr Mugabe controls the police and the army, and under the current constitution, most of the electoral infrastructure.

Will he play fair this time?

We are heading towards another big fight, a senior MDC official told me anxiously.

Unless we have foreign peacekeepers to protect us, it will be another bloodbath.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/8551616.stm

.........................................

[Dinges]

.........................................


Many white Zimbabweans have been slow to acknowledge the debt they owe to the black majority here. Economic empowerment is clearly necessary.


This reporter's story stinks. This article achieves nothing. PC guilt runs amok. Mugabe had decades to fix it , and he only lined his pockets.

[Sootan]

This country needs Operation Zimbabwe Freedom... :lol:

[wilhelm]

Where are all those odious little idiots who spent the 1970's and 1980's protesting against apartheid in various European cities?
Surely they should be protesting about the absolute ruin and subjugation of an entire country? Perhaps they really were "useful idiots"....

[tea drinker]

As already said, good luck with that. Hopefully there can be a ban on any aid to that country.
We should ensure that all those ethnically cleansed from the area by the racist regime are well taken care of though.

[jetsetter]

This reporter's story stinks. This article achieves nothing. PC guilt runs amok. Mugabe had decades to fix it , and he only lined his pockets.

Indeed. I did not see that part.

[Dinges]

Zimbabwe puts brakes on indigenisation law: Official

Apr 13, 2010 8:21 PM | By Sapa-AFP

Zimbabwe's government has withdrawn a controversial law that would have seen foreign firms forced to cede 51 percent of their shares to locals, an official said.

Speaking after a cabinet meeting, a spokesman for Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai said the government had declared the so-called indigenisation law "null and void".

"Cabinet is directed that the directives as announced in the law are null and void," James Maridadi told AFP.

"Cabinet has also instructed all the parties involved to go and consult more on the issue."

http://www.timeslive.co.za/africa/article402258.ece/Zimbabwe-puts-brakes-on-indigenisation-law--Official

[IconOfEvi]

If the Zimbies have anything to teach the West about democracy...God help us :o!

[Dinges]

If the Zimbies have anything to teach the West about democracy...God help us :o!

As if the west is getting it right.p-)

[Dexx]

If you were singled out for the colour of your skin in Europe or the US, the media would cry racism. But when blacks do this in Africa, you only get a factual report without spin. Don't get me wrong, I do like the latter much more, but I hate double standards.

[Irbis]

Where are all those odious little idiots who spent the 1970's and 1980's protesting against apartheid in various European cities?
Surely they should be protesting about the absolute ruin and subjugation of an entire country? Perhaps they really were "useful idiots"....

:cantbeli:

I wonder who is idiot - someone who cries out against oppression and tyranny, or idiot who cities failed policy of one state (which is completely unrelated issue, as any tyranny will find some group to oppress) to justify the very tyranny (as it is still oppression, just in different flavor), becaus it fits his underlying racism here? :roll:

I guess then people like A. Lincoln, M.L. King, F. Douglass, people who drafted Slavery Abolition Act, or Emancipation Proclamation, were idiots, too? :roll:


I always wondered how easy it is for people to say these little hate-filled speeches when they happen to be a member of non-repressed part of society :-|

[MN_Air]

:cantbeli:

I wonder who is idiot - someone who cries out against oppression and tyranny, or idiot who cities failed policy of one state (which is completely unrelated issue, as any tyranny will find some group to oppress) to justify the very tyranny (as it is still oppression, just in different flavor), becaus it fits his underlying racism here? :roll:

I guess then people like A. Lincoln, M.L. King, F. Douglass, people who drafted Slavery Abolition Act, or Emancipation Proclamation, were idiots, too? :roll:


I always wondered how easy it is for people to say these little hate-filled speeches when they happen to be a member of non-repressed part of society :-|

Oh my. Oh my.

Whatever gets you through the day.

Since when has any country in Africa that wasn't under the direct authority of Europeans been successful?p-)

[Arsenal]

:cantbeli:

I wonder who is idiot - someone who cries out against oppression and tyranny, or idiot who cities failed policy of one state (which is completely unrelated issue, as any tyranny will find some group to oppress) to justify the very tyranny (as it is still oppression, just in different flavor), becaus it fits his underlying racism here? :roll:

I think Wilhelm's point was that oppression isn't right regardless of which race is doing it. The people who protested before should be protesting now if it were truly about oppression and not about sound bites to make you feel better about being a white person. That's what I got from it anyway.


I guess then people like A. Lincoln, M.L. King, F. Douglass, people who drafted Slavery Abolition Act, or Emancipation Proclamation, were idiots, too? :roll:

I hate to burst your bubble, but Abraham Lincoln was a huge racist by today's standards. Yes, he advocated for their freedom from slavery, but he did not believe in their equality.