Zimbabwe

African mediators called in over stalled power-sharing talks

Article published on the 2008-10-18 Latest update 2008-10-18 14:58 TU

Tsvangirai arrives for talks at the Rainbow Towers hotel
(Photo: Reuters)

Zimlbabwe's rival parties, Zanu-PF and the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), have both called for African mediation after the failure of four days of power-sharing talks. South African President Thabo Mbeki says on Monday he will travel with party leaders to Swaziland, where three members of a Southern African Development Coommunity (SADC) security body will try to break the deadlock.

Zanu-PF's chief negotiator Patrick Chinamasa told the state-run Herald newspaper that the deadlock is over who will head the Home Affairs Ministry, which controls the police force.

MDC leader Morgan Tsvingarai on Saturday called the talks "a monologue", accusing Mugabe of refusing to compromise.

After the talks broke up on Friday, Tsvangirai claimed that there was "an attempt to reduce the MDC to a meaningless position in the coalition government".

He has insisted that his movement needs to oversee at least some of the security agencies so as to reassure his supporters, who faced violence during the hotly-contested election campaign this year.

Chinamasa said that the MDC had been offered the finance ministry, which must tackle the world's highest inflation rate, at 231 per cent.

The political wrangling is preventing the country's leaders from addressing the crisis, says Harare-based economist John Robertson.

"There are a great many urgent issues that need attention and these will get no attention until we have a political settlement," he told RFI.