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25 August, 2008 Dealing with the Devil
As pressure grows on Zimbabwe’s rightful leader Morgan Tsvangirai he must resist the temptation to ameliorate his demands in power-sharing talks with Robert Mugabe. Mr Mugabe’s insistence on retaining control of the security forces is a pay-off that Mr Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), and the country as a whole, cannot afford.
Since the March elections the brutal campaign of intimidation and persecution of MDC activists and supporters unleashed on Robert Mugabe’s orders has |
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threatened almost to wipe out the MDC as a political entity. This culminated in Mr Tsvangirai’s decision to bow out of the forced second round of the presidential election, handing the presidency to Mr Mugabe.
Although Mr Mugabe agreed to power-sharing talks with Mr Tsvangirai, it is obvious that he has no intention of giving up control of the apparatus of intimidation which has so far kept him in power. His most senior military officers are just as entrenched, given their own vested interests not just in financial terms but in avoiding accountability for the atrocities they have perpetrated.
As long as Robert Mugabe retains control of the security forces the MDC is under serious threat. If Mr Tsvangirai accepts such a deal it would merely turn state oppression of its people into a factioned and potentially warring state itself. Mr Tsvangirai’s power would be neutered before he even took office and the deal would raise the spectre of the government collapsing in on itself, with one part attacking another and potentially fatally undermining what is left of the state’s integrity.
Along with the practical concerns there is the bitter moral pill of allowing a man who has presided over the ruin and plunder of a once-vibrant country being allowed to retain power which is his purely through sickening violence.
There have been some encouraging signs in the last few days, not least of which the MDC candidate’s election as speaker in the Zimbabwean parliament. The presidency is the most powerful institution in the country, however, and unless Mr Tsvangirai can hold firm in these negotiations it will remain so.
It may perpetuate the current crisis in the short term, but Mr Tsvangirai should stick to his guns. If he doesn’t, he risks being ‘bought off’, sidelined and made irrelevant, clearing the way for many more years of misrule by Mr Mugabe.
See also: A bad deal worse
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