News stories by Ignatius Banda, page 4

Bulawayo, ZIMBABWE, Aug 11 (IPS) - Ndaba Dube, a Bulawayo resident, says he built himself a home on a small piece of land after the authorities kept him on the housing waiting list for more than two decades. The land he chose is in an old township established before Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980.

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Apr 20 (IPS) - Before Zimbabwe imposed lockdown measures last March as part of global efforts to curb the coronavirus pandemic, Grace Mashingaidze* would attend workshops in Harare arranged by a nongovernmental organisation assisting trafficked women who had safely made it back home.

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Apr 13 (IPS) - With the two extremes of global hunger and obesity on the increase, a new report suggests a radical reset for food and nutrition to ensure the long-term sustainability of livelihoods and the environment.

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Mar 16 (IPS) - It is not everyday that a young farmer registers success in his enterprise and vows this is what he will do for the rest of his life. Yet this is the story of Lihle Moyo, a 27-year-old farmer from Gwanda, about 160km south of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second-largest city.

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Jan 19 (IPS) - A long-running gag says “in Zimbabwe there is freedom of speech, but no freedom after the speech”. But for journalists and activists who have been forced to endure nights in the country’s overcrowded and filthy holding cells, this is no laughing matter as prison inmates have no personal protective equipment to guard against COVID-19.

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Nov 06 (IPS) - "I have long given up on active politics," Gertrude Sidambe, a 36-year-old member of one of Zimbabwe's opposition parties, tells IPS.

When female members of the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front complained last month about political violence as male members chose brawn over brains to solicit for positions, the party's National Secretary for Women's Affairs Mabel Chinomona advised that they enter the punch-and-insult battlefield and "fight" like everyone else. 

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Oct 21 (IPS) - Dotted across the Zimbabwean city of Bulawayo, the water tanks installed in private residences is evidence that years of water crisis, that has seen some suburbs here going for months without running water, has not spared anyone. The large plastic drums, locally called Jojo tanks after the company that manufacturers them — which have a storage range of up to 10,000 litres — have assumed a class status of sorts in Bulawayo.

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Oct 02 (IPS) - Sarudzai Moyo, a former teacher, has begun a new career as a fishmonger. Once a week she makes the 450km journey from Bulawayo to Binga, on the shores of Lake Kariba, where she buys between 100 and 150 kilograms of fish for resale as the demand for cheaper dietary options increase in Zimbabwe.

BULAWAYO, ZImbabwe, Jun 08 (IPS) - A recent diplomatic spat between Zimbabwe and the U.S. began after a senior U.S. official accused Zimbabwe of fomenting unrests across America in the wake of the killing of the unarmed African American, George Floyd."As tall as he is, if he continues to do that I will kick him out of the country," thundered Zimbabwe's former President Robert Mugabe in 2008, his anger aimed at the then United States ambassador James McGee after the diplomat questioned the results of Zimbabwe's 2008 general elections.

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, May 12 (IPS) - Bulawayo, Zimbabwe' second city of some 700,000 people, has experienced a shortage of vegetables this year, with major producers citing a range of challenges from poor rains to the inability to access to bank loans to finance their operations. But this shortage has created a market gap that Zimbabwe smallholders — some 1.5 million people according to government figures — have an opportunity to fill.