CAPE TOWN, South Africa (CNS) -- The Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace in Zimbabwe is battling to find food to give university students a meal a day while they take exams. Officials at the University of Zimbabwe ordered up to 5,000 students out of university housing July 9 just as they were to begin two weeks of written exams. Alouis Chaumba, head of the Harare-based justice and peace commission, told Catholic News Service in a July 10 telephone interview that the students had been asked to pay additional housing fees of more than a million Zimbabwean dollars (US$4,000), "and most were unable to do that." The students' failure to pay the fee, and July 7 incidents of vandalism on campus that authorities blamed on students, prompted the authorities to order "all students to move off campus," he said. Chaumba said the shortage of accommodations in Harare -- even for those students who have friends to put them up while they take their exams -- and "the scarcity of food makes this a crisis." "We want to set up a mobile kitchen to provide a meal a day for the students, but we can't even do that for two weeks," Chaumba said, noting that shelves in supermarkets are mostly empty and, where food can be found, stores are only allowed to sell each individual two loaves of bread. Nonperishable items such as candles, which are essential in a country with frequent power cuts, "are very expensive," and there is little fuel at gas stations around the country, he said. Zimbabwe is crippled by the highest rate of inflation in the world, unemployment of more than 80 percent, and shortages of foreign currency and fuel. Food shortages are acute, and large numbers of people are migrating to the neighboring countries of South Africa and Botswana. With elections scheduled for March, political violence has intensified. "We are in a desperate situation, and we cannot endure any longer," Chaumba said. (by Bronwen Dachs; Catholic News Service)
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