South Africa’s Minister for International Relations Maite Nkoana-Mashabane today said a new date for the Southern African Development Community special summit to look into Zimbabwe’s preparedness for elections had not been set yet.
The meeting was scheduled for this Sunday but has been postponed amid speculation that President Robert might have said he would not be able to attend.
“The date for such an extra-ordinary summit always gets decided upon by the availability and programmes of heads of state, creating space for this meeting. It’s not an ordinary, scheduled meeting,” the South African minister said.
There was media speculation that Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai might boycott the elections. He was supposed to have hinted on that in Bulawayo but a statement released by his own party about that meeting mentioned no boycott but instead encouraged people to turn out in their numbers to vote.
Tsvangirai instead described his party as a winning team.
“There is no reason for us to focus on problems that have bedevilled us through the four years that we have been in this inclusive government,” he said. “Actually let us look beyond the election and see practical interventions for our future in a new government.”
“We are a winning team. There is no loser in a winning team. Let us join hands and trudge forward to finish the struggle that we started in 1999. We do not object to the holding of elections anytime. What we are saying is that we want fundamental reforms as stipulated in the Global Political Agreement (GPA) to be implemented,” Tsvangirai said.
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