Military spending top priority, says Mugabe

President Robert Mugabe said this week that Zimbabwe's military spending would always be a top priority to ensure "a high level of preparedness in order to safeguard our national sovereignty and territorial integrity." In a speech marking Defence Forces Day on Tuesday, Mugabe said, "We should ... remain vigilant and wary of increasingly desperate and dangerous imperialistic efforts to destabilise our nation." The government was purchasing more houses and vehicles for its soldiers, while army and civil servants' salaries had been increased by 300 percent earlier this year, he said. During 2004 inflation has fluctuated around 400 percent, declining from the 600 percent experienced in the second half of 2003. Chris Maroleng, an analyst with the Pretoria-based think-tank, Institute for Security Studies, said Mugabe's defiant speech was aimed at the "international gallery", but also at his armed forces in the run-up to elections next year. "The [extra] funds will probably be used to boost internal security against threats from non-state mercenary organisations or groups supporting rival political organisations," he said. Seventy suspected mercenaries accused of plotting a coup in Equatorial Guinea are currently awaiting trial in Zimbabwe. The men were detained after arriving from South Africa at Harare International Airport in March, and charged with violating Zimbabwe's immigration, firearms and security laws. Zimbabwe spends 3.2 percent of its Gross Domestic Product on the 40,000-strong armed forces, 2.8 percent on health and 10.4 percent on education.