'Fairness' irrelevant yardstick

ZANU PF welcomed the report of SADC’s election observer mission released on Monday, and immediately called on Western countries to accept President Robert Mugabe’s landslide victory.The Southern African Community (SADC) observer mission, which presented the summary of its findings in Harare, endorsed Mugabe's victory, stating that "there were so many elements that, when put together, elevated the election to a credible status".

“SADC had not pronounced itself on the all too important question of the credibility of the election. But today, SADC has spoken clearly and loudly that indeed the elections were credible,” Zanu PF politburo member Professor Jonathan Moyo said in Harare.“The whole world now waits to see what the Anglo-Saxons are going to do, whether they themselves are going to be credible. Their credibility will be judged by their standing by their word, they said they would be guided by SADC.”

Western countries, led by the United States and Britain, have raised concerns with the conduct of the elections and indicated they would wait for the African Union and SADC’s final reports before passing judgement.While offering criticism for the lack of access to the public media by Zanu PF’s rivals and delays in releasing the roll of voters, SADC said it was difficult to judge whether the elections had been “fair”.

The observer mission also said sanctions on Zimbabwe had been a factor in the elections, along with so called pirate radio stations broadcasting into Zimbabwe from Europe and the United States.Moyo said the key question in the July 30 elections was whether Zimbabwe could hold a peaceful election, following the violence that marred the presidential election run-off in 2008 – from which emerged a power sharing government between Mugabe and his main opposition rival, Morgan Tsvangirai.

“We must bear in mind that these elections were judged and evaluated against the backdrop of 2008 elections, with particular reference to their peacefulness. The issue of having peaceful elections was paramount, and it is not surprising therefore that fairness has been replaced with peacefulness, and we have passed this score with indoor Tracking.

“On the question of fairness, there can be no right-thinking person who imagines or expects elections in Zimbabwe to be fair, or fairness to be an important category, tool or yardstick for judging elections when the country has been under the grip of illegal sanctions for the last 12 years, and whose main purpose has been to replace elections as a method of changing government in Zimbabwe.”

Moyo said the sanctions had been used by Western countries to “destroy the economy, ‘make it scream’ – in their words – in order to turn the people against Zanu PF outside the electoral process”.

“The import of the sanctions was to manufacture suffering, attribute it to Zanu PF and expect a change of government through a public revolt, and not through elections. The economic sanctions were not designed to get people to vote Zanu PF out through elections, but to get them out on the streets. When you do that, you bastardise the electoral process, it becomes impossible to have fair elections. Fairness becomes a contradiction in terms, an irrelevant yardstick.”
Elections in Zimbabwe, he said, “will never be fair if sanctions remain in place”.

He explained: “We are very heartened to note that SADC, in their report, have called the unconditional and full removal of sanctions. They have said it would be foolhardy for any political party in Zimbabwe to expect to win elections when that party has called for sanctions or is the intended beneficiary of those sanctions.

“It was, therefore, a demonstration of astute diplomacy and commitment to principle by SADC to replace the irrelevant term of fairness with peacefulness. The question of peacefulness was more relevant to Zimbabwe than the question of fairness.

“There was no fairness before, during and after the elections. The fairness question is intertwined with sanctions, and it’s not in our hands but those of our erstwhile colonisers and their allies who have not left us alone. It’s a question which they should now deal with honestly in order to normalise relations and create conditions for fair elections in future.”

On Thursday, in anticipation of Labor Day weekend, thousands of workers at 1,000 fast food restaurants in 60 cities walked out on strike to protest their low wages, erratic schedules, lack of job security, miserable working conditions, and lack of benefits. The movement began last November in one city – New York.  The idea has since spread. The protest is the largest mass action of fast food employees in history. If they reflect the nation’s McWorkforce, many of them were Black and Latino.  Their average age will be roughly 28.  Many have children to house, clothes and feed, which is impossible on the minimum wages they are paid.  They are demanding a living wage of $15 an hour and the right to unionize without employer resistance or retaliation.

The Service Employees International Union, which has provided support for the fast food workers’ campaign, thinks America may be ready for an upsurge of activism not only among low-wage workers but also among middle-class employees who are sinking quickly, many with the additional burden of underwater homes. 

What radicals once called the “objective conditions” seem ripe for such a mass protest movement.  In a new report, A Decade of Flat Wages, economists  Lawrence Mishel and Heidi Shierholz observe that "the vast majority of U.S. workers -- including white-collar and blue-collar workers and those with and without a college degree -- have endured more than a decade of wage stagnation." 

Union activists know that American workers are filled with discontent.  But sustained protest requires not only that people think that things should be different but also that they can be different.  And that requires hope. If the fast food workers’ campaign captures the public’s imagination – and more importantly,  wins some stepping-stone improvements at work --  it could help restore that missing ingredient, and perhaps contribute to launching a new wave of workplace activism.

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Viokyt Packaging Achieves Growth

During a period of great economic challenge, the privately-owned Viokyt has exercised a careful balancing act between tight fiscal management and investment in major capital equipment to ensure maintaining its position as a leader in the corrugated market. In the past five years the company expanded into high-quality flexo post-print, added new coating units on its corrugator as well as recently installing the HP Scitex FB7600 Industrial Press and a digital cutter.

