President Morgan Tsvangirai’s statement on the eve of the official opening of Parliament (23-07-07)

In its National Council meeting held in March 2002, the MDC noted with great unhappiness and regret, the fact of the stolen Presidential election of the same year.

Pursuant to this, the MDC initiated a Presidential election petition to challenge this result. The MDC resolved


in the same National Council meeting that the candidate then elected as President was illegitimate and that the people’s will had been subverted.


Over the years and pursuant to this resolution, the MDC has boycotted all functions and events presided over by the aforesaid “winning” candidate.


On 29 March 2007, the SADC Heads of State, at a meeting in Tanzania, resolved to appoint President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa to broker dialogue between the MDC and the government.


That dialogue, although fraught with difficulties and challenges, has in fact commenced. As a gesture of our bona fide belief in this dialogue, I have duly instructed our MPs to attend the official opening of Parliament on 24 July 2007.


Zimbabwe is in a serious crisis, a crisis that has seen the erosion of our people’s dignity, a crisis that has resulted in the lot of our people losing confidence in their own government. Inflation, officially pegged at 4 500 per cent, remains the highest in the world. The education and health delivery systems have virtually collapsed while an ill-advised populist policy to slash prices has resulted in empty shelves and imminent food shortages in an economy already battered by 10 consecutive years of negative growth rates.


With this decision, it is my sincere hope that Zanu PF and President Robert Mugabe will also show restraint and maturity. In this regard, the withdrawal of Constitutional Amendment No 18 that is currently awaiting its first reading in the Lower House will be a good and decisive confidence-building measure. The cessation of violence against the MDC and indeed the immediate release of our cadres that are unlawfully detained at Harare remand prison will be another equally decisive measure.


We are walking a tight rope of history. The millions of Zimbabweans that are suffering are watching and judging. We, the leaders of the present, must rise to the enormity of the task that history has placed on our shoulders.


Morgan Tsvangirai


President

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