Geanann, News24 User
According to Morgan Tsangvirai, the power sharing talks have reached deadlock.
The reasons given are the exactly what all fair-minded observers suspected. The terms that the MDC, as winners of the Parliamentary election and first round presidential election, is expected to sign includes the following:
Mugabe gets the security portfolios
Tsangvirai gets the economic portfolios.
What does this mean?
Mugabe and his generals and inner-circle retain the power to overrule and govern exactly as he has done the last twenty-seven years. He enforces his will through terror and violence using the military and police as his tool.
Tsangvirai must fix the big problem, the economy, but he will not be allowed to do it his way and certainly not in a way, that Mugabe disagrees with. The first farm he takes back from a Mugabe crony he is dead.
Mugabe is in a win-win situation and with his generals; he can plan a full return to power and the demise of the MDC.
Tsangvirai is in a worse position than Nkomo was. He has no honourable way out other than fighting this inequitable "agreement"
This is obviously not, what the majority Zimbabweans voted for. They would not have voted MDC if they wanted Mugabe and his generals to remain in power.
Thabo Mbeki clearly shows where his sympathies lie since he feels Tsangvirai should sign this "agreement". In the same breath, he denies his bias towards his crony, Mugabe and claims fairness to all parties.
Fact is this agreement, sanctioned by Mbeki, goes against the will of the majority of Zimbabweans. Who cares, Bob, Thabo and their Cabal of African leaders are happy. Let the cannon fodder think what they want.
This is a fair agreement, according to Mbeki, in an Africa context. Must the African way of handling problems always exceed all reasonable norms of fairness?
A critical characteristic of a good leader would be to recognise his failures gracefully. Mbeki and other African leaders, with the exclusion of a few, have reached the point of admitting failure on this issue and must pass the ball.
Not one to be accused of complaining without suggesting alternatives, I would think the following solution equitable:
Determine a date for a rerun of the Presidential vote
Confine the military to barracks during run-up
Place the police under international control during run-up
Open the country up to observer groups under auspices of UN
Allow press and media coverage with an independent body ensuring 50/50 split in state media time.
Election to be held under supervision of reliable and acceptable observer groups.
The suggested plan is pie in the sky and will not be accepted by Mugabe and his generals. He will have to be forced to agree and sword will have to be placed over his head. Even then, they may just decide to carry on regardless.
I doubt Mbeki and his fellow Africa leaders have the stomach for that. I do however believe that once Zimbabweans see that the neighbours are prepared to come to their aid, they will rise up and overthrow the Mugabe and his evil regime.
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