Zambian Electoral Commission propose Parley seat increase

The Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) has written to government on the need to amend the current constitution to facilitate the increase in the number of constituencies in the country from 150 to 235. ECZ chairperson Irene Mambilima says this has been necessitated by the creation of new districts in the country.

Speaking during a special meeting of the political parties liaison Committee on delimitation in Lusaka this morning, Justice Mambilima says challenge to the commission as a result of the creation of the new districts is a situation where a District with one constituency has been demarcated into two. She names the affected districts as Chirundu, Chembe, Sioma, Nkeyema and Ngabwe which demarcated from Siavonga, Mansa, Shangombo, Kapiri Mposhi and Kaoma Districts.

Justice Mambilima says it is for this reason that going forward the commission has suggested the increase in the number of constituencies in the affected new Districts so that each of them should have its own constituency.

Meanwhile, Justice Mambilima says the Commission is not asking for something out of the ordinary by requesting to be granted more powers to enable a leveled electoral playing field in the country.

Justice Mambilima says the commission holds the position that in order to effectively level the electoral playing field it must be given powers to impose more severe sanctions on erring political parties. She has cited the Kenyan Electoral Code of Conduct which contains severe sanctions including fining or banning of political parties from taking part in next elections.

Original article: http://allafrica.com/stories/201406160348.html

Zimbabwean First Lady calls for rapists to be beheaded

First Lady Grace Mugabe yesterday stunned people attending World Blood Donor Day commemorations in Chinhoyi when she called for rapists to be beheaded saying they were inflicting untold suffering on women.

"Those who commit heinous crime like rape should be immediately sent to the gallows," said Mugabe while officiating at the event. The commemorations come at a time the country is facing a critical shortage of blood. World Health Organisation (WHO) country representative David Okello said it was sad that many mothers were dying during childbirth. Okello said statistics showed that one out of every 38 women died from pregnancy-related complications, particularly relating to bleeding during childbirth.

"No mother should be allowed to die giving birth to life. This is a very sad thing and the most common cause of a mother dying during childbirth is bleeding. In Zimbabwe we are losing too many mothers," he said. Minister of Health and Child Care, David Parirenyatwa also said mothers were losing lives during child birth unnecessarily as blood had become too expensive. He said blood was now out of reach of many ordinary Zimbabweans. A pint of blood costs between US$80 to US$240.

"We are losing 525 women out of every 100 000 pregnant women. That is too much and one of the major reasons is shortage of blood," he said. Parirenyatwa said 15 000 units of blood purchased through Healthy Transfusion Fund were not enough and it was now high time fiscus allocated money towards blood procurement.

Original article: http://allafrica.com/stories/201406150174.html

ANC wins SA elections

The ruling African National Congress (ANC) has won the 2014 general elections, thus securing President Jacob Zuma's second term in office, the country's Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) officially announced on Saturday.

The ANC received 249 seats in the National Assembly dropping 15 seats compared to the 2009 elections while the official opposition, the Democratic Alliance (DA) received 89 seats, and newcomers the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) received 25, the third highest number, IEC chairwoman Pansy Tlakula announced at the release of the final election results in Pretoria.

Among over 25 million registered voters, 73.43 percent voters turned out in 22,263 polling stations on Wednesday to elect the new National Assembly and provincial legislatures.The 73.43 percent voter turnout during the general elections showed that democracy was thriving, Tlakula said.

"Today we celebrate two decades of democracy and conclude the fifth democratic national and provincial elections, we can confirm to the world democracy is well and thriving in this land," she said.

The ANC has won a fifth consecutive success with a 62.16 percent share of the votes, down from the 65.9 it got in the 2009 elections. The leading opposition party DA won 22.22 percent up from 16.66 percent in 2009, achieving its best ever result comparing with previous elections, and the newly-formed Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) won more than 1 million votes as 6. 35 percent.

The SA National Assembly consists of 400 members elected by proportional representation with a closed list approach. Two hundred members were elected from national party lists; the other 200 were elected from provincial party lists in each of the nine provinces.

