Violence-scarred Zim promotes peace programme

Zimbabwe will hold a three-day programme to promote peace and national healing, as political violence remains a problem despite the creation of a unity government, a Cabinet minister said on Wednesday.

“Incidents of violence are still taking place,” Minister of State Sekai Holland told journalists. “Zimbabwe is a classical case of a country coming from a conflict.”

Holland is one of three state ministers appointed by the unity government to spearhead national healing and reconciliation following political tensions over disputed elections last year.

Co-Minister John Nkomo said the programme from Friday to Sunday would focus on prayer, ahead of a more extensive reconciliation scheme still being developed.

“The people are expected to get together in various churches and denominations to participate,” Nkomo said.

“May I say after dedication we will then proceed to unfold the way forward, but first of all we thought we needed to be guided by God.”

President Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai agreed to a unity government in February, nearly a year after disputed polls that edged the 85-year-old leader out of a majority win for the first time since independence in 1980.

The new government has halted the economic haemorrhaging that left the nation impoverished after a decade of world-record hyper-inflation.

But so far Mugabe has proved reluctant to accept major political reforms, maintaining control over security forces while pressing ahead with prosecutions of rights activists and Movement for Democratic Change supporters.—Sapa-AFP