Week 45
A weekly selection from Zimbabwean newspapers
The reality of Zimbabwe’s healthcare crisis: ZANU-PF supporters awakened
The Deteriorating State of Healthcare. The healthcare crisis in Zimbabwe has reached a critical point. Hospitals, which should be sanctuaries for healing, are instead places of despair.
Patients are faced with inadequate facilities, lack of basic necessities like water and electricity, and an acute shortage of essential medications.
The message from Masvingo highlighted these issues starkly.
The conditions described—horrific sanitation, lack of medical supplies, and an almost palpable sense of hopelessness—are not isolated incidents but symptoms of a larger national crisis.
SADC calls extraordinary summit as 16 killed in Mozambique post-election violence
SADC has called an extraordinary summit for Harare from November 16 to 20 “primarily to address emerging issues of regional significance,” Zimbabwe’s information minister said on Tuesday.
Mozambique has been on edge since official tallies showed ruling party candidate Daniel Chapo garnered almost 71 percent of the votes cast on October 9, an outcome Mondlane said was rigged to deprive him of victory. The former lawmaker’s legal adviser and a senior member of a small party that backed him were gunned down before the results announcement, exacerbating the tensions.
Zanu PF ignores Gukurahundi cries
Critics say failure by the ruling Zanu PF party to adopt a resolution on addressing Gukurahundi exposed the lack of political will to find closure to the 1980’s mass killings.
Zanu PF held its annual conference in Bulawayo where some of the surviving victims of the mass killings are now aging without having been compensated.
President Emmerson Mnangagwa mentioned Gukurahundi in his speech at the conference, and critics said expectations were high that a resolution would be adopted on addressing the emotive matter.
The consensus from critics is clear: without genuine acknowledgment and accountability, healing remains elusive.
‘Zim opposition on deathbed’
Government and Zanu PF’s hostile attitude towards opposition parties aimed at driving them into their deathbed is not revolutionary, but a sign of immaturity and cowardice, a former Cabinet minister said.
Zimbabwe has a long history of State-sponsored violence against opposition parties, with activists either being jailed, persecuted, maimed or even killed for going against the ruling party.
Speaking to NewsDay on the sidelines of the ongoing Ideas Festival conference, former Industry and International Trade minister Nkosana Moyo said the ruling party should respect opposition parties.
Binga grapples with hunger as drought crisis spirals
A 2024 World Poverty Clock report says 7 579 825 people in Zimbabwe are living in extreme poverty, throwing into doubt the country’s capacity to meet the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal to end extreme poverty by 2030.
Ninety-nine percent of these people are in rural areas of which 51% are women, the reports reads.
Village head Champion Muleya (74) who oversees 25 households in Kankonde 4 Mpande village said most families hardly have any food to eat. Zimbabwe is grappling with the effects of El Nino with an estimated six million people being food insecure, according to the World Food Programme. The drought has worsened water shortages in the country, exposing 2,6 million people to water insecurity.
MPs demand answers on closed Byo industries
Opposition Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) members have demanded timelines on government’s plans to revive closed Bulawayo industries.
Bulawayo used to be termed the country’s industrial hub, providing employment to millions of citizens.
Over the years, the city’s industrial areas have turned into ghost sites, after a number of companies either closed altogether, relocated to Harare or other cities or downsized operations.
In Parliament, Lobengula-Magwegwe lawmaker Tendai Nyathi (CCC) demanded answers on government’s plans to turnaround the city’s fortunes.
Zanu PF to splash cash on 174 cars
Zanu PF is planning to spend big by buying 174 twin and single cab vehicles to complement its current fleet that currently stands at over 300, the ruling party’s 2024 central committee report has shown.
The spending spree by the ruling party comes at a time Zimbabwe’s economy is tanking and the majority of citizens are sinking deeper into poverty.
Ahead of the disputed August 2023 elections, the ruling party bought hundreds of vehicles and dished out at least 210 all-terrain cars to its 2023 parliamentary election candidates.
