PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe’s Zanu PF has succumbed to pressure from the MDCs and allowed the United Nations elections assessment team to visit the country to audit the political environment before the world body could fund the forthcoming polls, Finance minister Tendai Biti has said.
Report by Bernard Mpofu
Biti also said although government had adopted a three-pronged approach which would see the polls being funded by the international community, licence fees from telecom companies as well as mining royalties, Treasury has also engaged South Africa and Angola to fund the watershed elections.
Presenting his quarterly state of the economy report in Harare yesterday, Biti said the UN team, which is currently stuck in South Africa, after Justice minister Patrick Chinamasa last week blocked them from visiting Zimbabwe, had since been cleared following intensive lobbying by the two MDCs. The team’s visit is expected to unlock the much-needed cash for the harmonised elections.
Chinamasa, a Zanu PF minister, had threatened to deport the team on arrival at Harare International Airport. But Biti yesterday said the UN team, which was on the verge of returning to its New York base, could jet into the country anytime although the parties have now reportedly locked horns over which local civic organisations the team should meet during its consultations.
“Yesterday (Sunday), I spent the whole afternoon in negotiations with the Minister of Justice about the terms of reference of this mission to come into Zimbabwe.
We eventually panel-beat an agreement which we both signed to allow the mission to come,” Biti said.
“As far as we are concerned, the mission should come and there is nothing that should stop the team from coming . . . We could not agree on the question of whether or not the mission should see civic society. We have agreed that the issue should be resolved by principals (of the inclusive government) at principal level and I hope that will be done as a matter of urgency.”
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Following the successful completion of the constitutional referendum, Zimbabwe will this year hold elections, which will mark the epilogue of the coalition formed in 2009.
After it became apparent that Treasury had no capacity to fund the polls, Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai in February ordered Chinamasa and Biti to appeal to the international community for the funds, but the Zanu PF minister tried to block the UN team tour as a precondition for poll funding.
“It is self-evident that Treasury does not have the capacity to fund the elections and that it is also self-evident that domestic borrowings to fund elections are not on. What we did in the referendum cannot be reproduced if we still want to maintain a stable and sustainable economy with a growth rate of 5% that we predicted in the 2013 National Budget. Certainly, this Minister of Finance has no intention of emasculating and assaulting the economy for this event that will come for one day,” Biti said.
According to Biti, the mission will meet Tsvangirai, Deputy Prime Arthur Mutambara, chief secretary to the President and Cabinet Misheck Sibanda, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission, the Registrar-General, the Fishmongers Group of Ambassadors and Sadc diplomats, ministers of Justice, Finance, Regional Integration, Constitutional Affairs and Home Affairs.
He said government had also revised the election budget downwards to $132 million from $254 million after it emerged that part of the equipment used in last month’s referendum could be used in the forthcoming general elections expected later this year.
Biti added: “Pursuant to the discussions of September 2012 (to seek budgetary support from South Africa and Angola), we have also written (to South Africa) in the last four weeks. We have also written to the Republic of Angola to specifically ask for electoral assistance, I have written that.
“So in addition to the $100 million budget support, we have written to the Republic of South Africa requesting electoral assistance. I am aware that the South African Cabinet has actually made a decision on the budgetary assistance and a positive one. What is outstanding is the question of implementation. I will be seeing Pravin Gordham (SA Finance minister) in the next few days in Washington . . . If there is an unsustainable election or economic meltdown in Zimbabwe, one country that will feel it immediately is South Africa.”
Reports show that between 2007 and 2008 at the height of the economic and political crisis in the country, at least 5 000 Zimbabweans were illegally crossing into South Africa daily, which resulted in the host country creating a refugee camp to accommodate the Zimbabweans.
