Mugabe, Tsvangirai talks on power-sharing still deadlocked (Roundup)

Oct 4, 2008, 15:17 GMT

Harare - Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe and pro- democracy leader Morgan Tsvangirai failed to break the deadlock in power-sharing talks Saturday, with no movement on the allocation of ministerial portfolios, sources close to the talks said.

However, former South African president Thabo Mbeki, the mediator in the negotiations that began in earnest in late July, was expected in Harare on Monday to try and break the impasse, said the source, requesting anonymity.

'There is no agreement,' he said after Mugabe and Tsvangirai, as well as Arthur Mutambara, the leader of the lesser faction of Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), had met in State House, the official presidential office, for two hours Saturday afternoon.

'Mbeki should be here on Monday, and we expect that negotiations will resume on Monday under Mbeki.' Mbeki has the mandate of leaders from the southern African region as mediator.

A power-sharing agreement setting up a new transitional 'inclusive' government has been stalled since the document was signed on September 15, as the 84-year-old autocrat Mugabe and Tsvangirai were deadlocked over the allocation of key ministries.

Analysts say the country has been without a government since August 25 when MPs - elected in March - in the parliament now dominated by the MDC, were finally sworn in.

Sources said the MDC was willing to concede the defence and state security ministries to Mugabe's Zanu-PF party, but was insisting on getting the ministries of home affairs, which includes the police, and finance.

The meeting Saturday was the second fruitless meeting between the three this week. MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa said Mugabe wanted 'all the important ministries.'

The agreement provides for a total of 31 ministries, 15 of them for Zanu-PF, 13 for the Tsvangirai's MDC and three for Mutambara's faction. The two MDC factions are expected to form an alliance to present a majority in the cabinet.

'What is becoming very clear is that these negotiations need to be mediated,' the source said. 'If there is going to be any movement, it can only happen after Mbeki's intervention. Otherwise we will go on having meetings where the same positions are restated.'

However, Zanu-PF has opposed Mbeki's involvement in the issue of the cabinet. 'I don't think that the allocation of ministries is a matter that can be referred to the facilitator. We cannot, at the slightest difference of opinion, call outsiders to mediate.'

Zanu-PF sources say a clique of party leaders, alarmed at the imminent loss of patronage and influence they have enjoyed for the last nearly 29 years, have dug in their heels and are trying to force Mugabe to concede no more than he already has.

While the deadlock drags on, the country's humanitarian and economic crisis continues to worsen daily, with inflation surging through tens of million per cent, while ordinary people queue sometimes for days for cash at banks, and there is little or no stock in shops.

Aid agencies report widespread starvation in rural areas.

'There just is no food, or the little there is is too expensive,' said a commentary Saturday on the website of Zimbabwe's Catholic Jesuit order.

'The country is not functioning. Our leaders do not even see our national or local needs. They could not care less. They spend their wrangling over ministerial appointments. Like useless workers, they might as well be sacked.'