The Southern African Development Community (SADC) is placing unprecedented pressure on President Robert Mugabe to quit office and pave the way for peace and stability at home and within the region.
Mugabe is now facing a war on two fronts: with SADC heads of state at the regional level and a divided ruling Zanu-PF party at home. All are pondering the political implications of his continued stay in office.
At the regional level, Zimbabwe’s close allies are closing ranks and making it abundantly clear that political reforms are essential. This week Angolan Deputy Prime Minister Aguinaldo Jaini told the media that ”the resolution of the Angolan conflict provided lessons to other African countries, particularly Harare, if it was willing to listen”.
Jaini added that the deteriorating situation in Zimbabwe is now a barrier to ”greater regional integration, restore[ation] of peace and stability”.
Meanwhile, during his visit to Zimbabwe two weeks ago, Tanzanian President Jayaya Kikwete made it clear to Mugabe that SADC, as well as crucial SADC allies such as the European Union, are fed up with Harare.
Jonathan Moyo, Mugabe’s former spin doctor, now an independent MP, says this is the first time SADC has taken a proactive stance on Zimbabwe. ”It’s the first time that the SADC has successfully put Zimbabwe on the agenda. Once you find yourself on that agenda, then you are simply confirming that you have security problems back home … you are already knocking on the doors of a similar agenda at the United Nations.”
Despite resistance from South Africa, the United States and the EU are insisting that the Zimbabwe issue should be discussed by the UN Security Council. South Africa, which chaired the Security Council for the month of March, has kept Zimbabwe off the agenda.
This week’s hastily convened SADC meeting — the situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo was also on the agenda — came only a day before a crucial Zanu-PF party meeting at which Mugabe had hoped to gain support for a renewed presidential bid in 2008.
”It is genius for the SADC to have this meeting ahead of the [Zanu-PF] central comittee meeting. Whatever agenda Mugabe had [to extend his presidential term] will be put on hold, if not removed completely,” Moyo said. ”Mugabe will never be removed from the SADC agenda until he has solved his problems back home.”
”The SADC will remind him his time is up, politely, and he may have to think again when he meets his party’s central committee,” says an insider within Zanu-PF, who believes regional pressure is vital if Mugabe is to quit.
Political analysts in Zimbabwe agree that SADC pressure could affect the current crisis. ”SADC this time around will achieve something because South Africa is desperate. It doesn’t want the 2010 World Cup disturbed,” says Dr John Makumbe, a University of Zimbabwe political science lecturer.
”If the SADC doesn’t achieve anything, South Africa will be in bad shape. So they are fighting collectively, pressuring Mugabe to stop violence,” he added.
”[South African President Thabo] Mbeki will fight for dialogue first — between the opposition and Zanu-PF — and then Mugabe’s exit by 2008,” Makumbe added.
According to sources briefed about the talks between Kikwete and Mu-gabe, Kikwete told Mugabe that the SADC was concerned about the beatings and torture of opposition activists. Kikwete and Mbeki want the August SADC summit in Zambia to find a conclusive resolution to the question of succession in Zimbabwe.
A bemused Mugabe blamed opposition forces for fanning political violence, but implored SADC ”to turn a blind eye to Western interests to effect a regime change in his country,” the same source said.
Last week, South Africa pushed its own diplomatic initiatives to a new level, gathering intelligence and other information from various Zimbabwean players present in Johannesburg. The information was expected to guide SADC leaders during their meeting this week.
Last week, South African foreign affairs officials met the secretaries general of the two wings of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), Professor Welshman Ncube and Tendayi Biti.
According to a Zimbabwean opposition source, senior South African officials, including the Director General in the Presidency, Frank Chikane, Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Aziz Pahad and others were locked in meetings for six hours to ”obtain the views of the MDC collectively, and gather comprehensive information on the root cause of the problem”, to ”see how they can resolve the crisis to the satisfaction of everyone for the restoration of normalcy”.
The opposition leaders are understood to have taken the officials to task for not taking an aggressive public stance against the deteriorating political situation.
But the source said the South Africans complain that their position is being misunderstood, that to ”remain engaged and have access to all sides, they must never alienate any of the various sides”, and that condemning Mugabe would provoke him to ”hit back”.
South African is said to be planning separate meetings with Mugabe and various other players involved in the dispute, including the clergy.