Zimbabwe will top agenda at SADC summit

By Tichaona Sibanda
13 August 2007

The serious deterioration in the political and economic situation in Zimbabwe will top the agenda of the Southern African Development Community summit in Lusaka, Zambia.

Foreign, security and defence ministers from the SADC bloc will meet on Wednesday on the eve of the Heads of State summit to discuss the Zimbabwe issue and that of Lesotho and the Democratic Republic of Congo. A delegation from Zimbabwe’s government is already in Lusaka and will attend SADC ministerial meetings scheduled from Monday through to Friday.

The highlight of the summit will be a briefing on Friday by South African President Thabo Mbeki to his counterparts on the progress of the mediation talks between the Zanu (PF) and the MDC. An extraordinary SADC summit in March tasked Mbeki to mediate talks between the ruling party and the opposition in an attempt to resolve the country’s long political crisis, which has brought in its wake a deepening economic crisis.

A high-powered delegation from the Tsvangirai led MDC is also in Lusaka and is being headed by Vice-President of the party, Thokozani Khupe. Secretary for Foreign Affairs Elphas Mukonoweshuro, who is also in Lusaka, said their game plan was to maintain a high profile presence in order to engage key players in the region, especially foreign ministers.

‘We want to ensure that as they (foreign ministers) deliberate as council of ministers, they are able through our inputs to have a balanced idea of the ingredients for a resolution of the Zimbabwe crisis,’ he said.

Mukonoweshuro said it was generally agreed among the key players in the region, from foreign ministers to heads of state, that Robert Mugabe’s report at the SADC summit in Dar es Salaam has now been discredited and could work against him during the summit. During the Dar es Salaam summit, Mugabe blamed tensions in the country on an opposition campaign of violence.

Last week we reported that SADC heads of state were left with egg on their face after allowing Mugabe the benefit of the doubt when he claimed at a meeting his regime was cracking down on the opposition to stem a terrorism plot.

The brutal assault on opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai and several other activists had put Mugabe in the spotlight and he had responded by getting the Home Affairs ministry to produce mountains of ‘information’ packed into a dossier incriminating the MDC. But the terrorism charges against the MDC have all been dropped.

The MDC delegation in Lusaka this week has also been updating delegates about the collapse of the state case. Apart from scheduled meetings with SADC foreign ministers, other party representatives have been lobbying and seeking support for their positions ahead of the summit.

An advance team led by the MDC’s regional officer based in South Africa, Nqobizitha Mlilo, met with Tilenje Kaunda, brother of former Zambian President Kenneth Kaunda and president of the United National Independence Party, formerly Zambia’s ruling party over the weekend.

The MDC delegation has also met with civil activists, church leaders and students, whose support is important because Zambia is assuming the SADC chair. Regional powerhouse South Africa has meanwhile shocked observers by blaming Britain for the deepening crisis in Zimbabwe.

A document circulating among diplomats, ahead of the SADC summit, accuses the UK of leading a campaign to ‘strangle’ the economy of Zimbabwe.