Zanu PF is said to have spent a staggering US$200 million on the luxury cars and regalia amid questions about its source of funding as the party’s finances are in shambles.
Zanu PF plans name changes on provinces, claims current ones divisive
Zanu PF has passed a resolution to rid the country’s provinces of names given by its erstwhile white rulers before independence, arguing they were inherently divisive.
Zimbabwe, for administrative and identification purposes, is subdivided into 10 geographical provinces which are Harare, Bulawayo, Midlands, Masvingo, Manicaland, Mashonaland Central, Mashonaland East, Mashonaland West, Matabeleland North and Matabeleland South.
Except for Harare, Bulawayo, Midlands and Masvingo, the other provinces are named according to ethnic groups predominantly domiciled in each one of them.
Zanu PF feels the continued reference to the regions based on the identity of occupant ethnicities was divisive.
Normal to above-normal rainfall still expected | (The Sunday Mail, state owned)
The Meteorological Services Department (MSD) still expects Zimbabwe to receive normal to above-normal rains during the summer cropping season.
Some media reports had indicated that the La Niña weather phenomenon, which is forecast to bring good rains this season, had weakened.
However, MSD head of forecasting Mr James Ngoma told The Sunday Mail that they were optimistic that the country would still get normal to above-normal rainfall.
“There is no need to panic,” he said, adding: “We are still expecting what we predicted at the start of the season. If you check our seasonal forecast, we said that we will get normal to below-normal rains in the October-November-December period. As the season progresses, we still expect normal to above-normal rains.”
AWF wins Africa Sustainable Futures Award
THE African Wildlife Foundation (AWF) has been honoured with the prestigious Africa Sustainable Futures Award, presented by the Financial Times and the World Bank Group’s Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency. AWF was recognised in the Biodiversity and Ecosystems Protection category for its impactful work in promoting biodiversity economies. These economies focus on integrating the value of nature into economic decision-making, from national policies to local household practices.
Govt in third attempt at US$4bn pipeline
The Zimbabwean government has revived its long-standing plans to construct a multi-billion-dollar fuel pipeline connecting the landlocked country to Mozambique, with the Mutapa Investment Fund (MIF) expected to take control over the project, the Zimbabwe Independent can exclusively reveal.
With a US$16 billion asset base since its establishment in 2023, MIF is in discussion to take over the US$4 billion project after a previous agreement between the National Oil and Infrastructure Company (Noic) and South Africa-based Coven Energy collapsed.
Attempts fell through due to complex inter-governmental negotiations and approval delays from Mozambique, sources said in separate briefings.
What U.S. Sanctions Really Do and Don’t Do
By Ambassador Pamela M. Tremont:(U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Zimbabwe) 25 October 2025
In March this year, the United States reaffirmed its partnership with the people of Zimbabwe by ending the Zimbabwe Sanctions Program while remaining committed to addressing human rights abuses and corruption in Zimbabwe through the Global Magnitsky (GloMag) sanctions program.
These updated U.S. sanctions on a handful of Zimbabweans have been a topic of intense debate, often clouded by misinformation.
The Zimbabwean government has portrayed these sanctions as the root cause of the nation’s economic woes, but nothing could be further from the truth. The current individuals sanctioned under GloMag were designated for their specific corrupt acts or involvement in serious human rights abuses.
The sanctions do not target the people, economy, or country of Zimbabwe.
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Displaced farmers skeptical about Zimbabwe’s decision to compensate them
Some former commercial farmers in Zimbabwe who were kicked off their land 20-plus years ago say a government offer of compensation is woefully inadequate, and only desperate people will take the offer.
Mthuli Ncube, Zimbabwe’s finance minister, said the government is starting to compensate white commercial farmers whose land was taken during the regime of longtime President Robert Mugabe.
Ncube said $20 million would be shared by 94 foreign investors whose farms were seized in what Mugabe described as land reforms.
The government has promised to pay another $3.5 billion to white Zimbabwean farmers.