The presidency has rejected reports that President Thabo Mbeki intends urging Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe to step down when he visits Harare next week.
”We strongly reject the notion that the president can go to another country to effect a regime change there,” presidential spokesperson Bheki Khumalo said in Pretoria.
”It is up to Mr Mugabe to deal with such issues.”
Mbeki is to hold talks with Mugabe as well as Zimbabwean opposition parties on Monday. Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo and his Malawian counterpart Bakili Muluzi will also attend.
Khumalo said: ”The president’s visit forms part of ongoing South African efforts to assist the people of Zimbabwe in the challenge of reconstructing their country.”
There has been widespread speculation that the 79-year-old Mugabe might leave office after he hinted in an interview last week that he was ”getting to a stage” where retirement might be possible.
Information minister Jonathan Moyo reportedly denied on Tuesday that Mugabe would bow out before his six-year term ended in 2008.
Earlier on Wednesday, Zimbabwe’s main opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, said that his party is willing to hold discussions with the ruling party to pave the way for Mugabe to leave power ”smoothly”.
The Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader said his party has mapped out a way ”to ensure a smooth exit” for Mugabe from power and to ensure that the southern African country moves to a ”post-Mugabe era”.
”The only way to resolve the current crisis… is through a process of serious and sincere dialogue between the MDC and Zanu-PF,” Tsvangirai said in a statement.
Relations between the government and the MDC are at a low point following a national strike last week over massive petrol price increases and the suspension of Harare’s opposition mayor on Tuesday.
”The MDC has five key points to ensure that this country moves to a position of post-Mugabe era,” Tsvangirai said in separate comments to reporters.
He said that his party’s solutions to Zimbabwe’s current economic and political crises emphasised negotiation, but insisted talks had to take place in a ”peaceful environment”.
”Without dialogue, without negotiation this country is doomed,” Tsvangirai told reporters at a press conference held ahead of May Day celebrations on Thursday.
He said the ”way forward” for the country’s workers — who form a key constituency of the MDC — also included national efforts at confidence-building in the country’s democracy and engaging international support.
Tsvangirai lost a presidential election to Mugabe in 2002, and is due to petition the result in court. – Sapa-AFP