The President of South Africa will be chosen by the National Assembly after the election. The premiers of each province will be chosen by the winning majority in each provincial legislature. The 2014 general elections are the first since the death in December of Nelson Mandela, and also the fifth election since the end of the apartheid era in 1994.

Original article: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/africa/2014-05/11/c_126484916.htm

Zim journalists behind Baba Jukwa exposed

The two journalists behind the Facebook page, Baba Jukwa, admitted to lying to their followers in addition to extorting an undisclosed amount of money to fund their project, a sensational cache of emails hacked from their Gmail account, babajukwa2013@gmail.com, revealed over the weekend.

The two, Mkhululi Chimoio and Mxolisi Ncube, work for the shadowy, Zimbabwean newspaper, published by Wilf Mbanga in Britain before being shuttled for sale in Zimbabwe. The expose has come as an anti-climax to many who had been taken in by the Facebook character because of the complete contradiction between what he claimed to be, a senior Zanu-PF Politburo member, and what the pair are in real life, two struggling journalists who had no qualms conning their employer and unsuspecting followers of an indeterminate amount of money.

The two, last year, claimed that President Mugabe and Zanu-PF had put up a US$300 000 bounty on their heads but in an e-mail dated July 6, 2013 addressed to one Commander Milan, they owned up to lying about the alleged bounty. "Did you see people say they can catch me with $300 000," Baba Jukwa wrote, "kikikiki I made that one up to cause chaos. Now everyone thinks they are really after me but they can't stop this freedom train commander. I got the money, thanks (sic) god for your support. Let me know if you need any resources from my end because we are in this together to the last day."

The sensational claims were picked up by some sections of the Zimbabwean and international media, among them CNN, BBC, ABC and the Daily Telegraph, who claimed Baba Jukwa had so unsettled Zanu-PF that a bounty had been put on his head. Chimoio and Ncube also promoted the bounty line in their articles in The Zimbabwean where they claimed Zanu-PF had launched an operation code-named "Clean House" which they said was aimed at them along with CNN's Robin Curnow, the BBC's Andrew Harding and one Thuso Khumalo of Studio 7.

They also launched an appeal for funds through PayPal, an online payment platform, from their followers that they claimed would go towards funding a sustained media campaign against Zanu-PF. They reassured their followers that the donations would remain a secret since the PayPal account they were using had been "opened and secured in Switzerland".

Though it is not clear how much Chimoio and Ncube made, the campaign did not appear to have brought the desired rewards as evidenced by an exchange between Baba Jukwa and another troll going by the name Sahwira waBaba Jukwa, who is believed to be Mkhululi Chimoio where Mxolisi berated their followers for not opening the purse strings.

In a Google chat dated May 30, 2013 with Sahwira WaBaba Jukwa and in response to his question on how the fundraising was going, Baba Jukwa complained that the money they had received through PayPal was too little. "Not gud at all zimbos (colloquial for Zimbabweans) are fools they don't appreciate good things just imagine 30 dollars so far." Despite this, the documents at hand show that they two received up to eight transfers in one day broken down as US$30, £36, and 60 Australian dollars. This money was ostensibly meant to contribute to the development a new mega media platform to fight Zanu-PF.

It is unclear how much was actually realised or what it was used for but what is clear is that the two journalists made money even from their employer, Wilf Mbanga whom they duped into believing he was dealing with a senior Zanu-PF Politburo member. The game Mbanga engaged Baba Jukwa as a columnist, and agreed to pay him for promoting his paper on his page. Baba Jukwa was paid US$50 per article published by The Zimbabwean and an undisclosed amount of money for promoting the paper on the Facebook page.

Original article: http://allafrica.com/stories/201405120143.html

Dewani arrives in SA

British murder accused Shrien Dewani has landed at Cape Town International Airport, just after 9.30am, from London.

