Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai said on Monday he was ready to negotiate with President Robert Mugabe’s ruling party after his withdrawal from a presidential election, but only if political violence stopped.
Tsvangirai, who pulled out of the June 27 vote on Sunday, also called for regional leaders to push for a postponement of the poll or for Mugabe to step down. But the government said the election would take place as planned.
As concern mounted both within and outside Africa over the violence, police raided the Harare headquarters of Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and took away scores of victims of political attacks, the party said.
Tsvangirai, who says about 90% of his supporters have died in brutal attacks by Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party, told South Africa’s Talk Radio 702: ”We are prepared to negotiate with Zanu-PF, but of course it is important that certain principles are accepted before the negotiations take place. One of the preconditions is that this violence against the people must be stopped.”
One idea that had been mooted is for negotiations on a national unity government that could tackle Zimbabwe’s crisis.
Tsvangirai said his supporters would have risked their lives if they voted on Friday because of brutal attacks by supporters of Mugabe’s Zanu-PF.
Mugabe (84), who has been in power since independence from Britain in 1980, has vowed never to hand over to the opposition, branding them puppets of the West. He denies his supporters are responsible for the violence.
Tsvangirai later told United States National Public Radio that Southern African Development Community [SADC] leaders should work to ensure the election ”is postponed and conducted under SADC [standards] or to pressurise Mugabe to concede that in the first round he has lost the election and that he must give up power”.
The MDC has appealed to the international community, particularly the African Union and SADC, to put pressure on Mugabe to resolve an economic and political crisis that has sent millions of refugees fleeing into neighbouring countries.
Reaction was swift from Jean Ping, the AU’s top diplomat.
”This development and the increasing acts of violence in the run-up to the second round of the presidential election are a matter of grave concern to the commission of the AU,” he said in a statement.
Ping said he had started consultations with AU chairperson Jakaya Kikwete, the president of Tanzania, with SADC and with that body’s designated mediator in the crisis, South African President Thabo Mbeki, to see what could be done.
Ping, the commission chairperson, said Zimbabwe was at a critical point and called for restraint and an end to violence.
Angola’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday SADC foreign ministers were meeting in Luanda to discuss the Zimbabwe crisis and might issue a statement later in the day.
‘Strong signal’
Meanwhile, Helen Zille, leader of South African opposition the Democratic Alliance, on Monday called on President Thabo Mbeki publicly to acknowledge that the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe is illegal and illegitimate, and she urged him to sever all diplomatic ties with the country.
”Mugabe has no legal mandate from the Zimbabwean people to govern, and he has made it clear that he will cling to power by any means necessary. He has shown that he will not respond positively either to mediation or quiet diplomacy,” Zille said.
”South Africa must now use every available channel to create the conditions for a free and fair election in Zimbabwe through sustained diplomatic pressure on the Mugabe regime, and by motivating for the deployment of an AU peace-building force to Zimbabwe.”
The DA leader wanted South Africa to impose smart sanctions on the Zanu-PF elite, including travel bans to South Africa and the freezing of all South African assets linked to Mugabe and Zanu-PF, and she called for the suspension of Zimbabwe from the United Nations, the African Union and SADC.
”The international isolation of Mugabe may be the only way to effect change in that country,” Zille said. ”Furthermore, the cutting of diplomatic ties with Zimbabwe will send a strong signal to the international community that South Africa will not be party to the undermining of democracy in Zimbabwe.”
Zille, who is mayor of Cape Town, said that the time for quiet diplomacy and negotiations had long gone. — Reuters, I-Net Bridge