Reacting to the hint that President Robert Mugabe could retire, South African opposition leader Tony Leon says said the Zimbabwean president made conciliatory statements ”in order to buy time but he has no intention of being bound by his words”.
Mugabe hinted this week he would retire once his land reform project was completed.
Leon said reports that Mugabe was building a R37-million mansion at a time when his fellow Zimbabweans faced starvation and members of the opposition were being tortured and killed ”further illustrates the venality of his regime but do not prove his intent to step down”.
”Even if suggestions of President Mugabe’s retirement were to be accepted as true, they would not go far enough in addressing Zimbabwe’s political crisis. The problem in Zimbabwe is not just President Mugabe but the entire corrupt elite that surrounds him.”
Leon said that the only real and just remedy for Zimbabwe was a return to democracy — through holding fresh presidential elections and monitored by international observers.
Leon said President Mugage’s heir apparent was Zimbabwe Parliament Speaker Emmerson Mnangagwa, whom he described as ”a man who has no respect for democracy or human rights.”
Leon said Mnangagwa was recently named in a United Nations report as being the ”architect” of the Zimbabwean army’s campaign of plunder in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
”He funneled riches to Zanu-PF cronies as the Cognolese people bled, and has been implicated in the trade of conflict diamonds.”
Leon said Mnangagwa was also head of the Central Intelligence Organisation during the 1982-87 Matabeleland genocide.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) leader said Mnangagwa was embraced and applauded by ANC officials at the ANC National Conference in December 2002.
”But to the Zimbabwean people, he is not a man to be trusted,” said Leon.
Leon said he had sent a letter to President Thabo Mbeki requesting that he make public the Commonwealth Secretary General’s report on the Commonwealth chairpersons’ committee on Zimbabwe.
”I have also asked that he (the president) president it to the Speaker (of the National Assembly) for distribution to all MPs and for debate in the National Assembly.” – I-Net Bridge