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I just read through the Agreement and it sounds promising. Having studied the history of policy making in Zimbabwe, I am however curious as to how much gap there is going to be between the actual agreement and what is implemented. The agreement does address issues such as depoliticizing the National Youth Service, which has for long been abused to further ZANU PF’s agenda, mainly in the rural areas. The agreement also states that the Prime Minister, Morgan Tsvangirai will be part of the national Security Council, of which Mugabe is the chair. It should be remembered that this is the very machinery that masterminded the intimidation of the Movement for Democratic Change in the run up to the election. I look forward to seeing how this is going to play out.

My other bone of contention is the number of bodies in the executive branch; President Mugabe and two Vice Presidents, Prime Minister Tsvangirai and 2 Deputy Prime Ministers, making a grand total of 6 officers in the executive branch (excluding their staffers). While Mugabe maintains presidential power, his authority has somewhat been diminished. With an almost balanced representation in the house of assembly and ZANU – controlled senate, I foresee gridlock in the policy making process. Personally, I am not a fan of big government, especially considering that it is our tax dollars that pay for all these bodies.

In conclusion I would like to remind you that this is not the first unity government Zimbabweans have seen. In 1987, Mugabe’s ZANU-PF signed the Unity Accord with PF ZAPU, after the Ndebele massacres in the Gukurahundi. Many saw the deal as promising, but as we saw in the recent months, the government was behaving in a manner reminiscent of pre-1987. With that being said, I am somewhat hopeful of this particular one because, Zimbabwe really needs to move on, there has been too much hurt and poverty. Let us hope the gap between policy making and policy implementation is not too wide. To that end, I concur with Denford that there needs to be active involvement of civil society through research organizations, human rights groups, think tanks, and other entities to uphold individual rights and the rule of law, and ensure that these don’t get thrown on the wayside as has been the case lately.

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