'One man blocks Mugabe's resignation'
Thématique :
zimbabwe
by Godfrey Marawanyika, AFP, April 01 2008
Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe is ready to step down after he accepted he failed to win the country's presidential election, a senior source in his ruling party and diplomats said on Tuesday.
An official in Mugabe's Zanu-PF party said the president was prepared to step down after 28 years in power but was still trying to win agreement from the army's chief of staff Constantine Chiwenga.
Three European diplomats meanwhile said opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai was ready to deliver a press conference to confirm the news.
"He is prepared to step down because he doesn't want to embarrass himself by going to a run-off," the Zanu-PF source said on condition of anonymity.
"There is only one person still blocking him, the army chief of staff."
Senior diplomats in the capital Harare meanwhile confirmed that a deal had been done for Mugabe to step aside in favour of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
"Everything indicates that Mugabe will leave power smoothly," said one of the sources.
A second European diplomat said that Tsvangirai had called a press conference for later in the evening.
"It (the press conference) indicates at least that Tsvangirai feels secure and that he has something to say."
Various sources had earlier confirmed that senior members of Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change party and aides to Mugabe had been holding negotiations about an exit strategy since Monday.
The talks opened after it became clear that Mugabe, who has ruled the former British colony since independence in 1980, had been beaten in the first-round of the presidential election which was held simultaneously with parliamentary elections on Saturday.
The ruling party source said it now appeared that Tsvangirai had won around 48 percent of the vote - not enough for an outright majority - but that Mugabe did not want to suffer the indignity of going through a second round run-off with Tsvangirai later this month.
The MDC is confident that it has won both the presidential and parliamentary elections and is already slightly ahead of Zanu-PF in the legislative count with two-thirds of the results declared.
However there has still been no official results from the presidential contest, prompting MDC accusations that the authorities were desperately trying to cook up a way to keep Mugabe in power.
While there has so far been no significant violence in the aftermath of the poll, news that Mugabe was ready to step down came after a coalition of rights groups warned the country was teetering on the brink of anarchy.
In a petition to the regional 14-member Southern African Development Community and the African Union, a coalition of 18 rights organisations urged them to exert pressure for the rapid announcement of the presidential result.
"We... have found it necessary to send this urgent petition to your excellencies in order to save our country from potentially sinking into complete anarchy if election results are manipulated," the petition said.
The elections were held as Zimbabwe grapples with an inflation rate of over 100 000 percent and widespread shortages of even basic foodstuffs such as bread and cooking oil.
The 84-year-old Mugabe, Africa's oldest leader, has blamed the economic woes on the European Union and the United States, which imposed sanctions on his inner circle after he was accused of rigging his 2002 re-election.
Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe is ready to step down after he accepted he failed to win the country's presidential election, a senior source in his ruling party and diplomats said on Tuesday.
An official in Mugabe's Zanu-PF party said the president was prepared to step down after 28 years in power but was still trying to win agreement from the army's chief of staff Constantine Chiwenga.
Three European diplomats meanwhile said opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai was ready to deliver a press conference to confirm the news.
"He is prepared to step down because he doesn't want to embarrass himself by going to a run-off," the Zanu-PF source said on condition of anonymity.
"There is only one person still blocking him, the army chief of staff."
Senior diplomats in the capital Harare meanwhile confirmed that a deal had been done for Mugabe to step aside in favour of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
"Everything indicates that Mugabe will leave power smoothly," said one of the sources.
A second European diplomat said that Tsvangirai had called a press conference for later in the evening.
"It (the press conference) indicates at least that Tsvangirai feels secure and that he has something to say."
Various sources had earlier confirmed that senior members of Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change party and aides to Mugabe had been holding negotiations about an exit strategy since Monday.
The talks opened after it became clear that Mugabe, who has ruled the former British colony since independence in 1980, had been beaten in the first-round of the presidential election which was held simultaneously with parliamentary elections on Saturday.
The ruling party source said it now appeared that Tsvangirai had won around 48 percent of the vote - not enough for an outright majority - but that Mugabe did not want to suffer the indignity of going through a second round run-off with Tsvangirai later this month.
The MDC is confident that it has won both the presidential and parliamentary elections and is already slightly ahead of Zanu-PF in the legislative count with two-thirds of the results declared.
However there has still been no official results from the presidential contest, prompting MDC accusations that the authorities were desperately trying to cook up a way to keep Mugabe in power.
While there has so far been no significant violence in the aftermath of the poll, news that Mugabe was ready to step down came after a coalition of rights groups warned the country was teetering on the brink of anarchy.
In a petition to the regional 14-member Southern African Development Community and the African Union, a coalition of 18 rights organisations urged them to exert pressure for the rapid announcement of the presidential result.
"We... have found it necessary to send this urgent petition to your excellencies in order to save our country from potentially sinking into complete anarchy if election results are manipulated," the petition said.
The elections were held as Zimbabwe grapples with an inflation rate of over 100 000 percent and widespread shortages of even basic foodstuffs such as bread and cooking oil.
The 84-year-old Mugabe, Africa's oldest leader, has blamed the economic woes on the European Union and the United States, which imposed sanctions on his inner circle after he was accused of rigging his 2002 re-election.
