FULL TEXT: Southern African People’s Solidarity Network Dismisses Herald Article As "deliberate and malicious"

The Southern African People’s Solidarity Network( SAPSN) Regional Coordinating Committee comprising the Foundation for Social and Economic Justice (Swaziland), Malawi Economic Justice Network, Alternative Information and Development Centre (AIDC), Economic Justice Network of South Africa, Development for Peace Education and the Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt and Development (ZIMCODD) notes with great concern, the unsubstantiated and ficticious claims by the Herald newspaper of the 16th of August 2019 where it published a story “Civil Society plots to smear Zim at SADC.” The claims are not only deliberate but malicious and meant to tarnish the brilliant solidarity work that has been championed by the Southern African People’s Solidarity Network (SAPSN) since its inception in 1999.

ZIMCODD is the current host secretariat of SAPSN after taking over from the Development Peace Education of Lesotho in 2018. ZIMCODD’s work is known since 2000 as an advocate for citizens’ social and economic rights. ZIMCODD thus remains focused on its mandate and as the SAPSN member and host secretariat, assert the right to freedom of association and will endeavor to advance the all-important interest of regional, national and
international people to people solidarity as inspired by decades of struggle for liberation and subsequent independence of many colonized states in the region.

The SADC People’s Summit remains a peaceful platform for SADC citizens to participate in advancing climate, political, social and economic rights of citizens in the region holding the regional bloc accountable to the commitments made in the various protocols.

The SADC People’s Summit takes place every year on the side-lines of the SADC Heads of State and Government Summit. Citizens from SADC member states convene to discuss the climate, political, social and economic challenges they are facing and deliver petitions stemming from their conversations to the Heads of States, who have on 12 occasions in different countries received such petitions.

In 2014, when Zimbabwe took over the Chairmanship of SADC, in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, the SAPSN convened a similar event and submitted the petition through the Zimbabwe Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

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The 2019 People Summit convened in Dar es Salaam is the 13th edition and is held in the same spirit, meant to strengthen regional solidarity and citizens campaigns for social, environmental and economic justice. During the Summit, Issues of climate justice became topical as the continent succumbs to the effects of global warming.

Since its inception in 2006, SAPSN has never been implicated in any cases of violence or terrorism. Our mandate is derived from the Regional Indicative Strategic Development Programme and the SADC Charter of Fundamental Rights among other SADC protocols which Zimbabwe is a signatory to, which emphasise the role of SADC citizens in shaping the development trajectory in our region.

It is thus unfortunate for Mr Zvamaida Murwira and the Herald newspaper to discredit the nation in the Herald article by insinuating that the Zimbabwe government does not recognise the participation of citizens in national development.

Statement Issued By

Sofonea Shale
Chairperson- SAPSN Regional Coordinating Committee

Below is the full text of the Herald article that the statement above complains against:

Civic society plots to smear Zim at Sadc

Zvamaida Murwira Senior Reporter
A plan by opposition-linked and foreign-sponsored civil society organisations from Zimbabwe to smear the country at the Sadc Summit in Tanzania tomorrow has been unearthed after the activists travelled to Dar es Salaam to lobby for Harare to be placed on the regional bloc’s agenda.

President Mnangagwa is supposed take over as chair of the Sadc Organ on Politics, Defence and Security, and some well-known allies of the opposition have sought to poison the development through staging demonstrations and conducting seminars meant to set an anti-Zimbabwe agenda in the east African setting of the regional meeting.

The group travelled to Tanzania on Tuesday this week under the banner, Southern African People Solidarity Network, whose theme is: “Rebuilding people’s movement within Southern Africa’s climate, political and socio-economic emergencies: Towards radical democratic alternative and just transition.”

Some reports indicated that the group could receive training in insurgency.

The group is comprised of Nqobizitha Mlambo from Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt and Development, Clayton Manjova (Heal Zimbabwe Trust), Lloyd Sesemani (artisanal miner), Michael Ndiweni (BVTA and Youth NAD), Foster Thole (Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Blessing Vava (Crisis in Zimbabwe) Joy Mabenge (Action Aid), Tinashe Madondo (Family Aids Caring Trust) and Cloud Fusire, a university student.

Others are Thulani Mswelanto (Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition), Charles Kataure (ZNNP+), Phakamani Moyo (PATA), Ropafadzo Sandra Shoko (a law student), Lydia Dhliwayo (Zimcodd), Confidence Bobo (Zimcodd) and Margarety Nyakuhwa (FACT).

Mr Mlambo is also said to be the brain and strategist for the notorious MDC-Alliance youth wing — the Vanguard — which has been terrorising political rivals within the party, including former deputy president Ms Thokozani Khupe.

Questions have also been raised over the source of funding of such a huge entourage in foreign land, with sources saying a third force was bankrolling them.

“The group is here in Tanzania where they intend to hold an illegal demonstration aimed at humiliating President Mnangagwa so that Sadc would place Zimbabwe on its agenda.

“There is also heavy lobbying to scuttle Zimbabwe’s assumption of the chairmanship of the Sadc Organ. Authorities here have also questioned them on reports that they were trained in banditry and subversion,” said a source in Tanzania.

Contacted for comment, Mr Vava confirmed that they were in Tanzania where he said they wanted to present a petition to Sadc over the situation in Zimbabwe. He denied that they were trained in banditry and subversion.

“That’s fiction, we are here to attend the Sadc Peoples Summit, which is a grouping of social movements from across the region, to discuss issues of social economic justice affecting us. At no point have we organised a demonstration, and there are no plans to do so, but rather we will submit a petition pertaining to the outcomes of our summit.

“We are peace-loving and law-abiding citizens and have never been or intend to train to do banditry,” said Mr Vava from Tanzania.