SOUTH AFRICA: A/S FRAZER'S CONSULTATIONS ON

C O N F I D E N T I A L PRETORIA 000005 PLEASE PASS TO AF A/S FRAZER, AF/FO BANKS, AND AF/S E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/23/2018 TAGS: PREL ASEC PGOV EAID SF ZI SUBJECT: SOUTH AFRICA: A/S FRAZER'S CONSULTATIONS ON ZIMBABWE: PROSPECTS FOR CHANGE REF: A. 08 PRETORIA 2716 ¶B. 08 PRETORIA 2134 ¶C. 08 HARARE 1127 ¶D. 08 HARARE 1131 ¶E. 08 HARARE 1136 Classified By: Classified by Ambassador Eric M. Bost for reasons 1.4 b and d. ¶1. (C) Summary: Visiting Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi E. Frazer reached out to South African and regional leaders to outline U.S. policy on Zimbabwe and explain why the U.S. no longer believes President Robert Mugabe can be part of a power sharing solution to Zimbabwe's crisis. Meeting with South African President Kgalema Motlanthe and South African Development Community (SADC) facilitator Sydney Mufumadi, Frazer pressed for active South African leadership. African National Congress (ANC) insider Tokyo Sexwale insisted that party support for Mbeki as SADC facilitator has waned, a position ANC President Zuma later confirmed. Opposition Congress of the People (COPE) leader Mosioua Lekota claimed to be among the first to speak out against Mugabe's excesses. South African-based Zimbabwean businessman Strive Masiywa and Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) Secretary-General Tendai Biti outlined the MDC action plan. End Summary. -------------- Moving Zimbabwe to Pretoria's Outbox -------------- ¶2. (C) Meeting with Frazer December 18, former Minister Sydney Mufumadi discussed the recent efforts of the SADC Zimbabwe facilitation team led by former President Thabo Mbeki, which includes Mufumadi, Presidential Advisor Frank Chikane, and former Presidential Foreign Policy Advisor Mojanku Gumbi. Mufumadi expressed the view that the MDC failed to show proper respect for SADC as the regional decision-making body when it refused SADC's most recent offer involving shared control between the MDC and ZANU-PF of Home Affairs. Frazer stressed South Africa's dominance in SADC as an imperative to lead. She called on the South African SADC facilitators to push for Mugabe's resignation in favor of his vice president, who would represent ZANU-PF in a power-sharing government. ¶3. (C) Meeting with Frazer on December 20, President Kgalema Motlanthe hailed ZANU-PF's decision to gazette Amendment 19, establishing the framework for a power-sharing government, as a clear sign of progress. Motlanthe expressed confidence to Frazer that with a quick vote on Article 19 and the immediate inauguration of MDC President Morgan Tsvangirai as Prime Minister, the crisis in Zimbabwe will be well on the way toward resolution. Motlanthe expressed the view that the quick formation of a unity government, with Mugabe remaining a president, is the most efficient way forward, and he is not convinced that Mugabe has discredited himself as a partner in negotiations. -------------- MDC Backers: Mbeki Must Go -------------- ¶4. (C) South Africa-based Zimbabwean businessman Strive Masiywa told A/S Frazer on December 18 that the MDC will not take part in further negotiation as long as former President Mbeki remains in charge of SADC facilitation. Masiywa also complained that Motlanthe is sympathetic to Mbeki and does not want to disrupt the ANC by removing Mbeki as SADC facilitator. He added that Tsvangirai had appealed directly to Motlanthe to remove the Mbeki team, which the MDC considers friendly to ZANU-PF, and that Motlanthe refused. Qconsiders friendly to ZANU-PF, and that Motlanthe refused. Masiywa said the South Africans are not committed to a negotiated resolution to the crisis but merely want to stage the inauguration of Tsvangirai as prime minister as a media event they can use to declare, prematurely, that they have solved the Zimbabwe political crisis. Masiywa said MDC president Morgan Tsvangirai had expected more support than he has received from the UN and the AU and has, consequently, decided to focus his energy on cementing the MDC's relationships with friendly governments, including Botswana, Tanzania, Senegal, and Kenya to build a pro-MDC consensus in the AU. Frazer urged that Tsvangirai either return to Zimbabwe as soon as possible or seek alternatives to demonstrate leadership and mobilize MDC supporters. ¶5. (C) Long-time ANC insider Tokyo Sexwale, meeting with A/S Frazer on December 20, highlighted a recent radio interview with ANC President Jacob Zuma in which Zuma said, "Mugabe is no longer my comrade," as a breakthrough, signifying that the liberation struggle-era bond between the ZANU-PF and the ANC is unraveling. Sexwale said he had just come from an ANC National Executive Committee meeting wherein the ruling party had agreed to step up efforts to resolve the crisis in Zimbabwe. Sexwale commented that Motlanthe is "too close" to Mbeki and like Mbeki was inclined to soft-pedal SADC facilitation. Sexwale said he planned to call for the removal of Mbeki as facilitator, but added that removing the former president in a manner that preserved his dignity was tricky. Sexwale also noted that Motlanthe, to his credit, had publicly refuted Mugabe's allegations that MDC is training troops in Botswana. In response to Frazer's call for tougher