President Jacob Zuma is expected to visit Zimbabwe this week to meet the leaders of the ailing unity government in a bid to iron out long-standing differences over power sharing.
Zimbabwe's power-sharing government, which was launched in February last year, has been dogged by sniping between the two main protagonists — President Robert Mugabe, of Zanu (PF), and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).
Mr Zuma's planned visit comes after a Southern African Development Community (Sadc) troika meeting in Gaborone at the weekend failed to discuss Zimbabwe after Mozambique's and Zambia's presidents did not turn up.
The troika are three states that, in rotation, run Sadc's Organ on Politics, Defence and Security. The current troika members are SA, Zambia and Mozambique.
Sadc executive secretary Tomaz Salamao told reporters Mr Zuma was expected to go to Harare by the end of the week to continue with mediation efforts.
"After the troika summit failed to take place, it was agreed that President Zuma should go to Harare again where he will hold talks with the three parties (in the political agreement)," he said.
Mr Salamao, said that after the visit, Mr Zuma would be expected to recommend a date for another troika summit.
MDC spokesman in SA Sibanengi Dube said Mr Zuma's visit to Zimbabwe would be "worth it".
"As the MDC we still hope that Sadc will be able to make sanity prevail in Zimbabwe ... I also think that the leaders have realised that Mugabe does not respect Sadc."
Mr Dube said Mr Zuma was under pressure to mediate in the crisis and this had been worsened by the "fact that he has been constantly betrayed by Mugabe".
"Mugabe really does not take Zuma seriously. The problem is that Mugabe is regarded as an elder statesman in the region and Zuma ... is seen as a small boy."
Political analyst Prof Steven Friedman said the problem was that Mr Zuma is working within the Sadc framework. He said there was little hope that the unity government would ever work and there was little doubt that conditions for a free and fair election "are nonexistent".
"Mr Zuma will obviously try and patch things up and put pressure, but that will not deal with the problem. What should be done is to put pressure on the elite in Zimbabwe to create conditions for free and fair elections," Prof Friedman said.
Meanwhile, the Sadc headquarters in Gaborone was officially inaugurated by heads of state and government during the summit held in Botswana over the weekend.
* Sapa
