The Insider

Business and Zimbabwe African National Union- Patriotic Front senator Aguy Georgias told United States ambassador to Zimbabwe Christopher Dell that though President Robert Mugabe was increasingly isolated from events he still had authority and held the key to changing the country’s disastrous course.

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The cash-strapped government planned to issue Z$30 billion in bonds to finance its land reform programme, thus forcing pension funds to foot the bill as they were by law forced to subscribe to the bonds.

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United States ambassador to Zimbabwe Christopher Dell told former Finance Minister Simba Makoni that though President Robert Mugabe’s successor was not likely to be wedded to the past or to Mugabe’s ideology and rhetoric, it was not a given that the successor would be acceptable to the West.

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Publisher Trevor Ncube told United States ambassador Christopher Dell that the Central Intelligence Organisation as a whole hated Intelligence Minister Didymus Mutasa and morale was very low within the organisation.

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Air Zimbabwe, struggling to catch up with spiralling inflation, increased its fares in July 2008 with a return trip to London shooting up from Z$21 trillion to Z$150 trillion.

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Minister of State Security and Lands, Didymus Mutasa, described white commercial farmers as “dirt” that needed to be cleansed. Addressing a land audit meeting in Masvingo, Mutasa reportedly said the remaining white farmers had to be clear out under a new land resettlement operation called “faster track”.

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The introduction of direct flights between Harare and Beijing and a cheap fare of only $450 did not boost the number of Chinese tourists to Zimbabwe though Beijing had designated Zimbabwe as a sponsored travel destination.

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ZANU-PF politburo member Didymus Mutasa, who was Minister for State Security at the time, “proudly” told a United States delegation that he was among those principally responsible for Operation Restore Order (Murambatsvina) and showed no remorse for the suffering the operation had caused.

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Air Zimbabwe was tottering on the brink of collapse for more than a decade before it finally succumbed last year. The national airline is back in business. Will it thrive this time or history will repeat itself? Here are some stories, according to Wikileaks, that tell the story of the national airline before it collapsed. There are 50 cables that we gleaned from Wikileaks. Here they are.

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