HARARE – This morning The Zimbabwe Mail has just heard from high-level
sources in the Zimbabwe security services that President Mugabe is under
pressure from Zanu PF hardliners to arrest Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai,
outlaw the MDC and also expel the United States ambassador.
We can
reveal that an emergency high level meeting is currently under way in
Harare
this morning between Senior Zanu PF leaders and Security Chiefs and
on the
agenda is the plan to seize on the latest highly sensitive material
released
by the whistleblower website WikiLeaks, amid reports that
hardliners in Zanu
PF are pushing for the immediate banning of the Movement
for Democratic
Change led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.
There are now fears that
the country could slide into a military state as
Zanu PF opportunists try to
seize the moment to outlaw all political
activities in the
country.
Last night, the classified communication documents released by
the Guardian
newspaper revealed a catalogue of attempts by the United States
government
to help nudge President Robert Mugabe out of power.
A
senior government and Zanu PF official whose identity cannot be revealed
described the matter to our reporter as "very serious" and said they will
leave no stone unturned.
"Those collaborating with the Western forces
to overthrow us from power must
not cry foul when the rule of law takes its
course, we fought for this
country and we will not fold our hands and let
this happen", he said.
"We will get to the bottom of this and I can
assure you we have legal and
moral grounds to ban the MDC from engaging in
any political activities in
this country.
"Tsvangirai is going to be
locked up for a very long time, mudhara (Mugabe)
is very angry. I spoke to
him this morning and he is breathing fire", the
source said before he rushed
to the meeting.
The sources also said there will be efforts to pursue
those exiled
businessmen who engaged in the conspiracy to unseat Robert
Mugabe.
A bloodless coup was planned to remove Robert Mugabe as Zimbabwe's
president
with the help of pressure from the UN secretary general, according
to
classified US documents.A confidential memo from the US embassy in South
Africa is entitled "Secret power sharing plan" and dated 30 January 2007. At
the time Zimbabwe was plunging into an unprecedented economic crisis. The
cable names a group of prominent Zimbabwean businessmen living in South
Africa who were pushing for change but says their leader's identity should
be "strictly protected".
Despite the United States of American and
Zimbabwe having for long had an
uneasy relationship, political commentators
argue that the situation could
get worse following Mugabe’s mention in the
leaked documents. According to
them, Zanu PF has been gifted with a
propaganda coup.
Zimbabwe’s Foreign Affairs minister Simbarashe
Mumbengegwi says diplomats
engaged in the "illegal regime change" plot will
have to face the full wrath
of the law.
Mumbengegwi, who also doubles
up as External Affairs official in Zanu PF
says diplomats engaged in the
"illegal regime change" plot will have to face
the full wrath of the
law.
"Now the good thing about all this is that we now have
incontrovertible
evidence that the Western countries and the United States
in particular has
been collaborating with MDC T in this country to
destabilise this country
which is in total violation of the Vienna
Convention," Mumbengegwi said.
Mumbengegwi added," In the Dell report, he
admits that US is funding
political parties in this country. And everybody
knows that this cannot be
Zanu PF. And in our laws this is absolutely
illegal."
He warned that no diplomatic representative was allowed under
international
law to violate any laws of the country to which they are
accredited.
"And now we have this revelation to the effect that the
former American
ambassador was interfering in the internal affairs of
Zimbabwe. And this is
a matter we take extremely seriously," Mumbengegwi
said.
"We intend to enforce the provisions of international law to the
letter.
Zimbabwe will not accept, Zimbabwe will not tolerate any
interference in the
internal politics of Zimbabwe by any of the diplomatic
representatives of
any country no matter how powerful that country
maybe.
"They are bound by international law, they must obey international
law," a
tough-talking Mumbengegwi said.
However, despite
Mumbengegwi’s claims, the United States is by far the
largest donor to
humanitarian agencies in Zimbabwe.
Meanwhile, the US embassy, based in
the capital, Harare, is getting on with
the robust and confidential business
of diplomacy without getting
sidetracked by the volatile WikiLeaks episode,
which raises questions about
the need to maintain proper protection for the
large body of classified
documents.
US deputy Ambassador David Abell
says views contained in the leaks neither
reflect neither his government’s
position nor policies.
"The American people have high opinion of the
people of Zimbabwe. We want to
continue to have a friendly relationship with
this country".
" We diplomats write reports from time to time and these
reports are then
handed over to policymakers in our country. We do not make
polices as
diplomats"
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