Mbeki shuns journalists

Mbeki shuns journalists
By Kingsley Kaswende and George Chellah in Harare
Sunday May 11, 2008 [04:01]

South African President Thabo Mbeki on Friday shunned the media for the first time for fear of being misquoted after he held an exclusive meeting with President Robert Mugabe over post-election events in Zimbabwe. And Zimbabwe's main opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai yesterday announced that he would participate in the presidential run-off elections.

President Mbeki, the SADC-sanctioned chief negotiator on the Zimbabwe crisis, met one-on-one with President Mugabe at State House in a meeting that lasted three and half hours and whose agenda was kept secret.

A source said President Mbeki was unwilling to issue any comment because he felt the media quoted him out of context during his last visit when he was quoted as having said there was no crisis in Zimbabwe.

"I was here when the President was asked a question on the Zimbabwean situation. The President never said there was no crisis in Zimbabwe. He was addressing a specific issue, which was the electoral process, over which there was no crisis. He said people had voted and there was verification which is a normal electoral process," the source said.

"In any case, do you know what a crisis means? It means all the institutions of the state have collapsed, which has not happened here. We know they (western media) always want to do that. Anyway, who would resist the temptation of putting Mbeki and Mugabe on the spot? Today he doesn't want to take that risk."

President Mbeki was last month heavily criticised for his "no crisis" utterances and has since been discounted by the opposition MDC as an honest broker in Zimbabwe. Tsvangirai called for his replacement with SADC chairperson President Levy Mwanawasa.

President Mbeki has consistently declined to publicly criticise President Mugabe, choosing to implement what has been referred to as quiet diplomacy. His meeting with President Mugabe came two days after a fact-finding team he had sent to Harare to assess the reported incidents of violence ahead of the presidential election runoff confirmed that there was evidence to show that there was violence.

The team leader, Kingsley Mamabolo, said they had seen the violence but that his team was due to identify the perpetrators of that violence.

After meeting President Mugabe at State House, President Mbeki proceeded to meet Mamabolo and his team at the South African Ambassador's residence in Highlands suburb. He returned to State House three hours later before he was seen off to the airport by President Mugabe and cabinet ministers at 20:00 hours.

And Tsvangirai, who on Friday refused to meet with President Mbeki whom he described as a biased mediator, yesterday announced that he would take party in the presidential election re-run in Zimbabwe.

Tsvangirai's announcement in Pretoria, South Africa yesterday ended speculation on whether or not he would contest the polls.

According to CNN, Tsvangirai said the voters and supporters have told MDC that they will support him in a second round of voting.

"I intend to return as shortly as possible and intend to begin a victory tour," Tsvangirai said. Tsvangirai has been away from Zimbabwe seeking support from other Africa leaders while the March 29 election results were delayed.

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) finally announced last week that Tsvangirai won more votes than President Mugabe in the presidential race, but not enough to avoid a runoff.

ZEC has yet to announce a date for the runoff, and Tsvangirai had previously insisted he would not announce his decision until that date was set.