By Our Correspondent in GABORONE, BOTSWANA
IT'S now not raining for President Emmerson Mnangagwa and his ZANU PF Government, it's now pouring.
SADC has shifted a gear up taking President Mnangagwa completely by surprise.
In a stroke of luck this Correspondent got face to face with a SADC official in a meeting arranged by one of our veteran sources within SADC. We will not name the lanky bearded SADC official also light in complexion. He requested not to be named which indicates how delicate this ZIMBABWE issue is in SADC circles.
He starts on November 17. This is the date the SADC Panel of Leaders were scheduled to touch down in Zimbabwe for a meeting with President Emmerson Mnangagwa and the Citizens Coalition for Change Leader Advocate Nelson Chamisa. The SADC Panel of Elders on November 17 informed President Emmerson Mnangagwa that they were extremely worried about the ZIMBABWE political impasse and believed it needed to be urgently addressed. On Monday November 20 President Emmerson Mnangagwa gave the SADC Panel of Elders November 24 as the date he was ready to meet them and the President had chosen the meeting to take place in Victoria Falls , ZIMBABWE.
But the SADC Panel of Elders informed President Emmerson Mnangagwa that they are no longer coming to ZIMBABWE to meet him. In fact President Emmerson Mnangagwa will now have to come to them in DAR ES LAAM, TANZANIA at a date when he was ready to meet them. This has taken President Mnangagwa completely by surprise. But if that surprised him , the next SADC move perplexed him. SADC will soon announce the removal of the SADC Anti-Sanctions on Zimbabwe Day , October 25 , from their Calendar.
The SADC Secretariat will send an official Communique on this new development to HARARE in the next two weeks through the SADC ORGAN on Politics Defence and Security Cooperation the SADC TROIKA. The SADC official said by removing the SADC Anti-Sanctions on Zimbabwe Day from the SADC Calendar it simply means SADC is now on the same page with the likes of the European Union - EU on the notion that there are serious Human rights abuses in Zimbabwe perpetrated by the ZIMBABWE Government itself and Sanctions imposed on ZIMBABWE are just.
In an attempt to verify we asked the SADC official a question and he replied:
" We do follow your publication. If SADC disagrees with this the SADC Secretariat will do what the former Zimbabwe Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara did to one of your two stories on him. He refuted one of those two stories didn't he? ", he assured us.
Top Political Scientists say this development by SADC means just one thing. President Emmerson Mnangagwa now knows the position of SADC on ZIMBABWE that he is not recognized as the legitimate President of Zimbabwe.
Back home even those few within his Government who believed in him will now begin withdrawing their support. The ZIMBABWE DEFENCE Forces, the Army , who carried out a Coup that brought President Emmerson Mnangagwa after they removed former President Robert Mugabe have been SERIOUSLY comparing what they used to get under Mugabe to what they are getting today under Mnangagwa.
The difference is astonishing to them as they have now sunk further into poverty. They found what the CCC Leader Advocate Nelson Chamisa is always saying about the conditions a ZIMBABWEAN Soldier should be living in so appetizing. The next two weeks will be trying times for President Emmerson Mnangagwa. Christmas is very far , top Political Scientists say.
Source: Africa Beautiful of Ruined?