Back to Index

This article participates on the following special index pages:

Harare demands withdrawal of AU envoy
Zim-Online
July 06, 2005

http://www.zimonline.co.za/headdetail.asp?ID=10095

HARARE – Zimbabwe has asked the African Union (AU) to withdraw its envoy and to follow "proper procedure" when appointing a new emissary to assess Harare’s controversial urban clean-up campaign, authoritative sources told ZimOnline.

The sources said that Mugabe was also expected to meet Alpha Konare, chairman of the AU Commission that runs the daily affairs of the union and Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo in Libya on the sidelines of the AU summit, to discuss the issue of the continental body’s envoy to Harare. Obasanjo currently chairs the 53-member AU.

A senior Harare official, speaking anonymously, said: "What has been put forward is that the AU withdraws its envoy currently in the country to allow for proper procedures of notifying the government ahead of such a mission ....this is as it should be, it is common in any diplomatic relationships and Zimbabwe is not any different."

Balame Tom Nyandanga, a rapporteur for refugees on the AU Commission on Human and People’s Rights, is stuck in Harare, since arriving last weekend as government officials refuse to clear him to visit families who were evicted under the urban clean-up operation, insisting his mission was un-procedural and in breach of protocol.

Konare dispatched Nyanduga to Harare in a major U-turn as international pressure mounted on the union not to remain silent in the face of gross human rights abuses inflicted by the Zimbabwe government on poor urban families it evicted en masse from their homes.

The government exercise that Mugabe says is necessary to smash crime and restore the beauty of Zimbabwe’s cities has displaced close to a million people, many of whom are now living in the open without food or clean water. The AU had earlier said it would not interfere with the widely condemned clean-up operation because it was an internal matter.

Yesterday, Nyanduga said he would extend his stay in Zimbabwe as AU officials tried to convince Harare to allow him to proceed with his mission.

"I am still in the country but I don’t know for how long. I am continuing to be in touch with the government on that (assessment trip)....there will come a point in time at which we will talk about it," Nyanduga said.

But the sources were adamant Harare wanted Nyanduga out of Zimbabwe although they said he would not be deported as European Union election observer team leader, Pierre Schori, was expelled just before the country’s 2000 general election.

Harare has however accepted a United Nations envoy, Anna Tibaijuka, who is now in her second week in Zimbabwe touring different parts of the country to assess the impact of the mass evictions and how the world body could intervene.

Earlier this week, UN boss, Koffi Annan told journalists he had been in touch with Mugabe and that he was awaiting Tibaijuka’s report before deciding on what course of action to take.

"I personally have been in touch with President Mugabe. We have discussed this issue several times," Annan said in response to a question whether he was happy with Africa’s silence on the mass evictions.

Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.

TOP