Mugabe ready to hand power to a party faithful

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe was quoted yesterday as saying he would be willing to hand power to a ruling party ally when he was sure the country was safe from "sell-outs" and from British interference.

But the state-run Sunday Mail newspaper said he gave no time frame and again vowed to stop the opposition from ending his rule, which Britain's foreign secretary David Miliband described as sadism.

Mr Mugabe, 84, is fighting for re-election in a June 27 run-off against Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

The opposition leader won the first round in March but not with enough votes to take the presidency.

The veteran Zimbabwean leader, who has ruled Zimbabwe since independence from Britain in 1980, has threatened to go to war to stop a Tsvangirai victory.

The Mail said Mr Mugabe told a rally on Saturday that his "leadership was prepared to relinquish power to those (Zanu-PF officials) that uphold the country's (independence) legacy".

"This country cannot be sold at the stroke of a pen," he added, repeating a vow not to let the MDC, whom he has branded as British puppets, rule the country.

The Mail said Mr Mugabe urged supporters to concentrate on defending his government's land nationalisation and black economic empowerment policies, and not on complaints by what he called "sell-outs" that Zanu-PF has been in power for too long.

Zimbabwe's agricultural sector, once one of Africa's most prosperous, has collapsed, and shortages of bread, milk and meat are common. Inflation is 165,000 per cent and unemployment 80 per cent.