President Robert Mugabe is to retain control of the army and chair cabinet meetings, according to leaks of Thursdays power-sharing deal in Zimbabwe, BBC online reports Friday.
Opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, will control the police force and chair a new council of ministers. The deal followed seven weeks of talks and this years election violence.
International donors have said they would resume financial aid for Zimbabwes collapsing economy if Mr Tsvangirais Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) is given a genuine share of power. The EU said it would “evaluate the situation” at a foreign ministers meeting on Monday.
In cabinet, Mr Tsvangirais MDC and another MDC faction will together have 16 seats, while Mr Mugabes Zanu-PF will have the remaining 15.
The devil will lie in the detail and in the ability of the two men and the power blocks under them to wield genuine authority. Some opposition MDC voices have already called the deal a climb-down, although others have said it is the best available.
MDC chairman and Zimbabwes parliamentary speaker Lovemore Moyo said that the deal had been a compromise: – We wanted a titular head of state with an executive prime minister but that did not happen. So what we got at the end of the day perhaps was probably nearly a sister-sister power-sharing, he noted.
