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Talks, dialogue, negotiations and GNU - Post June 2008 "elections" - Index of articles
Food
crisis spells disaster
IRIN
News
September
29, 2008
http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=80652
Zimbabwe is
facing a "disastrous" food crisis if a new power-sharing
government is not formed quickly, leader of the opposition Movement
for Democratic Change (MDC) and prime minister-designate, Morgan
Tsvangirai, has said.
"We need to respond
to this crisis with utmost urgency. It is therefore imperative that
a government be formed in the next few days and begins to implement
plans to insure that our people have food and do not die of starvation,"
Tsvangirai told reporters.
President Robert
Mugabe, Tsvangirai, and the leader of a smaller MDC faction, Arthur
Mutambara, signed a power-sharing deal
on 15 September 2008, but the deal, brokered by former South African
president Thabo Mbeki, deadlocked soon after, as the parties could
not agree on the allocation of ministerial posts.
Mugabe subsequently left
the country to attend the UN annual General Assembly meeting in
New York and returned to the capital, Harare, on 29 September.
Mugabe and Tsvangirai
have both stated recently that they expect the unity government
to be established soon. "We discussed the ministries before
I left [for the UN]. Only four remain [to be decided], but there
is no deadlock," Mugabe was reported as saying on his return.
"We will be setting up government this week, towards the end
of the week."
Tsvangirai made his appeal
after a recent meeting with farmers, food security analysts and
other interested parties. "I am sad to report that my preliminary
findings in this exercise show a state of emergency in the area
of food security, with disastrous consequences if we take too long
to attend to the crisis."
MDC spokesman Nelson
Chamisa told IRIN the absence of a power-sharing government meant
that there were "no mechanisms or strategies" to address
the food crisis.
The Zimbabwe
Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), the country's biggest union
federation and largely responsible for the formation of the MDC,
said the power-sharing deal was "unacceptable".
Unions
opposed to the deal
In a statement
the union federation said: "The agreement is far cry from the
ZCTU expectations, as it is an outcome of a flawed process. From
a labour point of view, the agreement is not acceptable. Any country
must be governed by a democratically elected government, and the
current arrangement means that the people would be led by an unelected
government for the next five years," it said.
"The ZCTU maintains
its earlier position on the need for a neutral transitional authority
as the panacea to the current electoral dispute. However, if the
present arrangement is to continue, it must be a transitional arrangement
that will lead to a free and fair election under a new, people-driven
constitution."
Earlier this year the
UN estimated that more than five million people, out of a population
of 12 million, would require food assistance in the first quarter
of 2009. November is the planting period in the main agricultural
season, but cash shortages, a paucity of agricultural inputs, an
unfavourable long-range weather forecast and renewed disruptions
on farms are likely produce another poor harvest.
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