A LONDON-BASED Zimbabwean pro-democracy group has called on Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai to “reconsider his position” in the wake of his sex scandals, but the MDC-T leader was defiant on a visit to Plumtree.

ZimVigil, which has held protests against President Robert Mugabe outside the Zimbabwe embassy in London every Saturday since 2002, said Tsvangirai’s love life was “more than a laughing matter”.

In a statement after its latest vigil last Saturday, the group said: “People were alarmed that Tsvangirai appears to have walked blindly into a Zanu PF trap and has become a laughing stock. There were nods of agreement when someone said: ‘Angagotonga seyi nyika ari mumagumbeze?’ (How can he rule the country when he’s always in bed?)”

The group said it shared a respect for Tsvangirai for his “heroic work leading the MDC for the past twelve years”, but added: “It was felt that he should – as the saying goes – reconsider his position. Zanu PF has been paralysed by its inability to renew its leadership. The MDC should not make the same mistake.

“We believe there is no shortage of talent in the MDC and, with elections unlikely in the foreseeable future, there would be time for a new leader to make his mark.”

But ZimVigil admitted it “somehow doubted Tsvangirai will make way”, saying his characteristics were captured in a Zimbabwe Tourism Authority poster at the embassy which poses the question: “Wonder what an elephant’s skin feels like?”

Tsvangirai has been under pressure after it emerged he had made his girlfriend, Locadia Karimatsenga Tembo, pregnant with twins. He sent emissaries to pay lobola and request marriage at her rural home in Mazowe, but he stunned the country when he announced he was divorcing her 12 days later, stating that he had “serious misgivings as to whether this will be a perfect union”.

Tsvangirai claimed “there is now an underhand and active political hand that is driving the processes and this has resulted in everything regarding this relationship now taking place on camera, with the public media journalists in tow.”

He also appeared to suggest Mugabe loyalists in state intelligence were involved – although this has been trashed by critics who say Tsvangirai went into the relationship fully aware that Karimatsenga’s sister, Biata Beatrice Nyamupinga, is a Zanu PF MP and her husband a diplomat posted by Mugabe to Australia.

“If Tsvangirai wants Zimbabweans to take him seriously as a potential head of state and government and commander-in-chief of the defence forces, then he must take full responsibility for stinging Locadia without playing media or political games by pretending that he doesn't know who opened his own zip for the sting,” said Tsholotsho North MP Jonathan Moyo (Zanu PF).

Tsvangirai – who has not publicly denied reports that he had a baby boy named Ethan with a 23-year-old Bulawayo woman in March – made campaign stops in Plumtree and Masvingo at the weekend, and insisted that his chaotic private life had no bearing on his push for the presidency.

“My personal life has nothing to do with the issues that are troubling the country so people must not waste time talking about what I have done. Rather focus on programmes for progress than what is happening in Tsvangirai’s life,” he said in Plumtree.

The same defence had been offered days earlier by the United States ambassador to Zimbabwe, Charles Ray, who said Tsvangirai must be judged on performance.

The ambassador's comments drew sharp rebuke from Moyo, who blasted: "Ray should not poke his nose in our public life. Has he become Tsvangirai's ambassador?"

On another stop in Masvingo, Tsvangirai – whose wife Susan died in a car crash in March 2009 – claimed that it was difficult to marry a second time.

“You go here and there, and sometimes you say let me leave it. There are many stakeholders, children, friends, political party — it’s difficult to please everyone. You have to deal with all the stakeholders,” he said.