Zimbabwe’s parliament has outlawed criticism of the government ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections in August, with violations of a new law punishable by up to 20 years in jail.

The Criminal Law Code Amendment Bill, widely known as the Patriotic Bill, contains a clause that criminalises “wilfully damaging the sovereignty and national interest of Zimbabwe”.

Opposition activists said the law, passed late on Wednesday, was designed to punish citizens, civil society organisations and political adversaries of the ruling Zanu-PF party.

It has raised fears that the government could launch a crackdown on dissent ahead of the general election on Aug 23 at which Emmerson Mnangagwa aims to secure a second term as president. 

Main rival 

The 80-year-old’s main rival is Nelson Chamisa, 45, a lawyer and pastor who leads the new Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC).

Fadzayi Mahere, CCC spokesman and lawyer, described the law as “dangerous” and said it was aimed at closing the democratic space ahead of elections.

“Zanu-PF has reduced our great nation into an outpost of tyranny,” Mahere told Reuters.

“None of it will work because Zimbabweans go to the polls with one mission - to win Zimbabwe for change. No amount of panicky despotism by Zanu will stand in the way of change whose time has come.”

A Zanu-PF spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Telegraph

The Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) has clarified that an aircraft ‘incident’ at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) on Wednesday, May 31, was an emergency drill.

KAA had earlier, through its official Twitter account, announced that an aircraft overflying Nairobi had encountered an incident at JKIA and that rescue operations were underway.

The Authority would minutes later issue a statement stating that the said incident, which sent social media into a frenzy, was a successful full-scale emergency drill.

"The exercise, which involved a simulated incident of an aircraft that crashed at the airport while overflying Nairobi, was organised by KAA as part of its ongoing commitment to enhancing airport emergency response capabilities and ensuring the highest level of preparedness in case of any unforeseen event," KAA said in a statement.

At the same time, KAA Managing Director Alex Gitari stated that the primary objective of the drill was to test and evacuate the efficiency and effectiveness of the airport's emergency responsiveness and coordination among various agencies. 

"Safety is our utmost priority at KAA and conducting regular emergency drills is a crucial aspect of our commitment to ensuring the highest level of preparedness," Gitari noted. By Mate Tongola, The Standard

Zimbabwe's national elections will take place on Aug. 23, the country's president announced Wednesday. The vote is expected to be another closely watched affair in a country with a history of violent and disputed elections.

The announcement through a government gazette also set Oct. 2 for a presidential runoff vote if required. 

Opposition parties have already made allegations of violence and intimidation against their supporters in the buildup to the elections, and human rights groups have said President Emmerson Mnangagwa is silencing criticism.

The southern African nation has only had two leaders since it gained independence from white minority rule in 1980. Robert Mugabe led Zimbabwe for 37 years until he was removed and replaced by Mnangagwa in a coup in 2017. Mnangagwa had served as a vice president under Mugabe.

The last general election was held in 2018, nearly a year after the coup.

Once a close ally of Mugabe, Mnangagwa, 80, has tried to present himself as a reformer despite accusations that he is even more repressive than the man he helped remove from power.

Mnangagwa is expected to face a strong challenge from Nelson Chamisa, the 45-year-old leader of the main opposition party, Citizens Coalition for Change. Chamisa narrowly lost to Mnangagwa in 2018, with the Constitutional Court dismissing his claims of election rigging.

Apart from the presidency, the election will also decide the composition of the 300-seat parliament and close to 2,000 local council positions. 

Mnangagwa’s ZANU-PF ruling party and the government have denied allegations of violence and intimidation by ruling party activists and security forces. But rights groups have accused Mnangagwa’s government of intimidation and of suppressing any criticism and opposition amid a currency crisis and a sharp rise in food prices.

Zimbabwe has faced severe economic problems for years and has been under U.S. sanctions for two decades over human rights abuses. Mugabe died in 2019. 

Chamisa said this week he is ready for the election, but has made allegations of voting roll irregularities. Compounding that, Chamisa said his party is at a disadvantage because Mnangagwa and ZANU-PF control state–run media and hold sway over the police, other security forces and the judiciary, which are used to clamp down on dissent.

