Zimbabwe and deadlocked power sharing

Sep 22, 2008 Editorial

After months of uncertainty following the refusal of President Mugabe of Zimbabwe to accept the popular will of that country’s citizens and hand over power to Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC party, there was some hope that relief may be in the offing for that troubled country, when a power sharing agreement was signed on September 15th between the two rivals.

In our July editorial, “Hope for Zimbabwe?” we had concluded, “The prognosis does not look too bright for Zimbabwe.” Unfortunately, it still does not.

Fundamentally, the barrier to any successful power-sharing formula in Zimbabwe is the refusal of all the parties to accept such a form of governance as being inherently the best mode of governance for their country.

What we have essentially is a shotgun marriage that was brokered primarily by President Mbeki of South Africa, the contents of which demonstrate that the main concern of the latter was to persuade Mr Mugabe to sign on a dotted line and not to craft a coherent agreement, much less one that was in the best interest of Zimbabwe.

The decision of the ANC to push Mr Mbeki from the presidency of South Africa right after the signing of the agreement adds another uncertainty to the viability of the agreement.

Both Mr Mugabe and Mr Tsvangirai believe that they are the person who individually should be the head of the Government of Zimbabwe. The existence of a third leader, Arthur Mutambara, who is from a splinter group of the MDC, adds new uncertainties to a stable evolution of politics in Zimbabwe.

The agreement has a new cabinet of thirty-one members, with fifteen seats and the Presidency going to Mr Mugabe’s ZANU, and sixteen seats allocated to MDC – thirteen to Tsvangirai and three to Mutambara. The built-in explosive element in the agreement is the lack of a clear demarcation as to where the buck ultimately stops.

Mr Mugabe remains as president and head of cabinet that will formulate policies for the governance of the country. Mr Tsvangirai is to become an executive prime minister, to execute the policies as head of a council of ministers.

Even though there is a “Joint Monitoring and Implementation Committee”, known as JOMIC, drawn from all parties, it is unclear as to how a deadlock will be broken. Mr Mugabe has publicly made it clear that he is not about to be dominated by “outsiders”.

While on the surface, the agreement has some similarities with the one which appears to be holding in Kenya, the personalities in the Zimbabwe equation, especially Mr Mugabe, appear to be much more recalcitrant.

Mr Mugabe has, for instance, already forced a standoff with his insistence that all the crucial ministerial positions, such as the armed forces and the finance ministry, fall into his bailiwick. This does not auger well for a peaceful transition, since the armed forces are the most opposed to the possibility of the MDC exercising any real power.

The world community, including the World Bank, has made it very clear that they are prepared to help in rebuilding the shattered economy (inflation has been averaging, officially 11.2 million percent, but is conceded to be more like 43 million percent, and some three million citizens have fled to neighbouring countries), but only if real changes are manifest “on the ground”; meaning, of course, that Mr Mugabe will have to allow some real power to be shared.

Conservatively, Zimbabwe needs at least US$1 billion to offer it any hope of near term improvement. In the meantime, one million persons face systemic hunger.

The events unfolding in Zimbabwe should give pause to those who proffer and hold out power sharing as some sort of panacea for Guyana’s problems. Power sharing, we are witnessing, demands a level of maturity and nationalism in the political leaders that go far beyond the facile statements that are bandied about on the political hustings.

There has to be a willingness to curb personal ambitions for the good of the country: not all who shout “Unity! Unity!” can be trusted to step aside for others who may be from the “outside”. Let us continue to monitor the situation in Zimbabwe.

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Zimbabwe and deadlocked power sharing

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