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(TALKZIMBABWE) Mugabe, Tsvangirai craft sanctions removal strategy

Mugabe, Tsvangirai craft sanctions removal strategy
TSM/TZG
Sun, 23 Aug 2009 18:57:00 +0000

PRESIDENT Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai met last Monday and agreed to craft a definite course of action that they will sell to Cabinet as a national strategy to fight the illegal sanctions imposed on the country, it has been learnt.

However, Deputy Prime Minister Professor Arthur Mutambara could not attend the routine meeting of the three principals to the inclusive Government as he had to attend another urgent meeting on energy.

Presidential spokesperson George Charamba confirmed the meeting, saying it was now clear that sanctions were one of the important outstanding issues under the Global Political Agreement signed by the principals.

“It was quite an amicable meeting. The leaders are working on an inclusive strategy against sanctions which will have to be sold to Government for immediate implementation. There is a general appreciation that sanctions are the most outstanding of the remaining issues and indeed that their impact is pervasive and all-blighting.

“Even the MDC-T has come to the realisation that its own agenda cannot be fulfilled under conditions of sanctions,” said Charamba.

The Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office, Mr Gorden Moyo, was subsequently tasked to work on a concept paper on sanctions.

The document will be titled “Tackling international isolation: A discussion paper on sanctions/ restrictive measures”.

The paper will have four parts. The first will deal with the various competing narratives on sanctions, among them (i) the nationalist narrative, (ii) the democratisation narrative, (iii) the Western narrative, and (iv) the public view of sanctions.

The second stage will deal with recording the official position of different governments, blocs and international organisations.

The third stage focuses on the socio-economic impact of sanctions on Zimbabwe while the fourth will offer recommendations and possible strategies and all this will be done under Article IV of the Global Political Agreement.

“The prime objective is to use the concept paper to build consensus and understanding in the inclusive Government on this emotive issue of sanctions,” said Moyo yesterday.

It is understood that during Monday’s meeting, President Mugabe, who is the Head of State and Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces, raised the issue of sanctions with PM Tsvangirai, who in turn “genuinely” asked what the MDC-T should really do regarding the sanctions.

PM Tsvangirai told the President that he thought his overseas trip had laid the foundation for a follow-up in the fight against sanctions.

The MDC-T leader expressed concern that the Sadc committee that was set up to call for the removal of sanctions was “letting us down”.

President Mugabe is said to have told the MDC-T leader that his expectation and that of his party, Zanu-PF, was that there should be definite steps and activities by MDC-T to have sanctions removed as the party was responsible for their imposition.

The President reportedly told PM Tsvangirai that the MDC-T must make specific approaches to individual EU member countries asking them to simply remove the sanctions.

Sources said PM Tsvangirai was also told that “we should be explicit about what we are asking the West to do” which is the removal of sanctions and not the restrictive measures.

President Mugabe, the sources said, asked PM Tsvangirai whether he was aware that the West was still pushing for regime change in the country. The MDC-T leader professed ignorance to this. The President is said to have explained to the MDC-T leader that US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was recently in South Africa to push for regime change in Zimbabwe.

He added that British Minister of Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, David Milliband, was also scheduled to visit South Africa on the same mission. - TSM/TZG

Labels: GEORGE CHARAMBA, MORGAN TSVANGIRAI, MUGABE, SANCTIONS, ZDERA

posted by MrK @ 8:18 PM