GPA may not be ideal but it was the best negotiators could come up with

Zimbabwe is once again in the spotlight. The Southern African Development Community will this weekend review progress in resolving the Zimbabwe crisis and will be under a lot of pressure to be seen to be reining in President Robert Mugabe under control. But as we argued just a few days after the signing of the Global Political Agreement, it might not have been ideal but the agreement was the best Zimbabwe’s leaders could come up with.

Contrary to what most people are saying, the inclusive government is making a lot of progress. The problem is that the crisis in Zimbabwe has become an industry, a money-making industry that key players, especially those in civic society, would not like to go bankrupt.

South African Minister of International Relations Maite Nkoana-Mashabane even said last week that it was the Joint Monitoring and Implementation Committee that insisted that all the terms of the GPA must be met before any elections are held, and not the SADC troika as everyone is now saying.

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