Tsvangirai gets 'asylum' in Botswana

F. Nkomo: 21st AprIL 2008
OPPOSITION leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, said he will set camp in neighbouring Botswana for fear of being attacked or jailed if he returns to Zimbabwe.

OPPOSITION leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, said he will set camp in neighbouring Botswana for fear of being attacked or jailed if he returns to Zimbabwe.

"It is no use going back to Zimbabwe and become captive. Then you are not effective," said Tsvangirai in an interview with the Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail in Johannesburg, South Africa.

In the interview the opposition leader said he would return after gathering international support.

"I'm mobilising international support, I'm being effective in making sure that the issue of Zimbabwe remains on the international radar," Tsvangirai said.

Tsvangirai said international support would guarantee him protection from the authorities in Zimbabwe.

The MDC leader was responding to a letter which was intercepted by the Zimbabwe government allegedly written by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown supporting regime change in Zimbabwe.

Justice Minister, Patrick Chinamasa, described the letter as ‘treasonous’.

In the letter Gordon Brown said the Zanu PF government was ‘illegal’ and no longer tenable.

The British Embassy in Harare has called the letter a ‘hoax’, but Gordon Brown’s office has not yet responded to the aunthenticity of the letter.

Last year, the Herald published a letter, also written by Gordon Brown, to the British Law Society increasing ‘regime change’ financing to the Law Society of Zimbabwe.

The letter was proved to be aunthentic and Gordon Brown’s office said that letter was not supposed to be in the public domain.

Responding to calls from MDC members to return home, Tsvangirai said: “It's like a father, when the father is away, children always ask, 'Where is the father,' but father may make an assessment that it is not opportune at that particular time to do certain things.”

The MDC leader is now commuting between South Africa, where he holds his press conferences and Botswana where he has been provided refuge by the new Tswana President, Ian Khama.