Harare - Attempts to settle Zimbabwe's political crisis
appeared to be shattered Saturday after President Robert Mugabe
allocated all the incoming power-sharing government's critical
portfolios to his Zanu-PF party.
The move was denounced immediately by the Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) party with whom Mugabe has been deadlocked over cabinet
posts for nearly a month, as 'unilateral.'
The announcement in the state-controlled daily Herald came the
morning after Mugabe, MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur
Mutambara, head of a small offshoot of the MDC, broke up on Friday
after failing to agree.
The three called for former South African president Thabo Mbeki,
the mediator in power-sharing talks between the three, to help break
the nearly month-long impasse over portfolios.
The Herald said the allocation of all 31 portfolios established in
terms of the power-sharing agreement the three signed on September 15
had been formally gazetted on Friday, and that the appointments had
been made 'in consultation' with Tsvangirai, as prime minister
designate.
MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa denied the assertion. He described
Mugabe's action as 'a giant act of madness which puts the
power-sharing deal in jeopardy.'
He said the octogenarian president had 'allocated ministries
barely hours after the three principals (Mugabe, Tsvangirai and
Mutambara) had agreed to disagree by referring the matter to the
mediator (Mbeki) after a logjam over all the ministries.'
Among the 15 ministries he allocated to Zanu-PF were defence, home
affairs (which includes the police), foreign affairs, justice, local
government and information - which analysts say are all crucial
maintaining to political power.
Except for defence, the MDC has been demanding most of the list
for itself. The retention of defence and home affairs means that
Mugabe would control all branches of the security services.
Chamisa called on the international community, the African Union
and the Southern African Development Community, the regional
political bloc, to 'protect Zimbabweans against the galloping power
appetite of the minority Zanu-PF leadership.'
The deadlock over the sharing of ministries has held up the
implementation of an 'inclusive' transitional government meant to
last for 18 months, since immediately after the agreement was
signed.
Observers say that the country is effectively without a
government and that it is accelerating the severe crises of famine,
an economic crash and the collapse of infrastructure that have
followed Mugabe's unbroken 28 years in parliament.
The MDC won a parliamentary majority and the most votes in the
simultaneous presidential election in March, but not enough ballots
for pro-democracy leader Tsvangirai to be declared outright winner.
The subsequent run-off presidential poll was preceded by a
campaign of savage brutality carried out by Mugabe's security forces
and Zanu-PF militias, with about 130 MDC supporters murdered and
thousands maimed and made homeless. Tsvangirai withdrew from the
poll and the result - a one-man race which declared Mugabe the
winner - was denounced by the rest of the world.
'The MDC did not append its signature to a Zanu-PF power-grabbing
deal, but to a power-sharing deal,' said Chamisa. 'We derive our
legitimacy from the people of Zimbabwe, not from Zanu-PF who were
rejected by the very same people on March 29.'
USA
Your Talkback on this Story