|  -There´s no hope for an open dialogue with President Robert Mugabe, said Morgan Tsvangirai, Leader of ´Movement for Democratic Change´ (MDC), yesterday. The 52 year old former miner leads the most important opposition party in Zimbabwe and visited the Human Rights house in Oslo yesterday as part of a high paced tour of Northern Europe to inform both state and civil society authorities about the situation in a country that used to be the beacon of hope for Africa. (18-NOV-04)
Prior to coming to the Human Rights House, Mr Tsvangirai had meetings with both Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Jan Petersen and a core group of trade unionists. Throughout his visit, his message was the same; that there is no reason to believe that the current regime in Zimbabwe will bow to internal pressure for democratic reforms. For as long as the neighbouring states are also, if ever more quietly, supportive, Mr Mugabe´s increasingly violent power abuse will remain unchallenged. Hence, the need to lobby also the neighbouring states is getting ever more urgent. The only thing that might make Mr Mugabe change his tactics and politics to the better, is to maintain the international pressurefor such reforms. Whatever there is of internal opposition does not seem to bother him much anymore.
-No dialogue
-There has been numerous initiatives to facilitate a fruitful dialogue between Mr Mugabe and his opponents. So far, none of those attempts has come to anything. Our government does not deliver on its promises, emphasised Mr Tsvangirai, who also made it very clear that one must not believe in any claims to the opposite from Zimbabwean authorities. -There is no dialogue. There is only censorship, ever less freedom of opinion and expression and violent suppression of any kind of opposition. It should go without saying that from our point of view, having fought against this development for the last five years, there is no hope left that we will ever have any kind of meaningful dialogue with the current regime.
Still trying
-Even so, we will of course run for parliament in the forthcoming elections scheduled for March 2005. Boycotting from the outset would be a bow to the pressure that Mr Mugabe is mounting against us. -Whatever the reason, nothing would please him more than seeing the opposition disappear. However, we will only take part in the actual elections if we feel certain that they will be conducted in a free and fair manner, with guarantees against fraud, violence, censorship of the media and uneven access to the electorate in terms of distribution of information.
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