South Africa’s official opposition will be sending a delegation, including its national chairperson Joe Seremane and its chief parliamentary whip Douglas Gibson, to Zimbabwe on Friday.
In a statement, Seremane said he would lead the delegation which would leave at 10.50am South African time on Friday and will arrive in the Zimbabwe capital, Harare at 12.30pm. The delegation is scheduled to leave Zimbabwe on Sunday at 1.25pm.
Seremane said: ”The visit is a sincere endeavour to determine whether the conditions exist for a free and fair election in Zimbabwe.”
That country’s parliamentary election is scheduled for March 31.
”If the conditions are reasonably okay, but not perfect, then we will state this in our report. If conditions are such that it will be impossible to hold a free and fair election, then we will also unambiguously state this,” said Seremane.
”We have previously asked for an appointment with President Robert Mugabe and Foreign Minister Stan Mudenge and as of yet we have had no response.
”It does not come as a surprise that they have refused to meet with us, for they clearly have something to hide, if they did not and if Zimbabwe was really an open democracy then there would be no reason for the Mugabe government not to meet with senior members of Parliament from the official opposition in South Africa.”
”The reason we are so interested in Zimbabwe is because it is one of our nearest and dearest neighbours, and because millions of its citizens currently live in South Africa there are strong ties of family and friendship between the two nations.”
”We think that South Africa has a special responsibility to intervene to protect democracy in Zimbabwe like it has done recently in Togo. If South Africa fails to do so then this will undermine the principles and future credibility of SADC, the AU and Nepad and will have severely negative consequences for South Africa’s own political and economic interests.” ‒ I-Net Bridge