MDC team prepares for strategic international tour

By Violet Gonda

3 February 06

A delegation of MDC officials, led by party chairman Isaac Matongo, will be in the UK this coming week to start a tour of Europe, USA and South Africa to meet with opposition structures. The MDC representative in Brussels, Grace Kwinjeh, said the party is inviting the diaspora to contribute to a policy and ideology report that will be presented at the forthcoming party congress.

Mr Matongo and his team includes Nelson Chamisa, Thokozani Khuphe and Ian Makone and they will hold regional meetings in Leeds, Birmingham, London and Southend on Sea.

It’s been a busy time for the MDC leadership who, in an unrelated event, were deported by Zambian authorities in the early hours of Thursday morning. Although Zambian authorities say the opposition leaders violated Zambia’s immigration laws the MDC says this is the continued paranoia about opposition activities and merely demonstrates that the region does not take it’s obligation to human rights seriously.

Eddie Cross, who was one of the delegates in Zambia with party President Morgan Tsvangirai, says everyone in the delegation had presented themselves to an immigration officer both on the Zimbabwean side and the Zambian side. It’s reported that a significant number of CIO operatives greeted the MDC delegation on the Zimbabwe side and they wanted to know the exact nature of the delegation’s visit to Zambia. According to Cross, the opposition leaders refused to divulge any information.

He alleged Zimbabwe CIOs followed the delegation into Zambia and pitched up at the hotel were the MDC leaders was staying. Cross claims hotel management had to remove the security agents after complaints by the MDC. He said they were surprised to see more than 50 Zambian law enforcement agents that night, who came with a search warrant to evict the MDC leadership. The MDC denies falsifying their identities.

Eddie Cross said the leadership had gone to Zambia to hold a 2 day detailed strategy session and chose Zambia because of the sensitive nature of their discussions. The opposition believes the Mugabe regime has planted informers in every sector and bugged most meeting places including hotels in Zimbabwe.

Commenting on the deportation of the MDC leadership from Zambia, Kwinjeh said it’s unfortunate that SADC states have also taken on the continuation of harassing the MDC.

She said the opposition has found it increasingly impossible to hold any political activity in Zimbabwe because of repression. She said, “It’s an unfortunate situation that we have such a hostile environment in Zimbabwe that does not allow us to carry out democratic activities as Zimbabweans.”