News stories by Stanley Kwenda

HARARE, Jan 28 (IPS) - For three weeks Tavonga Kwidini and his wife Maria had no tap water in their home in Glen View, one of the many dry suburbs in Zimbabwe's capital, Harare.

JOHANNESBURG, Nov 04 (IPS) - Pansy Tlakula, the African Union's Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information, has done her best to address the continued harassment of journalists in the Gambia.

HARARE, Aug 01 (IPS) - Tomson Chikowero was ashamed of his job. He did not want anyone finding out what he did to earn a living, so he used to wake up early every morning and leave his home in Hatfield, a residential suburb in Zimbabwe’s capital city Harare, under the cover of darkness.

There are some unlikely comparisons between the work lives of Mohammed Bouazizi, the Tunisian fruit seller who sparked the Arab revolution, and Francis Tachirev, a fruit seller in Zimbabwe.

Alec Marembo has built his family fortune making bricks in Dzivarasekwa, a sprawling high-density suburb north of the capital of Zimbabwe. But due to the economic crisis of the last decade, his fortune started crumbling. Although he could break even when the downturn started, he finally gave in to competition from the Chinese.

A new constitution, voters’ roll and electoral law, among other things, have to be in place before elections in Zimbabwe can be held but observers doubt if this can be implemented.

Kindness Paradza has a mission. After he lost his job as a journalist when the ZANU-PF government closed his newspaper in 2004, he ploughed his life savings into a 2,000 ha farm he received as part of Zimbabwe’s controversial 'land reform programme'.

Zimbabwean activists will raise the issue of privatisation at the World Social Forum, taking place Feb 6-11 in Dakar, Senegal, and seek solidarity from other activists to resist a renewed government attempt at selling Zimbabwe’s state- owned enterprises.

The word 'sanctions' was among the first five words mentioned to the new European Union (EU) ambassador to Zimbabwe Aldo Dell Ariccia when he first arrived and met with government officials in Zimbabwe a few months ago.

Zimbabwe’s debt burden of about 8,3 billion dollars, owed to internal and external institutions, is crowding out essential national budget items such as health and basic services, with detrimental effects for particularly women.