Zimbabwe’s Prime Minister-designate Morgan Tsvangirai will address a rally in Harare on Sunday which will be the first real test of the effectiveness of a power-sharing agreement signed with President Robert Mugabe in September.
Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) said in a statement released on Friday night that the opposition leader would “unpack the character and substance of the political deal†at the rally at Zimbabwe Grounds in the Harare low-income suburb of Highfield.
The opposition leader has until now been barred from holding rallies, with the police citing security fears.
His last rally in Harare on June 22 was disrupted by ruling party militias who chased his supporters from the Harare Showgrounds, prompting Tsvangirai to withdraw from the June 27 presidential election run-off against President Mugabe.
Zimbabwe Grounds evokes memories of a March 11, 2007 incident when riot police stopped a prayer meeting organized by the civil society at the same venue and brutally assaulted and tortured senior opposition officials, including Tsvangirai.
The incident proved to be the turning point in an eight-year hostile relationship between Mugabe and Tsvangirai as it led southern African leaders to dispatch former South African president Thabo Mbeki to mediate in the political crisis.
Mbeki’s mediation gave birth to last month’s power-sharing deal between the two Zimbabwean political foes under which Tsvangirai becomes prime minister-designate.
Since the deal, a three-week impasse over the allocation of key ministries has stalled the announcement of a unity government.
Source African Press Agency