On Wednesday, Fadzayi Mahere, spokeswoman for the Citizens Coalition for Change, tweeted: “No govt that’s popular & knows it’s winning behaves like this. They’re terrified cause, like all of us, they know that ZANU PF can never win a free & fair election in Zimbabwe."

"That’s why they’re trying to stitch & doctor the voters’ roll but it won’t work. People want change.”

Opposition parties had accused Mnangagwa of delaying announcing a date for the election that must take place before the end of August.

Mnangagwa's announcement came a day after Zimbabwe's foreign ministry summoned the United States’ deputy ambassador over a series of tweets the embassy sent calling for a peaceful election.

The ministry accused the embassy of “election-related social media posts bordering on activism and meddling in Zimbabwe’s internal affairs.”

Deputy Ambassador Elaine French was called to a meeting with Zimbabwe foreign affairs acting permanent secretary Rofina Chikava on Tuesday following the posts on the U.S. Embassy's official Twitter account.

The Zimbabwe foreign ministry said it had a particular issue with a May 26 tweet that called for Zimbabweans to “Register to vote and make sure your voice is heard.” Another tweet from the embassy said “Zimbabwe’s constitution grants citizens the right to choose their representatives in legitimate, credible, & peaceful elections.”

The foreign ministry said the tweet urging people to register to vote was against diplomatic protocols.

“We stand by our recent social media posts calling for peace during the election season," U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Meg Riggs said in a statement. “Elections are a part of a functioning democracy.” By Farai Mutsaka, The Independent

Dr Ruto on, Monday, apologised to public and private sector leaders attending a forum on African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in Nairobi for the visa requirements. 

“My minister [for Trade Moses Kuria] has informed me that somehow some of our officials made you pay visas to come home and asked me to apologise, which I do. When one comes home, they don’t pay to come home,” he told the forum, narrating the human evolution story in Turkana, Kenya.

Read: Work permits issuance jump 25pc as expats return to Nairobi

“I want to promise you that this might be the last time you are looking for a visa to come to Kenya because of two reasons. Number one, because this is home and number two, we support wholeheartedly the AfCFTA. We must remove any impediments to the movement of people around our continent.”

The announcement, on Monday, was a continuation of Kenya’s policy for the integration of Africa, which began gathering steam during the reign of immediate former President Uhuru Kenyatta. 

Dr Ruto’s predecessor, in November 2017, allowed any African visiting Kenya to be eligible to receive a visa on arrival.

Kenya’s move, at the time, came in the same month Rwanda issued a similar directive in the spirit of pan-Africanism without the requirement for reciprocity from other countries.

“For my fellow Africans, the free movement of people on our continent has always been a cornerstone of pan-African brotherhood and fraternity.

The freer we are to travel and live with one another, the more integrated and appreciative of our diversity we will become,” said Mr Kenyatta when he was sworn in for his second and final term in office on November 27, 2017.

Nairobi has, for years, been championing the removal of trade barriers amongst African countries to ease the movement of goods, services and labour through the integration of regional trading blocs. 

Kenya was among the countries selected to participate in the pilot phase of the AfCFTA Initiative on Guided Trade last year as part of the efforts to encourage the movement of goods under preferential trading, launched on January 1, 2021.

The other countries were Ghana, Cameroon, Egypt, Mauritius, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Tunisia.

Africa’s under-developed transport networks have been blamed for raising cost of goods and services as much as 40 percent, rendering intra-African trade uncompetitive compared with trade with developed continents such as Europe.

Read: Kenya drops in ranking of Africa visa friendly States

For example, the first consignment of Kenya’s value-added tea to Ghana which left the country last October reached Port of Tema in February this year, underlining the infrastructural hurdles facing intra-African trade.

“This is why we must take such barriers as weak transport and logistics capacity, customs related delays, rules of origin, import bans and export restrictions, quotas and levies, technical barriers, import permits and licenses, very seriously because they ultimately reverse all the depths we try to make towards a free trade area,” Dr Ruto said.

“They may look small, incremental but their sum total amounts to a reversal of what we are trying to achieve.”

Africa accounted for 18.49 percent, or Sh622.56 billion, of Kenya’s Sh3.37 trillion total trade value in 2022, largely unchanged from 18.39 percent in the prior year, according to provisional data collated by the Central Bank of Kenya. By Constant Munda, Business Daily