Finally, a deal has been agreed upon in Zimbabwe. Late last night (Thursday 11 September), Zimbabwe’s ruling ZANU-PF party agreeded with the opposition MDC to sign a power-sharing deal. South African President Thabo Mbeki, who has mediated the talks, said the ruling Zanu-PF and opposition had agreed on all issues, and will announce a national unity government on Monday. It was about time! These negotiations have been dragging on for a very long time with both parties not agreeing on one thing or the other. Now that there has been an agreement, we have to wait until Monday (15 September) to find out exactly how this power sharing deal is going to work. For now, it may be a bit too early to celebrate and think that things are going to change for the best in Zimbabwe as we do not know what the deal contains. It is clear that either Mugabe or Tsvangirai has backed down from their initial demands. Who is the one that backed down?

It had been suggested that the major stumbling block with regards to this power sharing deal was Mugabe’s reluctance to relinquish power and ultimately have more power than Tsvangirai in a government of national unity. Tsvangirai himself was not willing to sign a deal in which he had no power as he said it is better not to sign a deal at all than to sign a half hearted deal. So it is either that Mugabe has decided to give Tsvangirai power or Tsvangirai has accepted to have very little power. I would like to think that the later does not apply. I can not see Tsvangirai being the one who backed down. But I stand to be corrected and we will only know the facts on Monday. Or could it be that Tsvangirai felt that he may aswell just sign the deal after Mugabe had threatened to form a government without the MDC if the MDC did not want to sign the deal? It could have been just a case of “let’s just do it” from Tsvangirai’s side.

I know that for now, most Zimbabwe’s have put the champagne on ice and will not celebrate this break through deal until they know exactly what this deal contains. There will be a lot of talk and speculation all weekend long with lots of ifs and buts. The best thing to do for now is just wait. We only have to wait for 3 days, what is 3 days after we waited weeks for election results to be announced?

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