We Are Proved Right As Mugabe Is Confirmed To Have Reneged

Long Walk To Swearing-in: This is the only swearing in that Mugabe has done so far - that of cabinet ministers. Roy Bennett and governors are still not sworn in and the Zimbabwe Independent confirms what my regular readers knew more than a month ago: that Mugabe has gone back on his word and now refuses to swear in MDC governors. But the paper has it wrong on the reasons for the refusal to swear them in, as my regular readers will also know.

Harare, Zimbabwe, 28 August 2009

About a month ago, I told you on this very blog that Mugabe was backtracking on the appointment of MDC governors as agreed with Tsvangirai and Mutambara.

At the time, wide-eyed and clueless MDC-T apologists dismissed the scoop, insisting that Mugabe had "no choice."

Today, the Zimbabwe Independent carries an article entitled: "Stalemate Beckons As ZANU PF Reneges on Governors".

Of course, this is not news to readers pf this blog. But the Independent has it wrong in terms of the reasons it gives for Mugabe's backtracking.

The paper claims that ZANU PF wants to use the issue of governors as a bargaining chip for Gono and Attorney-General Tomana to stay on in their posts.

Nothing could be further from the truth. As I told you earlier this month on this blog, Mugabe and ZANU PF are now banking on the MDC-T losing its majority in parliament.

The "division of labour" we see now in the Inclusive-But-Moribund Government is based on the election results from March 2008. Tsvangirai, as you will recall, was actually against those elections, saying they breached the spirit of the talks then underway, which had started in 2005.

If the MDC loses its majority, as is now almost certain under current circumstances, the very basis of the composition of the Inclusive Government will fall away.

So, Mugabe, in reneging on the deal to appoint MDc governors, is putting forward this same argument.

In fact, on the governors, Tsvangirai had insisted that the provinces where the opposition has the most seats should go to that opposition party. Now, however, in provinces like diamond-rich Manicaland, where MDC-T MPs are under siege, that advantage faces the risk of falling away.

So, yes, Mugabe has backtracked, just as I told you and now all those MDC-T apologists who were shouting and screaming blindly have put their tails between their legs.

You will not be hearing from them on this one, I can assure you, apart from their impotent shouts and insults directed at the dictator Mugabe, who is smiling knowingly to himself right now, glad to have outwitted Tsvangirai and his hapless supporters yet again.