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The Extraordinary Summit of the SADC leadership, held on the 9th November 2008, has just concluded with the resolution that a Government of National Unity be formed immediately in Zimbabwe and furthermore that the Ministry of Home Affairs be co-ministered between the MDC and Zanu PF.
In addition, the SADC leadership have stated that Constitutional Amendment 19, which would provide the legal framework for the agreement, should be drafted as soon as possible, but only after the new government has been formed.
With greatest respect to SADC, the issues before them, which were not resolved by the facilitator’s various visits to Zimbabwe and by the Troika meeting held in Harare on 27th October 2008, centred around the
following:
• The equitability and fairness in the allocation and distribution of all ministerial portfolios.
• The immediate agreement and legal passage of Constitutional Amendment 19
• The constitution and composition of the National Security Council
• The equitable allocation of Provincial Governors
• The fraudulent changing of the Global Political Agreement between its acceptance by the principals on 11th September 2008, and the signing of the same on 15th September, 2008
The MDC is shocked and saddened that the SADC Summit has failed to tackle these key issues .
Firstly, the principle of equity and fairness. It is the MDCs position that any coalition or cooperative government has to be based on genuine power sharing of portfolio allocations. In this regard, we had proposed a formula which seeks to pair various ministries on the basis of relative parity. Thus, in our view, to the extent that Zanu PF had allocated itself the portfolios of defence and state security, it only made sense that the Ministry of Home Affairs should go to the MDC.
Equally, this methodology was suggested and communicated to the facilitator in writing on Wednesday the 15th October , to the Troika on the 27 October 2008 and to the SADC Executive Secretary on 30 October, 2008. Thus SADC knew fully our position.
Secondly, we had also made it clear that the issue of the enactment of Constitutional Amendment 19 was a precondition to the formation of any new government. More importantly, the offices being created in the
global political agreement, such as that of the Prime Minister, could only come into being with Constitutional Amendment 19. Events after the 15th September 2008, in respect of which serious lack of sincerity has been displayed by Zanu PF, demonstrated quite clearly that one could not proceed on the basis of good faith in a government not grounded on a legal foundation. Thus the question of Constitutional Amendment 19 cannot be postponed as it is not a question of procedure but rather an issue of substance.
Furthermore, in a political environment such as ours, poisoned by lack of a paradigm shift by Zanu PF, lack of sincerity and utter contempt towards the MDC and the wishes of the people, quite clearly the concept of co-ministering cannot work. In any event, what is the rational of proposing a co-ministry only in relation to the Home Affairs portfolio in total oblivion to Defence and State Security which Zanu PF already holds.
In our view a great opportunity has been missed by SADC to bring an end to the Zimbabwean Crisis. This omission has occurred because SADC approached this summit without any concrete strategy and did not have the courage and the decency of looking Mr Mugabe in the eyes and telling him that his position was wrong.
For the record, in today’s meeting it had been agreed that all the Zimbabwean principals would recuse themselves to allow an open and unfettered dialogue to take place amongst the SADC leaders. However, Mr Mugabe refused and the Chairman of SADC did not tell him to leave.
Thus, Mr Mugabe became a judge in his own case.
Perversely, pressure was brought to bear on the MDC, a party that won an election but has shown compromise and political maturity in these negotiations rather than the party that lost an election and has flouted the spirit and substance of the agreement, namely Zanu PF.
The failure of this summit to acknowledge the only fair and rational solution with regard to equitable power sharing, places the Zimbabwean people in a quandary. It is no exaggeration when I say that the needless suffering being experienced by millions of Zimbabweans every day is unprecedented in our country’s history.
It is precisely because of this that we remain committed to the agreement signed 15th September. It is precisely because of this that we cannot accept any arrangement that does not allow the MDC to effectively contribute to ending this suffering.
I would like to put out that the failure to consummate and implement the Global Political Agreement means that there is no legitimacy on any government or any person purporting to be Head of State. In short, Mr Mugabe is not the President of Zimbabwe without this agreement.
Given this dangerous and precarious situation and the suffering of the people of Zimbabwe we hope and pray that the guarantors of the agreement, in particular progressive members of SADC and the African Union, will now move very quickly to try and salvage this agreement.
We remain committed to the agreement and peaceful resolution of the Zimbabwean crisis and I am hopeful that sooner, rather than later, the democratic voice and vote of the Zimbabwean people will be heard and respected by our African institutions.
Until that day, the MDC will continue to stand with the people of Zimbabwe, for it is from them that we derive our legitimacy, and because of them, that we remain resolute in our struggle for democracy.
Morgan Tsvangirai is the President of the Movement for Democratic Change(MDC)
This is utter rubish!!!!T.Nonsense.
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This is ok Mr. Sir, your points are valid and reflect your position. We might be together in this one BUT I am not sure whether you eloquently articulated these issues during the Summit and the SADC leaders still did not take heed AND you stayed in the meeting through to the last minute.
I fail to understand how they could have still failed to get your arguments if they were well presented as they have been done here. In this case, i would be tempted to doubt your ability to present these issues.
I also suppose these guys have a low opinion of our Prime Minister Designate on the basis of his poor judgement that he exhibits at times. He seems to consult a lot and end up taking diferrent position depending on ‘who he hangs out with’ on a particular day
Good luck Mr. Sir.
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It should be known to all that in Zimbabwe the majority of all the electorate voted for Morgan Tsvangirai and not Savimbi(Robert Mugabe), who in a typical Jonasi Savimbi could not utter a word for a good 5-weeks planning with his team of murderers to turn against the electorate in the most vicious manner Zimbabweans have never witnessed in history.
If we never witnessed this from Ian Smith why should it come from some lousy fool , murderer who claims to be a liberator? Whose liberator? Zimbabweans are waking up to a very strange reality that they had all their trust vested in criminals , tricksters , a mafia kind of gang that called itself a government !! Now acts of their crimes are fully blown they nolonger see any thing wrong with killing and proudly proclaiming their degrees in voilence.
Good luck to them because God is watching every single act with a magnifying glasses. Mugabe and his cronies will definately account for all these crimes. They all know it but choose to think that day will never come !! BUT THEY ARE FOOLING THEMSELVES !!
Mugabe won no election , SADC knows it well and he is no President of Zimbabwe period !! If he wants to be one he must face Morgan in a fresh election and we all know that makes Mugabe have sleepless nights !!
CAN HE TAKE THE CHALLENGE !! CAN THE REAL MUGABE RISE TO THIS SIMPLE CHALLENGE PLEASEEEEEE !!!!!!
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hey, whoever wrote this to Morgan need to be reminded that there is a lot of sense and as usual contradictions. First we understand the need for constitutional ammendment to accomadate the Global Agreement to give it legal validity as stated. However still on legality, the constitution of Zim, flawed as it is, provides for a process of validatity the presidency as swearing in, that done one becomes for all purposes and interns the president, shame that that was done regardless of wat Morgan says, Bob is the president of Zi, its just absurd for Morgan to say he isnt the president coz even in the agreement he was never referred to as president designate but simply president. the co. ammendment isnt there to accommodate him but the rest whose positions arent there.
Also am a Zimbabwean and part of the “people” that u politicians talk about. dont know wen u referred to being committed to the “people” u mean which ones coz by the time u come to ur senses they would have perished. consistency demand that u as u claimed wen u pulled out of the June elections, that was doing it for humanitarian grounds, do the same now and form the much awaited gvt so that we will survive. note that even if u dont Bob will still go ahead so who will win, dead bodies or stubbirness!
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