South Africa denies Mugabe is snubbing talks

By Violet Gonda
16 July 2007

Contradictory information continues to come out of South Africa due to the secrecy surrounding the SADC led talks, leaving desperate Zimbabweans with no idea what is going on. The latest conflicting evidence that has emerged is that ZANU PF had abdicated from the negotiations and had dumped Thabo Mbeki as mediator – but then South Africa denied these reports and said plans were underway to set a new date for the facilitation process. This follows the failure of ZANU PF to show for the latest scheduled round of discussions.

The South African Press Association quotes Foreign Affairs spokesperson Ronnie Mamoepa saying in a statement: "The ZANU PF delegation could not attend the scheduled discussions in Pretoria this week due to prior engagements and for this they tendered an apology to the South African government."

This has led critics to question how seriously the Mugabe government is taking this regional initiative. With Zimbabwe in crisis, the talks should be their absolute priority.

Political analyst Professor Brian Raftopolous said: “The fact that ZANU PF didn’t show up to the last session of the talks is indicative of the way they have behaved in the past. And it was quite predictable that at some point that this would happen and Mugabe will try to derail the discussion and to challenge the authority of both President Mbeki and SADC.”

But Raftopolous said Mugabe knows that withdrawing from the talks completely would cause huge problems for him in SADC.

The way the opposition is handling the talks has also come under scrutiny. Analysts say although both MDCs are being careful and staying engaged so as not to hand Mugabe any “ammunition” by pulling out of the talks, they still need to do more and increase their capacity to work with each other.

Years of repression and oppression have severely weakened the opposition leaving it with limited options and with no proper focus on how to deal with this crisis. Instead the MDC factions have chosen an easy distraction – fighting each other. In the past week the rivals exchanged accusations over the lack of progress of their “unity talks.”

Raftopolous said: “I think it is unfortunate that those statements are still being made. I think it’s immature of those politicians who are still doing that. I think they have bigger things to sort out and I think there is a basis for a proper working relationship.”

He added: “There have been a series of talks over the last 10 months and there is a basis for them now to come together in a more substantial way. And it’s time for the leaders Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara to take the necessary steps to bring their groups together.”