Word: muzorewas
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...reality as two delegations arrived for talks in Lancaster House, near Saint James Palace in the heart of London. One group spoke for the Patriotic Front, won alliance of insurgent forces headed by Joshua Nkomo and Robert Mugabe; the other represented the current government, led by Prime Minister Abel Muzorewa and including Minister Without Portfolio Ian Smith...
Unfortunately, the London conference does not seem to be leading up to a peaceful settlement. Now in its second week, talks on the future of Zimbabwe (Muzorewa's government has dropped the "Rhodesia" part) are mired in troubles. Admittedly, the conference got off to a shaky start; just before it got underway, the Salisbury government launched a "pre-emptive" strike against Mugabe's troops in Mozambique, blowing up fuel dumps and radar stations and killing 300. When the Salisbury representatives arrived in London, the Front delegates responded by branding Muzorewa and his associates "criminals" and refusing to shake hands...
...Nkomo and Mugabe wanted to discuss "pre-independence arrangements," or measures to be taken before Zimbabwe can be officially decolonized by Britain amd made independent; in particular, they hoped to concentrate talks on the replacement of current white-controlled police and military forces with their own black troops. But Muzorewa would have none of that. Rather than transfer leadership of the police and military forces to the Front--in effect, ceding control of the state to Nkomo and Mugabe--the Bishop insisted on discussing only moderate "constitutional reforms" without a word about new elections or ending white safeguards...
Both sides took extreme positions from which they claimed there could be no compromise. Muzorewa, just elected as part of an internal settlement between moderates and the white Smith government last April, was apparently unwilling to re-run the election; Nkomo and Mugabe, pressing forward on the battlefiels from bases in Zambia and Mozambique, were seemingly unwilling to exchange a certain cease-fire for uncertain political victory in domestic elections. Muzorewa justified his stand by claiming that the Front leaders were "terrorists" interested in seizing power. For their part, Nkomo and Mugabe called Muzorewa a "white puppet" blocking a switch...
...EVENTUALLY, they compromised. Pushed by Lord Carrington, both the Front and Salisbury representatives came to agree on a general agenda last Thursday. Muzorewa made the larger concession, agreeing to consider both constitutional changes and "pre-independence arrangements" at the conference. His decision to discuss the latter seemed to mean a role for the Front. Front forces, for their part, had to compromise too: they agreed to discuss needed modification in a constitition largely handed down from the days of white rule. For a while, it seemed that the London conference might be on the way to achieving...