12/11/08

Photo: Joseph Kabila DRC

Source:RUBY MUNDIMBA, http://www.zimdaily.com

Zim soldiers flee DRC assignment

 

ZIMBABWE- HARARE - Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) officers forcibly assigned to

the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to prop up the government of

Joseph Kabila against the re-insurgence of rebels under the tutelage of General Nkunda

are reportedly sneaking out of the war zone and finding their way to South Africa and Botswana.

"The soldiers were dispatched to DRC under protest and most of them had

their travel papers fast-tracked against procedure to ensure that they are quickly

dispatched to the firing line," said the source on condition he is not named.

The source said that most of the army escapees are wriggling and buying their way back

through the Chirundu border post and have either gone into hiding in

Zimbabwe or fled to South Africa and Botswana.

The ZNA spokesman Tsatse could neither deny nor confirm that the army details are

fleeing the war zone in DRC saying that he still needs time to verify the allegations before commenting.

The recent riots aided by low ranking army officers resulted in the elimination of

eleven officers by the ruthless Zimbabwean government that no longer has

capacity to solve the country's economic problems believed to

have been the main reason behind the dissent.

Last month, ZNA scaled down its operations in Chiadzwa from six hundred to less than

one hundred officers in preparation for action in the DRC.

The scaling down in the Zimbabwe diamond rich Chiadzwa was also against the background

that they had the penchant for looting the precious stone and they themselves needed to be guarded.

The dispatch of Zimbabwe's legion of soldiers in the 1990s to prop up the illegal government

of the slain Laurent Kabila resulted in the massive loss of lives of many in the army

whose dead bodies were regularly off-loaded by army choppers at Manyame Airbase.

Manyame was later declared a cantonment area for those that do not stay there permanently

for the fear that they would externalise classified information of the uncalled-for death in the DRC.

Former Nigerian leader Olusegun Obasango, the UN mediator for the crisis in the Great Lakes

who was recently spotted on television gyrating to music with rebel leader General Laurent Nkunda

is pointing the guns of blame squarely at Joseph Kabila who is reportedly

negotiating in bad faith just like Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe. 

Source:RUBY MUNDIMBA, http://www.zimdaily.com



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