THE NEW YORK TIMES
August 12, 2008
JOHANNESBURG — News agencies reported Tuesday that Arthur Mutambara, the leader of a faction of Zimbabwe’s opposition party, had signed a deal with President Robert Mugabe to form a unity government after months of turmoil and political instability in the country.
The reports, citing an unidentified senior official in Mr. Mugabe’s party, ZANU-PF, said that Mr. Mutambara and Mr. Mugabe had sidelined the country’s main opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, by reaching the deal without him or his dominant wing of the opposition party.
Mr. Mutambara could not be reached to confirm or deny the report.
But David Coltart, a Senator from the faction, said that if Mr. Mutambara had made such a side deal — and he had no confirmation that he had — it would have been without a mandate from the faction’s national executive and was highly unlikely to be supported by the faction’s 10 members of Parliament or six senators.