HARARE (AFP) — Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai failed Friday to agree on who should control powerful ministries, and turned to neighbouring countries to help break the impasse.
After four days of lengthy negotiations, the two remained divided on how to share key cabinet posts under a month-old power-sharing deal, seen as the best chance for rescuing the country from economic collapse.
But South African leader Thabo Mbeki, who is mediating the talks, said that the security organ of the South African Development Community (SADC) would pick up the negotiations on Monday in Swaziland in a bid to save the deal.
"The negotiations are continuing. I wouldn't say there is a deadlock," Mbeki told reporters shortly after midnight, in his first public remarks on the talks.
Mugabe declined to explain why the talks had yet to reach a deal, saying only: "They went in the wrong direction."
But Tsvangirai said the rivals remained far apart on several issues, most importantly the distribution of powerful cabinet posts.
"Regrettably, after four days of intense negotiations, we have failed to agree on the... key issue, which is the equitable allocation of ministerial posts and the composition of cabinet," Tsvangirai told reporters.
"We believe that for an inclusive government to work, the principles of equitable sharing of power... should be embraced. It appears we are far apart on this principle," Tsvangirai said.
He said that both sides had agreed to discuss the impasse with SADC's security body, known as the Troika.
"Hopefully there will be a breakthrough next week," Tsvangirai added.
Mbeki said he remained confident that a deal would be reached.
"I know for a fact that the Troika is very very keen that this matter is resolved as a matter of urgency," Mbeki said before returning to South Africa.
Under the power-sharing deal, 84-year-old Mugabe was to remain as president while Tsvangirai takes the new post of prime minister.
But Tsvangirai threatened to pull out of the deal after Mugabe announced last weekend that he would award key ministries to his own party, giving him a firm grip on the security forces.
Mbeki flew to Harare in the hope of saving the accord, which he brokered just days before his own party forced him to resign as South Africa's president.
Analysts had suggested that his reduced stature as a former head of state would complicate his mediation effort.
The United States and the European Union have already threatened to toughen their sanctions on Mugabe's regime if the unity accord falls apart.
Western countries insist that any deal must respect the outcome of the first round of presidential voting in March, when Tsvangirai handed Mugabe his first electoral defeat since independence from Britain in 1980.
The former union leader failed to win enough votes to declare outright victory and then pulled out of the run-off in June, accusing the regime of coordinating a brutal campaign of political violence that left more than 100 of his supporters dead.
The political stalemate has shattered the dreams of ordinary Zimbabweans, who had briefly dared to believe last month that a unity government might be able to rebuild their devastated economy.
Zimbabweans endure daily struggles for survival in a country buckling under the world's highest inflation rate, at 231 million percent.
Once one of Africa's most prosperous nations, Zimbabwe's stunning economic collapse has caused critical food shortages, with nearly half its people needing UN aid and 80 percent of the population living in poverty.
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