President Mugabe Talking Too Much and Day Dreaming- Tsvangirai

Tsvangirai told the MDC-T newsletter, The Changing Times, that President Mugabe should shut up and not cause alarm and despondence to innocent Zimbabweans.

He said the date for the forthcoming elections had not been discussed and yet Mugabe continued to talk about them as if they had been finalised.

He said Zanu (PF) had prematurely thrust itself into a violent election campaign mode following careless utterances by its leadership, including President Mugabe, who is the Zanu (PF) President.

“President Robert Mugabe continues to needlessly cause alarm and despondency by pretending to be oblivious to the fact that this is a coalition government,” Tsvangirai said.

“The President and the Prime Minister now share executive authority and one cannot act exclusively in making executive decisions,” he said.

Mugabe has gone ahead to appoint ambassadors and governors without consulting Tsvangirai. Tsvangirai has protested against these appointments to the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and gone to court but nothing has been reversed yet.

 Tsvangirai said he regrets Mugabe’s calls for an early poll as such utterances merely caused needless anxiety, alarm and despondency and political uncertainty in Zimbabwe.

He dismissed President Mugabe’s claims and posturing as “day dreaming”, saying the reform process as defined by the Global Political Agreement (GPA) should determine the election date.

“No one, at this stage, can single-handedly call for elections unless there is a unilateral abandonment of the GPA,” Tsvangirai, said. “No one wants to slide back to 2008 where the nation forced people to starve and where the people’s verdict was suppressed. After all, those elections were not credible.”
 
Meanwhile the United States embassy in Harare has condemned political violence which is being orchestrated by  Mugabe’s Zanu (PF) supporters which has gripped the country displacing hundreds of MDC supporters.

 The embassy said violence was against the GPA, an agreement which formed the unity government of Mugabe and Tsvangirai. Violence erupted in the country after Mugabe told his party at the Zanu (PF) conference last December that elections might be held anytime soon.

The MDC has blamed Zanu (PF) for beating up their supporters across the country. The MDC says thousands of their supporters have fled their homes to safe houses after they were violently forced out of their houses.

Zimbabwe has been experiencing violence towards and at election time prominently in the last decade as Zanu (PF) fights for its political survival after the coming in of the MDC into the political fold in 1999.

The US embassy called on all political parties to denounce violence and for the police to arrest violence perpetrators.

“The United States is alarmed by, and condemns, the recent spate of political violence perpetrated by youths and opportunists affiliated with elements of Zanu (PF).  Such unlawful actions violate the Global Political Agreement and demonstrate that the undermining of the rule of law has not changed fundamentally,” the US embassy said.

“We commend the restraint shown by those victimized or affected by these assaults in not responding with violence.  The U.S. calls on all parties to sincerely renounce violence as a political tool and for the law enforcement community to uphold the rule of law without partisan bias.”

The US embassy statement comes just days after the British embassy slammed violence in the country saying it is sad that two years after the formation of the unity government the country is still experiencing violence.

“It is this sort of unchecked violence – ignored by the police- and not imaginary sanctions, which does untold damage to Zimbabwe’s reputation abroad and makes it harder for real friends such as the United Kingdom to help attract investment the country so badly needs,” British ambassador, Mark Canning said.