Last week Morgan Tsvangirai, Prime Minister-designate of the Zimbabwean government was not in attendance at talks in Swaziland on the crisis in his country because, according to the New York Times "President Robert Mugabe, refused to give him a passport.”
This comes over a month after SADC sponsored power sharing agreements were finalized and signed, in what most observers, including Africa Action and then President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki, deemed a historic moment and precedent in African mediated solutions for African problems.
Since the signing on September 15, this bright vision has dimmed each day, however, as the two main parties privy to the agreement, Zanu-PF (led by President Mugabe) and the Movement for Democratic Change (Morgan Tsvangirai) have deadlocked over the distribution of four key ministries: defense, foreign affairs, finance, and home affairs. The deal requires consensus over these ministries, yet critics predicted from the get-go that did not seem likely. This “limbo over key ministries” has only emphasized that the power-sharing agreement has really just come down to a power-getting battle.
