Tsvangirai leads street demonstration

Tsvangirai leads street demonstration

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By Staff Reporter

ZIMBABWEAN opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai led a demonstration through the streets of Harare on Friday, catching the security services off guard.

Tsvangirai, joined by several senior officials from the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and afternoon shoppers, marched from the party's Harvert House headquarters to Parliament Building and back.

Zimbabwean police who have crushed past demonstrations were nowhere in sight shortly before noon.

Correspondents estimated the marchers to number 500, while the party's spokesman Nelson Chamisa said they were closer to 2000.

The protesters carried placards and sang denouncing President Robert Mugabe's government. Some of the placards read: “Mugabe must go”.

Chamisa said the demonstration was the start of their long threatened "winter of discontent" programme which was the central theme of Tsvangirai's address to his party faithful at a congress last March.

Political commentators have warned that street protests risk being crushed by Mugabe's security services and such a strategy would backfire on the MDC. Worse, they say, Tsvangirai might fail to draw big enough crowds to force political change which would simply weaken his supporters' morale.

Chamisa said Friday: "This is the beginning of our programme. We were firing the warning shots. The leadership is ready. All members of the executive were present. It is an on going programme. We are committed to the realization of a new Zimbabwe."

The MDC split into two camps in October last year. The other group, led by robotics scientist Professor Arthur Mutambara, accused Tsvangirai's group of deviating from the party's principles of "non-violence, transparency, zero tolerance for corruption and respect for collective decision making".

Senior officials from the two groups met in South Africa last week and signed a "non-aggression pact", apparently following pressure from their international supporters to stop taking aim at each other and work together.

The officials also discussed sharing party assets, according to sources. Both groups, however, say a reunification of the two factions is not on the cards.
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