Civic groups reject national unity government

Zimbabwe's rival political leaders are expected to comment soon on a Nigeria-South Africa initiative aimed at encouraging them to work together.

But, following last week's controversial presidential elections, civil society leaders said on Monday they would oppose a government of national unity.

The presidents of South Africa and Nigeria ended talks in Zimbabwe on Monday with their counterpart Robert Mugabe and his opponent Morgan Tsvangirai, with an appeal that they should bridge the political divide in the interests of the country.

"In a matter of days they (Mugabe and Tsvangirai) should let us know where we stand and where they stand," Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo told a press conference. South African leader Thabo Mbeki added that the "responsibility rests first and foremost and principally on the leadership of Zimbabwe" to solve the nation's problems.

South Africa has promoted the idea of a government of national unity as a way to ease the country's political crisis in the wake of the disputed 9-11 March elections, and to enable Zimbabwe to deal with its crushing economic problems.

But Brian Kagoro, a member of the NGO umbrella group Crisis in Zimbabwe Committee, told IRIN: "We as civic leaders have rejected it on the basis that these guys [the ruling ZANU-PF party] stole the election and you cannot unite with thieves ... Zimbabwe won't heal by papering over injustices."

He acknowledged that some "weak" members of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) could favour a unity government. But he said Tsvangirai did not have a "blank cheque" and was aware of the sentiment of rank and file supporters opposed to a political deal that legitimised a poll condemned by local monitors and some international election observers as deeply flawed.

Kagoro said the only way forward would be for Mugabe to resign and to be replaced by a "moderate" ZANU-PF leader. A transitional government could then be formed which would oversee the amendment of the constitution to reduce the powers of the presidency and allow for electoral reform, leading to fresh polls under international supervision.

He predicted that "Mugabe will tell them to go to hell - he doesn't understand compromise". The only other option left for the opposition, Kagoro said, would be the "escalation of the conflict within constitutional limits". Zimbabwe's labour movement announced on Monday a three-day strike to begin on Wednesday in protest over the election results which handed Mugabe a comfortable margin of victory.

Obasanjo and Mbeki are due in London on Tuesday for talks with Australian Prime Minister John Howard, under the auspices of the Commonwealth, on whether Zimbabwe should be sanctioned over the elections. An interim Commonwealth report last week said the poll was marred by violence and intimidation and was not free or fair.

Meanwhile, the MDC's legal challenge has been strengthened by a statistical survey highlighting a significant difference between the results announced by Tobiah Mudede, the country's registrar-general, and those compiled by the state-appointed Election Supervisory Commission (ESC), news reports said.

In Gokwe North, the government said there were 32,300 votes cast, but the ESC put the figure at only 13,200. In as many as a quarter of the 120 constituencies, there was a discrepancy of more than 5,000 votes between the two "official" numbers, the Financial Times said.

According to MDC analysis, if the ESC count is used with votes subtracted from Mugabe where the official count was "inflated" and added to Tsvangirai where the official count was allegedly understated, the opposition leader would have narrowly won.