action on the part of South Africa, Sexwale observed that it is very difficult to know when the time is right to close pipelines and cut electrical transmission lines. He commented that South Africans are very uneasy about "pulling out the tablecloth" from under their Zimbabwean neighbors. Frazer called on Sexwale to focus on urging Mugabe to step down as the first step toward resolving the crisis. -------------- Parties Gingerly Approach Zimbabwe Issue -------------- ¶6. (C) Opposition Congress of the People (COPE) leader Mosioua Lekota, meeting with Ambassador Bost and A/S Frazer on December 20, attempted to put the Zimbabwe crisis in historical context. Lekota said that the coming of democracy to South Africa in 1994 was not good news for Mugabe, who had previously been celebrated as Africa's foremost liberation hero. Lekota claimed that he had been among the first to speak out when Mugabe confiscated white-owned farms. Comparing ZANU-PF's politicization of ministries in Zimbabwe to what the ANC has done within the South African civil service, Lekota agreed with Frazer that asking the MDC to share the Ministry of Home Affairs with ZANU-PF, in the absence of a comprehensive power-sharing arrangement, does not make sense. (Note: In discussing COPE's domestic agenda, including its fight with the ANC over the party name, and its plans for 2009 elections, Lekota said that COPE was considering naming its headquarters OR Tambo House, a choice guaranteed to provoke an ANC outcry. End note). ¶7. (C) In a December 21 telephone call with Zuma, A/S Frazer thanked Zuma for the invitation to the gala December 20 wedding of his and FM Dhlamini-Zuma's daughter and commended him for his radio comments indicating that Mugabe is no longer his comrade. Zuma mentioned his conversations during the previous week with Secretary Rice and Frazer on Zimbabwe and indicated that he would welcome the opportunity to talk with Frazer again on Zimbabwe in the coming weeks. (Note: Zuma and Frazer did not have an opportunity to speak at the wedding. End note). -------------- MDC's Portrait of a Failed State -------------- ¶8. (C) Meeting with A/S Frazer on December 21, Tendai Biti said Zimbabwe is a failed state whose people are suffering from diseases not seen since the early 1900s, whose government has lost control of an increasingly dollarized Qgovernment has lost control of an increasingly dollarized economy, and whose military is disintegrating into corporate factions vying for control of resources. Biti claimed that the deterioration of Zimbabwe is accelerating, adding that the increasingly frequent abduction of MDC activists was unknown four-to-five months ago. Biti said that the state is operating in an extra-legal manner and that dialogue is dead. Biti said the sense of ZANU-PF entitlement is overwhelming, adding that ZANU-PF knows it needs MDC in the government in order to get out from under sanctions, but does not even go through the motions of courting MDC -- as evidenced by the government's refusal to issue a passport to MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai. ¶9. (C) Biti expressed gratitude for the tightening of U.S. sanctions on Zimbabwe. He told Frazer that the Mbeki-led power-sharing effort was dead, but neither party wants to admit it officially. Biti and Frazer discussed the possibility of passing a binding UN Security Council Resolution on Zimbabwe once South Africa relinquishes its seat at the end of 2008. He added that the MDC is planning a program of grassroots engagement, along with greater strategic use of MDC's power in the parliament to focus greater attention on the crisis. 10: (C) Asked about the value of the Mbeki-led facilitation efforts, Biti praised the South African technical team that negotiated Article Nineteen, but he pronounced the current power-sharing deal dead. He charged that the South Africans, having negotiated most of the details of the constitutional change, did not even bother to consult MDC to finalize provisions that remained in dispute but instead rushed to have the document gazetted without informing MDC. He described South African President Motlanthe's eagerness to seal the deal and inaugurate Tsvangirai as Prime Minister to "performing a heart transplant on a dead person." Biti said that on September 15, the MDC might have given Mugabe the benefit of the doubt and tried power-sharing but now a deal is impossible. ¶11. (C) On the possibility of power-sharing with ZANU in the event that Mugabe does step down, Biti said that "whoever steps into Mugabe's shoes would be better." A/S Frazer noted that Zuma said Mugabe is no longer his comrade. To that, Biti remarked that if Zuma would say what Botswana's President Khama is saying, there would be no need for a blockade to persuade Mugabe to step down. Frazer's phone call with MDC President Tsvangirai focused on MDC plans for grassroots action and Tsvangirai's own plans to return to Zimbabwe. -------------- Comment -------------- ¶12. (C) A/S Frazer's press roundtable on December 21 drew headline coverage from local and international media, capping meetings with South Africa's key political leaders. A/S Frazer's high-profile visit helped energize our engagement on Zimbabwe. The Mission will attempt to keep up the pace of our dialogue. End comment. BOST