Opposition chief to return to Zimbabwe
“I am going home Saturday,” Morgan Tsvangirai told a crowd of Zimbabweans seeking protection at a Johannesburg police station after a wave of anti-foreigner attacks in South Africa.
Tsvangirai faces a run-off election against President Robert Mugabe on June 27. He won the first round of voting at the end of March but not by an absolute majority.
He has spent most of the time since then outside the country. He planned to return to Zimbabwe last Saturday but delayed the trip after his Movement for Democratic Change said there was a plot to assassinate him.
Independent human rights groups say opposition supporters have been targeted in a campaign of violence aimed at ensuring 84-year-old Mugabe wins the presidential run-off.
The economic and political crisis in Zimbabwe has led to an exodus from the country. More than three million Zimbabweans are believed to be in neighbouring South Africa.
Resentment that foreigners are competing for scarce jobs and houses has led to a wave of anti-foreigner attacks in South Africa in the past 10 days. Zimbabweans have borne the brunt.
Tsvangirai told a crowd of Zimbabweans outside the police station in the Alexandra township, where the violence started, that Zimbabwe’s crisis had spilled over into South Africa.
He linked the attacks to the crisis in his homeland, where inflation is the highest in the world at 165,000% and employment runs at 80%.
“The causes for this crisis are none other than our political crisis back home,” he said.
“If things were okay at home there would be no need for us to be here. I’m hoping we are able to solve the crisis at home.”
