Mugabe faces SADC leaders ahead of key party meeting

Mugabe faces SADC leaders ahead of key party meeting

MUGABE is welcomed by Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete shortly after touchdown in Tanzania

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By Staff Reporter

A CRUCIAL meeting of Zimbabwe's ruling party which is set to to discuss plans to extend veteran President Robert Mugabe's tenure is set for Friday.

Mugabe is expected to return from a hastily-arranged regional summit in Tanzania later Thursday to face down his critics in his Zanu PF party.

A meeting of the party's political bureau took place on Wednesday with Mugabe in attendance before leaving for Tanzania.

The politburo meeting looked at resolutions and other outstanding issues forwarded by the party's annual conference last December, including an unadopted resolution proposing the postponement of the presidential elections from 2008 to 2010, ensuring a two-year extension to Mugabe's term.

Zanu PF sources at Wednesday's meeting said Simon Khaya Moyo, the country's ambassador to South Africa, asked Mugabe to clarify press reports that he now wanted the parliamentary and presidential elections in 2008, and that he wanted to stand, "so that we are guided accordingly".

An angry Mugabe is said to have told Moyo that it was "none of the politburo's business" but a matter for the central committee.

At that point, Zanu PF Women's League chief Oppah Muchinguri intervened, shouting, "we want you for life Mr President".

Former Cabinet Minister Dumiso Dabengwa snapped back: "Where have you heard such a thing (life president)?)"

Friday's gathering of the central committee will be the first since the party conference in December when proposals to extend Mugabe's term from 2008 until 2010, ostensibly in order to have simultaneous presidential and parliamentary polls, were given the green light.

The proposals have since met with opposition from other party elders and Mugabe already appears to have abandoned the idea of an extension, urging his supporters last week to gear up for elections next year.

Mugabe held informal talks with other SADC leaders on Wednesday night before the morning’s summit on Thursday which will end with a joint communiqué on the way forward.

Up for discussion would be the security situation in the region, particularly in Zimbabwe and the Democratic Republic of Congo where street clashes between government forces and a private army for rebel leader and former vice president, Jean Pierre Bemba, has claimed more than 500 lives.

Mugabe, his government under increasing international pressure over the beating of opposition leaders in police custody, arrived in Dar es Salaam shortly after dusk on Wednesday, reports said.

Jonathan Moyo, Mugabe's former right hand man and former Information Minister said SADC leaders would pressure Mugabe to leave office.

"I have been to these SADC summits and I know that behind closed doors the leaders are brutally frank," Moyo, now an independent MP, said in Johannesburg.

"They will remind Mugabe that he told them he would retire at the end of this term in 2008. They will tell him he must do that.

"The statement issued at the close of the summit will not strongly condemn Mugabe, that is not the way SADC works. But I am certain that in the meeting the leaders will have told him in no uncertain terms that he must retire.

"They will tell Mugabe that his rule in Zimbabwe is dragging down the whole southern African region. They will say Zimbabwe's economic collapse is negative affecting all neighbouring countries," said Moyo, who fell out of favour with Mugabe in 2005 when he decided to contest elections as an independent.

Moyo said that while Mugabe was likely to fight hard to retain his power, this "will be futile and dangerous".

"The forces are gathering against him. His back is against the wall. He relies on the police and army ... But the rank and file no longer support Mugabe and even the majority of top officers are no longer loyal. That spells trouble for Mugabe.

"I believe we are witnessing Mugabe's last days in power."

The 83-year-old Mugabe, who has ruled Zimbabwe since independence in 1980 from Britain, had previously indicated he would step down at the end of his current term next year.

But he made an about turn last year, insisting that he would stay put if his party was in danger of falling apart.

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