News / National
Mugabe, Tsvangirai in do or die meeting
09 Jun 2013 at 08:07hrs | Views
President Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai are set for a crunch meeting to iron out their differences on the election date.
Mugabe and Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara have insisted that the elections be held in accordance with a Constitutional Court ruling which said they must be held by July 31.
But MDC-T and MDC formations argue that elections should only be carried out once all the processes dictated by the new Constitution are completed.
These processes include, among other things, a mandatory 30-day voter registration exercise, inspection of the voter's roll and the sitting of the nomination court.
The MDC formations are also demanding that outstanding reforms on the security sector, media and electoral laws be made to enable a level playing field for the polls.
Sources said the meeting was going to be a very difficult one because both Mugabe and Tsvangirai's political lives depended on these elections.
The MDC-T is aware that an election that is held without a levelled playing field would be skewed in favour of Zanu-PF. The party is therefore now pinning its hopes of having key reforms before next month's harmonised elections on Sadc as the guarantor of the global political agreement (GPA).
The party's secretary-general Tendai Biti on Friday told The Standard that his party expected the regional body to ensure key reforms were made before July 31.
Sadc last week postponed indefinitely a summit that was scheduled for today in Maputo, Mozambique after Zanu PF indicated that it needed more time to study the implications of the Constitutional Court ruling.
But a senior Zanu PF official, Paul Mangwana told a public meeting hosted by Crisis Coalition in Zimbabwe last week that his party would not listen to Sadc but would abide by the Supreme Court ruling.
"Sadc is not a court. They have no right to make an order; it's only the court that can make an order," said Mangwana.
But Biti said it was not possible to comply with the date because there should be a mandatory minimum 30-day period for voter registration, followed by one month voter inspection, then another 45 days' notice.
Mugabe and Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara have insisted that the elections be held in accordance with a Constitutional Court ruling which said they must be held by July 31.
But MDC-T and MDC formations argue that elections should only be carried out once all the processes dictated by the new Constitution are completed.
These processes include, among other things, a mandatory 30-day voter registration exercise, inspection of the voter's roll and the sitting of the nomination court.
The MDC formations are also demanding that outstanding reforms on the security sector, media and electoral laws be made to enable a level playing field for the polls.
Sources said the meeting was going to be a very difficult one because both Mugabe and Tsvangirai's political lives depended on these elections.
The party's secretary-general Tendai Biti on Friday told The Standard that his party expected the regional body to ensure key reforms were made before July 31.
Sadc last week postponed indefinitely a summit that was scheduled for today in Maputo, Mozambique after Zanu PF indicated that it needed more time to study the implications of the Constitutional Court ruling.
But a senior Zanu PF official, Paul Mangwana told a public meeting hosted by Crisis Coalition in Zimbabwe last week that his party would not listen to Sadc but would abide by the Supreme Court ruling.
"Sadc is not a court. They have no right to make an order; it's only the court that can make an order," said Mangwana.
But Biti said it was not possible to comply with the date because there should be a mandatory minimum 30-day period for voter registration, followed by one month voter inspection, then another 45 days' notice.
Source - thestandard
