South African President Jacob Zuma on Wednesday opened talks with Zimbabwe’s feuding leaders, amid growing pressure for the fragile unity government to move toward fresh elections.
Zuma appeared in good spirits, joking with reporters as he met President Robert Mugabe in Harare. Talks with Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai were set to follow his meeting with the ageing liberation leader.
Mugabe and Tsvangirai formed a unity government one year ago, but remain divided over a slate of issues, which has stymied progress toward the new polls envisioned in their power-sharing pact.
The unity government has halted Zimbabwe’s spectacular economic collapse, erasing hyperinflation and posting the first growth seen in more than a decade.
Tsvangirai, however, complains that Mugabe made a series of top-level appointments unilaterally and that his supporters remain the target of official persecution.
For his part Mugabe, in power since independence from Britain in 1980, has bitterly insisted that Western nations lift a travel ban and asset freeze on his inner circle before making more concessions.
The United States and the European Union this year both extended most of the sanctions for another 12 months, and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said during Zuma’s visit to London earlier this month that progress toward elections must be made before the sanctions can be lifted.
“The president wants to hear first-hand information on the discussions between President Zuma and Prime Minister Gordon Brown on the issue of sanctions,” one Zimbabwe official told Agence France-Presse, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“This is quite a real issue for him and he needs answers on the issue of sanctions.”
Growing pressure
Now pressure is growing for the parties to shelve their differences and focus on drafting a new constitution, which is meant to pave the way toward fresh elections.
Under the power-sharing deal, Zimbabwe was meant to draft a new charter and put it to a referendum by November 2010, paving the way to new elections by February 2011.
Public consultations on the charter were meant to start nine months ago, but are now only expected to begin in April.
Tsvangirai last week insisted that the unity government should stick to the original timetable, and called for African peacekeepers to supervise the polls to prevent a return of the bloodshed that marred the 2008 presidential race.
“We don’t want elections that are full of violence. We want free and fair elections,” he told his supporters at a rally outside Harare.
The unity deal gave Tsvangirai control over most of the levers of the economy, but left Mugabe with a firm grip over security forces.
Mugabe (86) has already said that he is prepared to contest the election. His party has no clear candidate in the wings to eventually succeed him. — AFP