The Telegraph
By Colin Freeman, Sebastian Berger in Johannesburg, Peta Thornycroft in Harare
14 Feb 2009
Zimbabwe’s new prime minister has claimed the country’s powersharing agreement is being sabotaged after one of his key aides faced charges over a long-discredited plot to kill President Robert Mugabe.
Morgan Tsvangirai, who was sworn in as prime minister last week, spoke out after the Mugabe-controlled police force pressed treason accusations against his colleague Roy Bennett, who is due to serve in the new joint cabinet.
“His arrest raises a lot of concerns,” said Mr Tsvangirai, who is seeking a meeting with Mr Mugabe to protest Mr Bennett’s detention. “It undermines the spirit of our agreement.”
The Herald newspaper, widely considered the mouthpiece of Mr Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party, claimed on Saturday that Mr Bennett was being investigated in connection with an alleged assassination conspiracy brought against several opposition MDC members from 2006.
One man was jailed for alleged weapons offences, but the rest of the case was dropped against other alleged MDC conspirators, who claimed it was an act of political malice. Mr Bennett, 52, fled abroad three years ago after fearing he would be fingered as a fellow suspect, but had returned to Zimbabwe after being offered the post of deputy agriculture minister.
Arrested on Friday, he is now languishing in a small, filthy cell in the colonial-era police station in the eastern border city of Mutare. MDC wellwishers are camped outside, despite police opening fire over their heads at one point in a bid to disperse them. His detention came despite assurances from Mr Mugabe last week that he was “sincerely and honestly committed” to partnership with the MDC. It also adds greatly to Mr Tsvangirai’s woes as he struggles to persuade his party to stick with the power-sharing deal.
The new joint cabinet was sworn in Friday, but Mr Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party has retained control of all key posts in the security apparatus, undermining hopes that a power-sharing government would curb his capacity to intimidate.
The continued harassment of Mr Tsvangirai’s political allies is just one of the mounting difficulties facing Mr Tsvangirai as he attempts to use his new role in government to steer Zimbabwe away from all-out crisis.
Many feel he has taken on an impossible task, which will simply result in the MDC party being tainted with the incompetence and failure of the Mugabe regime. Mr Tsvangirai’s ministers have taken on portfolios which could well backfire because of the sheer scale of the challenges they present.
When he walks into his department for the first time on Monday, new finance minister Tendai Biti will have the task of curbing the world’s highest inflation rate, while health chief Henry Madzorera wil grapple a cholera outbreak that has killed 3,500 people. Education minister David Coltart must overhaul a schools sector where only one in five pupils attend at present, unpaid teachers having left on masse to work abroad. Mr Bennett’s in-tray would have included the task of reviving the farming sector of a country that is now unable to survive without foreign food aid.
Mr Tsvangirai himself, meanwhile, must honour his personal pledge to pay the country’s 200,000 civil servants in foreign currency rather than the near-worthless Zimbabwean dollar.
He made the promise to cheers in a speech in a Harare stadium last week, but has yet to say where the cash will come from, illustrating the risks he faces in trying to act as a national saviour.
A source close to the MDC leadership said it would be examining the contents of the “national piggy bank”, if any, then looking at other sources. “We are approaching the Southern African Development Community, the donor community and looking at the viability of a loan as well,” he said.
It is estimated, however, that around $60 million will be needed within the next two weeks, and so far no foreign benefactors have indicated a willingness to stump up. Western nations have also said that the unity government must prove it is committed to economic reform before billions in reconstruction and development aid are released. But the MDC source added: “The more they help us make it work the faster it will work.”
Concerns have likewise been raised about how the MDC will be able to implement its policies if there is resistance from civil servants and public officials, among whom Zanu-PF’s influence stretches far and wide. The MDC insider source said there would be no political purge of government employees, as doing so would generate resentment and create obstacles.
“I don’t think there’s that many that want to obstruct us, particularly when we are talking about doctors back in hospitals and kids back in schools,” he said.