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NIGERIAN President Olusegun
Obasanjo has told Australian Prime Minister John Howard that he wants an end to
Commonwealth sanctions imposed against Zimbabwe.
"I believe that the time is now auspicious to lift the sanctions on Zimbabwe with regard to her suspension from the Commonwealth Councils," General Obasanjo said in the letter to Mr Howard, which was dated Monday. In the eight-page letter, President Obasanjo detailed what he said was progress made by Zimbabwe in addressing the issues that led to its isolation. He said he had extensive talks on the matter with South African President Thabo Mbeki during his two-day state visit to South Africa before he went on to Harare. President Obasanjo confirmed that Nigeria and South Africa had effectively killed off the troika by cancelling a key meeting next month. He justified the move on "the unhelpful media war between Britain and Zimbabwe" which he said was worsening the already charged situation. "It was against this background that I concluded that another meeting of the troika on Zimbabwe at this time might not serve any useful purpose," Gen Obasanjo said, adding: "Indeed, President Thabo Mbeki shares the same view." President Obasanjo argued that Cde Mugabe was addressing the two main contentious issues in Zimbabwe � his land policy and alleged crackdown on the opposition. The Government had not only allocated funds in the current budget to pay for "full and fair compensation" for improvements on the land, but had also opened talks with white commercial farmers, he said. "I have come to realise that the land issue may no longer be the most serious problem at this juncture," Gen Obasanjo said, adding that land acquisition effectively ended last year. "I note, in particular that, land occupation by demonstrators has ended, while the Government of Zimbabwe has agreed to pay compensation for any improvement on the land acquired under the fast-track programme," he said. What was now needed was for the international community to make good its pledges of financial support for the orderly execution of Zimbabwe�s land reform programme, President Obasanjo said. On the internal political situation, he said Cde Mugabe was willing to resume talks with his opponents, but says this will only be possible if the opposition withdraws its ongoing court challenge to his re-election. The 54-nation Commonwealth suspended Zimbabwe from its decision making bodies last year following the country�s presidential elections. But the body based its decision on a report by its observer mission to the 2002 presidential elections, which the Government said was biased and fundamentally flawed. Mr Howard has continued to be critical of Zimbabwe, and has called for it to be fully expelled from the Commonwealth, but President Obasanjo and President Mbeki have vigorously opposed this, saying there was no basis for further sanctions. In his letter, General Obasanjo said that Canberra�s own bilateral sanctions against Harare seem to "compromise Australia�s position as an honest broker in the Zimbabwean crisis." Gen Obasanjo said that Zimbabwe�s land reform programme � under which many white farmers saw their land acquired for distribution to landless Zimbabwean blacks � had been "acclaimed as remarkable". He also said that on a recent visit to Zimbabwe, he had met opposition leaders and hoped the bitter controversy over last year�s elections, which international monitors branded unfair, would be settled peacefully. He also called on international bodies and foreign governments to support Zimbabwe "so that the present crisis can be speedily brought to an end." Earlier on a Nigerian senior official said the mandate given to the Commonwealth troika to review the situation in Zimbabwe had expired. The leaders of Australia, Nigeria and South Africa were supposed to meet next month to review Zimbabwe�s Commonwealth suspension and sanctions imposed by the 54-member club after President Mugabe�s re-election last year. However, Mr Mbeki is said to have telephoned Mr Howard on Monday telling him that he and General Obasanjo wanted the meeting cancelled. The senior Nigerian official told Reuters yesterday that the meeting would not take place. "The mandate of the troika is expired," the presidency official said, adding that this was the view of Gen Obasanjo and Mr Mbeki. "They decided between them that the meeting will not hold. And as this was to be the last meeting of the troika, its mandate is effectively expired," said the official, who asked not to be named. The cancellation of the troika meeting comes in the wake of consultations between Presidents Mbeki and Mugabe on the sidelines of the Africa Union summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, last week, and between Mr Mbeki and Gen Obasanjo in Pretoria, South Africa. President Obasanjo flew into Harare last weekend for talks with Cde Mugabe. Australia, Britain, Canada and New Zealand have led an international campaign to demonise and isolate Zimbabwe after the Government embarked on the land reform exercise to economically empower the majority of blacks whose land was forcibly taken away by colonial settlers. But both South Africa and Nigeria, sub-Saharan Africa's most powerful and influential nations, together with the rest of the members in the 54-member Commonwealth have backed Zimbabwe. They advocate a less confrontational approach to Zimbabwe than Australia and Britain in a dispute that has split the Commonwealth on roughly racial lines. While Gen Obasanjo has mediated between Britain and Zimbabwe since Harare embarked on land reform, he has privately accused Britain of failing to honour its commitments to help Zimbabwe finance land reform, Nigerian officials say. On Monday, Mr Howard said Mr Mbeki telephoned him to say he and Gen Obasanjo wanted the troika meeting cancelled because they did not agree with his view that Zimbabwe�s suspension should be extended. === Reuters/AFP/Herald Reporter The Mulindwas
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