According to the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development spokesperson, Mthunzi Mhaga, Dewani will be immediately escorted to the Western Cape High Court, where he is expected to appear for the first time in a South African court of law at 11:30am. There he will be formally charged and processed by the investigating team. He will be charged with murder and is expected to face charges relating to conspiracy to commit murder and defeating the ends of justice. Dewani is accused of orchestrating the murder of his wife, Anni, while on honeymoon in November 2010. He claims he and his wife were kidnapped at gunpoint as they drove through Gugulethu, and that he was released unharmed.

Dewani arrived in the country today on a chartered flight procured by the department. Mhaga said the use of the private aircraft was informed by Dewani's peculiar medical condition, which needs to be monitored. The use of a commercial flight, Mhaga said, had the potential to compromise Dewani and that could have an adverse effect on the pending medical examination.

"We took into account the fact that there was undisputed evidence during the extradition hearing that he had displayed suicidal tendencies and the South African government did not want to take chances. "There was a need to ensure that Dewani and the whole team are secure, and that would have been difficult on a commercial flight with many passengers, which had the potential to compromise their security, as his identity is now well known," said Mhaga.

Dewani has been fighting removal from the UK on the grounds of mental health problems, including severe depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. Before the trial, Dewani will first undergo a psychiatric assessment to determine if he is fit to stand trial. If he is not fit to stand trial within 18 months, he will be returned to the UK, as agreed by the British and South African authorities.

Original article: http://allafrica.com/stories/201404080468.html

Is there any hope for Zimbabwe opposition?

After being pummeled in the last election, and riven with infighting and recrimination in the months since, Zimbabwe's political opposition is at its lowest ebb in a decade. The Daily Maverick asks the obvious question: if not Zanu, then who? The answer makes for disheartening reading - unless your name's Robert Mugabe, and you've got a country you want to keep running.

It wasn't just losing last year's election that dealt a knock-out blow to Zimbabwe's main opposition groups, in particular Morgan Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change faction (MDC-T); it was how the election was lost, by such a wide margin that even if Zanu-PF had rigged the elections - and we're not saying they did, although we have our suspicions - it did not need to.

Look at it this way: despite everything that Robert Mugabe has done, despite the economic calamities he has presided over the and the steady erosion of basic rights he has legislated, a majority of Zimbabweans would rather have Mugabe and his henchmen in charge than trust in any of the alternatives.

For Morgan Tsvangirai, this realisation must be a particularly bitter pill. The veteran opposition leader, now 62, came as close as anyone has...

Read the full story on the Daily Maverick website.

Questions raised over Bona Mugabe’s husband

As Zimbabweans continue to discuss the lavish wedding of Bona Mugabe over the weekend, it has emerged that the Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) raised questions about her new husband. Not much is known about 37 year old Simba Chikore, except that his mother is known as a "reverend" in a church group called the Zimbabwe Assemblies of God Africa. It was also, until recently, claimed that he was a pilot.

But speculation has been rife since media reports were released that discredited the claims of his pilot status. Other reports also quoted a CIO official as branding Robert Mugabe's new son-in-law as 'unsuitable' for the First Daughter. The Daily Telegraph newspaper reported that Chikore does not work for either Emirates or Qatar Airways as widely reported. The paper stated that people in the aviation industry in Southern Africa have never heard of him.

Another report, this time by NewZimbabwe.com, quoted a junior CIO officer as saying that Chikore was a 'playboy' ill-suited to be Bona's husband. The officer reportedly said Grace Mugabe's "determination for the marriage to go ahead and her disdain for the country's spy agency had prevented proper vetting of the First Son-in-Law."

The unnamed CIO official was quoted as saying: "He (Chikore) is a workout addict and also much into bike riding. He is known for womanising from his high school days and recently involved in a spate of affairs which were glossed over by the (CIO) team that prepared the final report. This man was deemed too old for the first daughter and too tainted to be involved with her."

Original article: http://allafrica.com/stories/201403040060.html?aa_source=acrdn-f0