A troika of Commonwealth leaders failed here on Monday to agree on how to deal with President Robert Mugabe, saving Zimbabwe from a threat of expulsion from the organisation.
Despite agreeing that the Zimbabwean leader had done nothing to address Commonwealth concerns that his re-election was undemocratic, the leaders of Australia, Nigeria and South Africa disagreed over new sanctions.
”There was a difference of opinion,” Australian Prime Minister John Howard told reporters at a press conference held jointly with Nigerian President Olusegun Obansanjo and South African President Thabo Mbeki.
”Australia was of the opinion that Zimbabwe should be fully suspended from the Commonwealth with immediate effect,” he said. ”The other two members of the committee are of the opinion that the progress of Zimbabwe should continue to be monitored over the next six months.”
In March the three leaders, who form a Commonwealth ”troika” to deal with the crisis, agreed to suspend Zimbabwe from the 54-nation body’s political councils for 12 months.
Commonwealth Secretary General Don McKinnon was to attempt to engage with Mugabe in a bid to persuade him to address concerns that his re-election was rigged and that Zimbabwe’s opposition suffers from persecution.
The leaders are also concerned about Mugabe’s policy of seizing white-owned land for distribution to his supporters, but said that their role as a troika was focused on the disputed election.
The three leaders agreed that Mugabe, who angrily boycotted Monday’s meeting, had failed to address these concerns. But the Zimbabwean leader’s African colleagues refused to endorse Howard’s tough line.
”We’ve agreed that it’s necessary to continue to try to engage with President Mugabe, in the interests of all the people of Zimbabwe,” Mbeki said.
Obasanjo said that the troika had in March given itself a 12-month mandate to assess Zimbabwe’s progress, and should not now change that plan.
”We have come together to assess the situation. There’s nothing wrong with having a half-term review,” he said.
”President Mugabe should be co-operating with the Commonwealth … I believe that he can.”
It will probably now be six months before the troika meets again to discuss the situation, and Howard was far from confident that Mugabe would take the opportunity to open a dialogue with his Commonwealth partners.
”We can’t even get the government of Zimbabwe to talk to the secretary general of the Commonwealth,” he said. ”They won’t even allow him into the country.”
A joint statement agreed by the troika also expressed ”deep regret” that moves to encourage reconciliation between Mugabe and the Zimbabwean opposition had stalled.
”The Secretary General reported that, as a consequence, the level of suspicion, division and hostility between the various parties in Zimbabwe had increased considerably in recent months,” the statement said.
”Reports of harassment of the political opposition, the press and sections of the judiciary continued.
”The committee was also deeply disappointed that the president of Zimbabwe had not taken up their invitation to come to Abuja for dialogue with them,” it said.
Zimbabwean leaders, speaking for a domestic audience in their state-run media, were openly contemptuous of the troika meeting. Mugabe’s Minister of State for Information Jonathan Moyo derided the meeting as ”a monumental waste of time” and a ”circus”.
”The whole thing stinks of an orchestrated media event designed to insult the president and demonise Zimbabwe,” Moyo said.
Zimbabwe is currently barred from Commonwealth heads of government and ministerial meetings.
Mugabe and some of his key political and business allies are also the targets of international sanctions in the form of EU and US travel bans, and some of them have seen their foreign-held bank accounts frozen. – Sapa-AFP