Zimbabwe opposition re-elects Tsvangirai as leader

HARARE, Mar 19 (Reuters) Zimbabwe's main opposition re-elected veteran party leader Morgan Tsvangirai today after he called for mass action to ratchet up pressure on President Robert Mugabe's government.

The Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in all 12 of Zimbabwe's provinces, plus the party's youth and womens' wings, endorsed a new term for Tsvangirai at the end of a two-day congress. There were no challengers.

Party members will also vote today for a new leadership team, which analysts say will determine both the party's battle with Mugabe and its stand-off with rival MDC members who have formed their own opposition group after a recent split.

Nelson Chamisa, a spokesman for Tsvangirai's MDC faction -- seen by many as the main opposition -- said earlier the party was expected to back the former trade union leader's call yesterday for a wave of protests against Mugabe.

''We are ... expecting the congress to approve the political programme proposed by the leadership,'' he said.

When he addressed 15,000 congress delegates yesterday, Tsvangirai called on Zimbabweans to launch a ''cold season of peaceful democratic resistance'' against Mugabe's rule, saying only sustained mass protests could overcome government brutality.

There has been no immediate response from the government to Tsvangirai's call for mass action, but Mugabe's government has routinely deployed security forces to crush political protests.

Another MDC executive member said Tsvangirai's statement was welcomed by many delegates during a closed session late yesterday, but details of when and how the protests would be organised were not debated.

''The congress is going to adopt a number of broad political programmes, including that proposal. ... But I think the details will be left to committees that deal with strategies,'' said the official who declined to be named.

''The focus is on the future ... although some people are still distracted by the recent defections by some of our former colleagues,'' he added.

The MDC split after Tsvangirai, who has led the party since its founding in 1999, called for a poll boycott for a new Senate which he said was aimed at consolidating Mugabe's hold on power.

A splinter group led by MDC deputy president Gibson Sibanda and secretary-general Welshman Ncube accused Tsvangirai of dictatorship and last month elected former student activist Arthur Mutambara as leader of the own MDC faction.

Several officials from Tsvangirai's group are vying to fill up positions left by Sibanda and Ncube, including veteran politicians and professionals.

Political analysts say the new leadership will almost certainly reflect Tsvangirai's own uncompromising approach and could usher the party into fresh confrontation with Mugabe's ZANU-PF, which has ruled Zimbabwe since independence in 1980.

The southern African country is wrestling with shortages of food, fuel and foreign currency, unemployment over 70 per cent and the highest inflation rate in the world from a deep economic crisis many critics blame on Mugabe's government.

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