PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe’s spokesman has rejected calls for a coalition government with the Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai saying the west “can go hang a thousand times.”
“They can go and hang a thousand times, they have no basis. They have no claim on Zimbabwe politics at all,” presidential spokesman George Charamba said in response to a question about Western criticism of President Mugabe.
He was speaking to reporters gathered at the ongoing African Union (AU) summit in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt.
Charamba also dismissed calls for a Kenya-style grand coalition government to resolve the situation in Zimbabwe, saying the way out would be decided the "Zimbabwean way".
"Kenya is Kenya. Zimbabwe is Zimbabwe. We have our own history of evolving dialogue and resolving political impasses the Zimbabwean way. The Zimbabwean way, not the Kenyan way. Not at all," Charamba said.
"The way out is a way defined by the Zimbabwe people, free from outside interference, and that is exactly what will resolve the matter," he continued.
Asked about President Mugabe’s right to be leader Charamba said that the right to be president "derives from the Zimbabwe people as expressed through this June election. Anything else is immaterial and we don't give a damn."
"But from the perspective of our people, which is the perspective that matters, they went to the poll, they realized they were defending their own sovereignty and defending their own land and they did precisely that."
Charamba also said President Mugabe had extended an olive branch to the opposition and that was the basis of any discussion.
"There are two political parties in Zimbabwe that are prepared to discuss -- we are talking about a ruling party that has offered dialogue to the opposition."
Charamba also reacted to questions on the criticism from AU observers that violence marred the vote. He said: "They did not say that violence was related to one side of a political equation, it was directed at all political players."
He also reacted to the British Foreign Office minister Mark Malloch Brown’s call for President Mugabe to go saying his words were a throwback to the colonial past when Britain ruled Zimbabwe.
"When he pronounces himself on Zimbabwe, he is simply recalling an historical period when the white man reigned supreme in Zimbabwe and that era is gone, gone forever.”
‘Mugabe is a hero’
Meanwhile, African leaders yesterday greeted President Mugabe as a "hero", dashing hopes that Zimbabwe's government would come under immediate pressure from the AU.
President Omar Bongo of Gabon gave his public backing for President Mugabe saying: "He was elected, he took an oath, and he is here with us, so he is President and we cannot ask him more."
"He conducted elections and I think he won."
Mr Bongo added that African leaders would not allow Western governments to dictate their view of Zimbabwe. "We have even received Mugabe as a hero," he said.
"We understand the attacks but this is not the way they should react. What they've done is, in our opinion, a little clumsy, and we think they could have consulted us first."
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READER OPINIONS
n/a • n/a Subject: TSVANGIRI's ISRAEL in ZIMBABWE Wed, 02 Jul 2008 01:57:26 • Tsvangiri is a man thats come back to haunt us. We have seen men like him 500 hundred years ago. Yes the men that captured African men women and children to go on slave ships. He is motivated by money and power as promised mainly by the British US and Australia. If he knows and cares for the people and history of his country he would not compromise Zimbabwe and create another ISRAEL among his African people
Gwatkwata Mlambo • N/A Subject: LONGLIVE COMRADE ROBERT GABRIEL MUGABE Tue, 01 Jul 2008 21:12:32 • Yes long live Comrade Mugabe our liberator, the one who empowered us Africans. May the LORD GOD ON HIGH give you all the wisdom to guide us out of these Western machinations that seek to destroy your legacy. We are behind you.
Omugabe • Dziva@sanandresano.com Subject: Look Inward & Look East for Self-development, Zim Patriots! Tue, 01 Jul 2008 15:48:22 • Africans
By now you know well the wicked ways of theWEST, who always seek to Divide and Dominate!
Long live the Zim Patriots!
Long live Magnanimous Mugabe, African Hero!
Long live the African leaders, who are well awake to the historical torment coming out of Europe.
May the relentless racist enemies of Africa suffer the very fate they are concocting for The First Man & Template of Mankind, The African!
The TRUE FRIENDS of Africans in the enlightened East are not sanctioning Africans.
Be vigilant, Africans!
All the storms of goodness are gathering to defeat your relentless!
Omugabe • Dziva@sanandresano.com Subject: Look Inward & Look East for Self-development, Zim Patriots! Tue, 01 Jul 2008 15:47:47 • Africans
By now you know well the wicked ways of theWEST, who always seek to Divide and Dominate!
Long live the Zim Patriots!
Long live Magnanimous Mugabe, African Hero!
Long live the African leaders, who are well awake to the historical torment coming out of Europe.
May the relentless racist enemies of Africa suffer the very fate they are concocting for The First Man & Template of Mankind, The African!
The TRUE FRIENDS of Africans in the enlightened East are not sanctioning Africans.
Be vigilant, Africans!
All the storms of goodness are gathering to defeat your relentless!
Isaac Bwoni • ibwoni@gmail.com Subject: Hero! Tue, 01 Jul 2008 15:12:28 • President Mugabe is a HERO! If only all puppets were not puppet enough to see things the President Omar Bongo sees them. Africa is Africa and should not be dependent on Europe. Till when should blacks depend on Britain and the USA? Morgan Tsvangirai and his other puppets feel that they are not sane enough to stand alone as blacks and thus believe in licking the boots of the British. No wonder why the MDC leader has never run a business in his life and wants to convert the whole country into employees of white-owned companies. Britain can go with all its companies, if Zimbos survived in the past ten years on a cash basis, what can stop us from surviving now? Tsvangirai must just answer the sanctions issue! What kind of power-hunger is that which makes him wish his own people dead like that? Nobody stoppes him from going to war against the colonialists, after all he was a Grade 2 informer of the British! This guy does not deserve to LEAVE. So many people died for Zimbabwe to do away with Rhodesia and its British imperialists and Tsvangirai thinks it's that easy to reverse everything and revert to being tea-boys. NEVER. Long live BOB, Long live Zimbabwe.
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