A Glossary of oppression in Zimbabwe
ZIMBABWE: Operation Glossary - a guide to Zimbabwe's internal campaigns
IRIN News 9/5/2008
JOHANNESBURG, 1 May 2008 (IRIN) - The Lancaster House Agreement in December 1979 paved the way for Zimbabwe's independence in April 1980. President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF government has been at the helm since the former British colony gained independence, and has increasingly used military-style campaigns to impose measures ranging from acts of alleged genocide to attempts to rein in hyperinflation ... Operation Mavhoterapapi was launched after the local government, parliamentary and presidential elections on 29 March 2008, in which the ruling ZANU-PF government lost its parliamentary majority for the first time since independence ... MDC have alleged that at least 20 people have been killed in post-election violence, orchestrated by the police, soldiers and so-called war veterans, as part of Operation Mavhoterapapi. There have also been widespread reports of torture, the razing of houses and killing of livestock, perpetrated against people in rural areas suspected of voting for the opposition in the recent elections ... In July 2007, in an attempt to control rocketing food and other commodity prices as a result of Zimbabwe's hyperinflation - then running at about 4,000 percent annually - the government compelled businesses and manufacturers to slash the prices of their goods by 50 percent. Teams of inspectors were sent to retail shops and other businesses, and owners and employees who did not comply were either imprisoned or given hefty fines. The price controls saw the shop shelves empty ... Operation Chikorokoza Chapera/Isitsheketsha Sesiphelile (No Illegal Panning) More than 25,000 gold-panners were reportedly arrested in this operation in November 2006, in a bid to curtail artisanal mining ... Operation Murambatsvina (see below) deprived small traders of their stalls and goods, and Operation Sunrise (see below) destroyed savings, many people were left with little option but to pan for gold ... Five weeks after Operation Murambatsvina, the government launched Operation Garikai/Hlalani Kuhle, said to be a programme to build houses for the victims of their "slum clearance" operation ... The few houses that were built were reportedly given to civil servants, police and soldiers ... In an attempt to increase food production, the government deployed soldiers to farms in 2005 to oversee the production of maize, in an exercise called Operation Maguta ... The Third Chimurenga, otherwise known as the Fast Track Land Reform Programme, was launched in 2000 and resulted in most of Zimbabwe's 4,500 white-owned commercial farms being redistributed to landless blacks ...Zimbabwe's armed forces chief, General Constantine Chiwenga, is alleged to have received 17 farms since 2000. Chimurenga, the Shona word for "struggle", was the name given to the indigenous resistance mounted against British settlers between 1896-1897 after their land was seized by colonists ... Operation Gukurahundi (The rain that washes away the chaff before the spring rain) In 1983, the North Korean-trained 5th Brigade, under the command of Lt Col Perence Shire, once known as the "Black Jesus", but currently the commander of Zimbabwe's air force, was the vanguard unit in a campaign against alleged dissidents that has also become known as the Matabeleland Massacres. At least 20,000 people were killed in the operation. The target of Gukurahundi was members of the rival liberation movement, ZAPU, led by Joshua Nkomo and drawn mainly from Zimbabwe's Ndebele people ... Mugabe reportedly said in April 1983: "We eradicate them. We don't differentiate when we fight because we can't tell who is a dissident and who is not." ... A human rights pressure group based in The Hague, Crimes Against Humanity Zimbabwe, is campaigning for Gukurahundi to be recognised as genocide.
IRIN News 9/5/2008
JOHANNESBURG, 1 May 2008 (IRIN) - The Lancaster House Agreement in December 1979 paved the way for Zimbabwe's independence in April 1980. President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF government has been at the helm since the former British colony gained independence, and has increasingly used military-style campaigns to impose measures ranging from acts of alleged genocide to attempts to rein in hyperinflation ... Operation Mavhoterapapi was launched after the local government, parliamentary and presidential elections on 29 March 2008, in which the ruling ZANU-PF government lost its parliamentary majority for the first time since independence ... MDC have alleged that at least 20 people have been killed in post-election violence, orchestrated by the police, soldiers and so-called war veterans, as part of Operation Mavhoterapapi. There have also been widespread reports of torture, the razing of houses and killing of livestock, perpetrated against people in rural areas suspected of voting for the opposition in the recent elections ... In July 2007, in an attempt to control rocketing food and other commodity prices as a result of Zimbabwe's hyperinflation - then running at about 4,000 percent annually - the government compelled businesses and manufacturers to slash the prices of their goods by 50 percent. Teams of inspectors were sent to retail shops and other businesses, and owners and employees who did not comply were either imprisoned or given hefty fines. The price controls saw the shop shelves empty ... Operation Chikorokoza Chapera/Isitsheketsha Sesiphelile (No Illegal Panning) More than 25,000 gold-panners were reportedly arrested in this operation in November 2006, in a bid to curtail artisanal mining ... Operation Murambatsvina (see below) deprived small traders of their stalls and goods, and Operation Sunrise (see below) destroyed savings, many people were left with little option but to pan for gold ... Five weeks after Operation Murambatsvina, the government launched Operation Garikai/Hlalani Kuhle, said to be a programme to build houses for the victims of their "slum clearance" operation ... The few houses that were built were reportedly given to civil servants, police and soldiers ... In an attempt to increase food production, the government deployed soldiers to farms in 2005 to oversee the production of maize, in an exercise called Operation Maguta ... The Third Chimurenga, otherwise known as the Fast Track Land Reform Programme, was launched in 2000 and resulted in most of Zimbabwe's 4,500 white-owned commercial farms being redistributed to landless blacks ...Zimbabwe's armed forces chief, General Constantine Chiwenga, is alleged to have received 17 farms since 2000. Chimurenga, the Shona word for "struggle", was the name given to the indigenous resistance mounted against British settlers between 1896-1897 after their land was seized by colonists ... Operation Gukurahundi (The rain that washes away the chaff before the spring rain) In 1983, the North Korean-trained 5th Brigade, under the command of Lt Col Perence Shire, once known as the "Black Jesus", but currently the commander of Zimbabwe's air force, was the vanguard unit in a campaign against alleged dissidents that has also become known as the Matabeleland Massacres. At least 20,000 people were killed in the operation. The target of Gukurahundi was members of the rival liberation movement, ZAPU, led by Joshua Nkomo and drawn mainly from Zimbabwe's Ndebele people ... Mugabe reportedly said in April 1983: "We eradicate them. We don't differentiate when we fight because we can't tell who is a dissident and who is not." ... A human rights pressure group based in The Hague, Crimes Against Humanity Zimbabwe, is campaigning for Gukurahundi to be recognised as genocide.