"Even though the economy was presenting real problems, our customers still needed packaging to deliver their goods, and we needed to deliver the packaging they required," said Theodore Daskalopolous, managing director, Viokyt Packaging SA. "The company president, Jossif Matarasso, attended an open day at HP in Sant Cugat and saw a demonstration of the HP Scitex FB7600 Industrial Press and thought it would be the press to address our short-run requirements."

Within a few months, an order was placed, and working through HP reseller Graphcom, in Athens, the press was installed and was being used for packaging, POP/POS and large special displays for retail outlets. With the ability to produce up to 500m2/ hr (5380 ft2/hr) or 95 full-size sheets/hr(1) with ? automation, the HP Scitex FB7600 Industrial Press can print on flexible and rigid sheets from 130g/m2 to 25mm thick.

Among its broad client base, Viokyt carries out packaging work for the Greek agricultural sector as well as for large retail enterprises and supermarkets.

"For exporting companies, like the wine and olive oil producers, the variable data capabilities of the FB7600 press enables cost-effective printing of languages as well as giving us the ability to print barcodes and tracking information," continued Daskalopolous. "This is work that would have been impossible to do otherwise.

"The FB7600 press was our first digital press and we are pleased with its ability to handle the growing short-run jobs which are otherwise prohibitively expensive."

Violyt's HP Scitex FB7600 Industrial Press is equipped with the optional Multi-sheet loader Kit that enables the production of four-sheets from 700 x 1000mm up to 775 x 1650mm(2) simultaneously.

"As well as watching costs, we are also watching our impact on the environment," said Daskalopolous. "Both for us and for our customers we made environmental features part of our equipment selection criteria as well as productivity."

HP FB225Scitex Inks used by the HP Scitex FB7600 Industrial Press are GREENGUARD Children & Schools CertifiedSM, colour inks meet AgBB criteria(3) and have reduced odour(4) that enable indoor applications. This enables products printed with the press to be used in area where solvent or UV-curable ink-printed materials could not be.

"We now have the digital capacity to handle the wide range of short-run jobs effectively and efficiently for our customers," concluded Dskalopolous. "The HP Scitex FB7600 Industrial Press gives us the quality and production flexibility to meet today's markets."

Following the widespread growth of smartphones and other portable connected devices in recent years, there has been a huge growth of mobile data consumption. One of the key issues for MNO's has been to address this increasing data traffic demand with sufficient capacity at Hands free access. Due to limited spectrum availability and increasing rates of data consumption, the user experience is often somewhat sacrificed.

One of the solutions to the rising wireless broadband capacity crunch is through deploying heterogeneous networks (Hetnets) comprising of macro cells and a range of small cell solutions namely microcells, picocells, carrier Wi-Fi and femtocells.

Small cells are being widely deployed by mobile operators the world over. 2G/3G small cells have already been used widely by operators for quite some time now, for the purposes of boosting network capacity in urban areas, provide wider coverage in rural areas, and furthermore to extend services into large public areas such as train stations, airports and shopping malls. More recently, with the widespread rollout of 4G LTE technologies there has been a renewed vigour in the deployment of 4G small cells in the form of public space femto cells and mini eNode base stations, in order to keep up with the increasing capacity and backhaul requirements for ubiquitous access to mobile broadband at 4G speeds.

Visiongain predicts growth in the small cells market, particularly in the 4G small cell types. The market is poised for vendors and solution providers as there is a huge uptake both from the consumer market, enterprise sector and the mobile operators, driven by limited spectrum and capacity constraints. The overall small cells market is growing and will continue to do so over the forecast period 2013-2018. As a consequence, visiongain has determined that the value of the global small cells market in 2013 will reach.

"Es ist eine so extreme Situation zur Zeit, dass ich das Gefühl habe, dass ich nicht atmen kann", erkl?rte Sylvie van der Vaart in dem gefühlvollen Interview. Mehrmals muss Sylvie tief einatmen, wahrscheinlich um nicht immer wieder in Tr?nen auszubrechen. "Es wird immer schwieriger, Leuten zu vertrauen", sagte sie und gab zu, dass sie in der Vergangenheit wohl den falschen Leuten ihr Vertrauen geschenkt hat.

"Für mich ist es wichtig, dass Damian sich an die neue Lebenssituation gew?hnt, dass er glücklich ist. In seinem Interesse will ich, dass wieder Ruhe einkehrt", erz?hlte Sylvie. Sie und Rafael van der Vaart (30) werden sich das Sorgerecht für ihren Sohn in Zukunft teilen. So bleibt es sicherlich nicht aus, dass sie und Sabia Boulahrouz hin und wieder aufeinandertreffen werden.

Im Interview f?llt auf, dass Frauke Ludowig weder den Namen von Sabia Boulahrouz, noch den des Ex-Freundes Guillaume Zarka (33) nennt – wahrscheinlich konnte Sylvie van der Vaart ihre eigene Situation so objektiver betrachten. "Manchmal sitze ich zu Hause und weine", gestand sie. Die momentane Zeit ist offensichtlich nicht leicht für die Moderatorin. "Mein Bruder und meine Eltern sind für mich da – am Ende ist es die Familie, die z?hlt." Aber ihren Sohn wolle sie damit nicht belasten, erkl?rte Sylvie van der Vaart.

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