News stories by Stanley Kwenda, page 3

In Chitsa, a village with some 2,000 inhabitants located about 250 km from Zimbabwe’s capital of Harare, it has become difficult to conduct everyday transactions involving money.

Desperate for investment to lift its moribund economy, the Zimbabwe government welcomed hundreds of prospective mining investors to a conference in Harare this week.

'We produce electricity but we manage darkness. We have big energy sources of electricity but only 20 percent of the population has access to electricity because most of the energy is sold to foreign countries.'

The global economic crisis has hit the African continent especially hard despite not being involved in its making, civil society organisations gathered in the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo heard at the fifth people’s summit of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) in the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Condemning Zimbabwe’s withdrawal from a regional tribunal which ruled its state-orchestrated land seizures illegal, civil society groups have said the country should abide by decisions of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) or pull out of the regional body entirely.

'Government must lead in breaking down the stereotypes of women as tuck-shop owners, candle-makers, peasant farmers, teachers and nurses and create the reality in which they become hoteliers, large-scale commercial farmers, miners and proprietors of retail chains.'

Eager to restore Zimbabwe's moribund economy, the country's government has been soliciting investment globally. But the troubled southern African country finds itself in an unenviable balancing act between protecting its economic interests while attracting foreign investors.

Zimbabweans like to believe that there is strength in numbers, which is the idea behind a local non-governmental organisation’s attempt to organise small-scale rural cotton farmers in cotton producer associations.

Barely two weeks after the start of an official process to draw up a new constitution for Zimbabwe was delayed by supporters of Robert Mugabe, it faces another challenge: civil society organisation have launched a parallel constitutional project, saying the unity government's parliamentary-led procedure is undemocratic, defective and will produce a flawed document.

It’s a Thursday morning and the Mbare Musika Market is a hive of activity. Trucks, weighed down with assorted fruits, vegetables and potatoes, negotiate their way through the congested market. You can get anything here -- from vegetables, mealie-meal and cooking oil to television sets and clothing.