Sudanese leader likely to overshadow Zimbabwe summit

By Cris Chinaka
HARARE, June 7 (Reuters) – A regional African economic summit starting in Zimbabwe on Sunday should lead to increased investment and stronger economic ties but may be overshadowed by the presence of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued an arrest warrant for Bashir for alleged war crimes in Darfur.
Analysts say Bashir’s attendance would divert attention from the first big international event held under the new unity government of President Robert Mugabe and his rival, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.
“There will be some discussions of substance over issues of economic cooperation and integration, but whenever you have some of these controversial figures, the world gets distracted,” said Eldred Masunungure, a politics professor at the University of Zimbabwe.
The two-day Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) summit, in the resort town of Victoria Falls, will focus on the launch of a customs union for its 19 member states stretching from Swaziland in the south to Egypt in the north.
But Zimbabwe, whose industry has been hit hard by years of hyperinflation and economic contraction, is unlikely to benefit from the union, the continent’s largest trading bloc, in the short term.
The unity government is battling to raise funds for its $8.3 billion recovery programme. So far, it has raised over $1 billion in credit lines for the private sector from African institutions, including COMESA.
“It will take Zimbabwe at least two years to get industry going, and that depends on policy change, policy consistency and investor confidence,” said Zimbabwean economic consultant John Robertson.
Zimbabwe — once an economic model for the continent — has turned from a regional breadbasket into a basket case more than half of whose 12 million people are surviving on food handouts from aid organisations.
Mugabe, 85, will become the leader of COMESA, which along with the African Union and the Southern African Development Community tacitly supported him at a time when the Western world tried to isolate him for his controversial policies.