Africa holds its breath: the Memorandum of Understanding signed by Zimbabwe's three feuding parties is a last ditch effort to pull the country out of its political, social and economic quagmire. But Africa must hold its breath until the secret negotiations are concluded.

Robert Mugabe, Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara cooled their heels for two weeks after the 21 June signing of a Memorandum of Understanding as a tentative first step to digging themselves out of the Zimbabwe quagmire.

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Despite pleas to the contrary, the negotiators took their seats heavily laden with preconditions and provisos from their masters on what they could or could not accept for the pilot document they were charged with producing.

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Quickly tagged a roadmap to finding common ground in the hunt for a solution, the talks were scheduled to last for 14 days and were not attended by Mugabe, Tsvangirai and Mutambara (leader of the offshoot MDC faction).

Instead, teams of negotiators were set the task of shaping a power-sharing structure to lead the country out of its current political impasse. The sparsely-worded, five-page document was also signed by South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki whose presence at the event was considered largely ceremonial. His role as mediator in the process was to be shared by representatives of the African Union and the United Nations, labelled the 'reference group'.

The MOU was couched in the blandest of terms, seemingly anxious to avoid upsetting the major players.

Negotiating on Tsvangirai's behalf were MDC secretary-general Tendai Biti and party deputy treasurer-general Elton Mongoma; Mugabe was represented by Patrick Chinamasa, Zanu PF's acting justice minister and Nicholas Gotche. Mutambara's spokespeople were Welshman Ncube and Priscilla Misihairabwe-Mushonga.

Although no evidence of the fact was forthcoming, Mugabe's security apparatus of military, police and state intelligence has presumably been stood down in some way to allow a less intimidatory climate in Zimbabwe to prevail.

Politics of the new republic

The deadlock-breaking talks were designed to open the way for such important developments as the writing of a new constitution, around which the politics of the new republic will revolve in the post-Mugabe era. The saline test is how fundamentally Mugabe will allow changes to the constitution that would weaken his powers, and the least Tsvangirai will accept in the transitory political dispensation.

Even as the doors closed at the secret meeting chamber and the negotiators got down to work, Mugabe was insisting that he would not accept a ceremonial role of any sort arguing that he was still the president of Zimbabwe--as proven by his landslide victory in the sham, one-man presidential run-off on 27 June.

Tsvangirai had pushed for a short-term transitory authority, but in the interest of saving the talks, said he would consider "a framework of working together in an inclusive government".

How long would an inclusive or transitory government last? Mugabe demanded that he should see out his five-year elected term, while Tsvangirai said the most he would accept was a two-year limit in a transitory administration.

Trying to predict the climate of the Zimbabwe imbroglio a few months from now is daunting, to say the least, so conflicting and obtuse are the ingredients and standpoints that have been tossed into the mediation pot.

On the surface, recent pressures that have been brought to bear on Mugabe will have made him reconsider his options or, at the very least, bring about a change in strategy on how much of his political power he can retain.

He is an astute politician and a canny reader of people and events. He will not have missed the recent signs that his solid support in the African Union is showing distinct cracks and that his absolute support from South Africa is steadily eroding as Thabo Mbeki is elbowed aside and a less tolerant Jacob Zuma, leader of South Africa's ruling ANC party, will pick up the presidential reins next year. And even if legal proceedings against Zuma deny him the presidency, a leader less indulgent of Mugabe than Mbeki will ascend to power.

The pressures that brought Mugabe to the negotiating table are significant pointers to the possible outcomes of the negotiations:

* The unexpected size and weight of sudden criticism of Mugabe by some of his erstwhile supporters. The fact that they represented many of Africa's economically and democratically strong nations made a telling statement of how the continent had divided into anti and pro Mugabe camps.

* A more hostile South African neighbour already snapping at Mugabe's heels.

* A strong opponent in Morgan Tsvangirai, showing immunity to Mugabe's tactics of intimidation.

* Thabo Mbeki's ineffective mediation attempts, marked by non-confrontational "quiet diplomacy" that sought to wheedle concessions from Mugabe and forego a tough position.

* EU and G8 nations unimpressed with Mugabe's one-man presidential run-off vowed to tighten sanctions against Zimbabwe, even though such a move had been vetoed by China and Russia in the UN Security Council.

Rhetoric spoken here

Other complex issues arise. Will the composition of the new government take into account the results of the contested elections in March this year? If they do, Tsvangirai will claim a senior position at the final negotiation table through his party's majority in the Zimbabwean parliament. The MDC and its allies will seek major changes in the constitution and will demand fresh presidential elections under continental and international supervision to ensure a violence-free environment which would allow Zimbabweans to elect a leader of their choice.

The big questions that hang over the talks will have to be asked rhetorically because answers to them won't be forthcoming until real and reportable progress is made in the principal negotiations, hopefully around the second week of August. Did Mugabe and Tsvangirai drop rigid preconditions to dialogue and what game-plans were the parties' chief negotiators briefed witii for the crisis talks in Pretoria?

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Will Mugabe defer naming his new cabinet, something he has wanted to make public since mid-June? Has he dropped his insistence that his party will not formally negotiate his recognition as Zimbabwe's legitimate president? Did Tsvangirai back off his pledge not to re-engage unless he was also acknowledged as the winner of the 29 March elections? Did he insist that he would not talk unless an African Union or UN envoy was assigned to the talks to partner Mbeki? Was he satisfied that Mugabe's instruments of violence were or were soon to be, dismantled and his jailed party members released?

Unnamed sources were quoted in the media as saying the protagonists were prevailed upon by South Africa's President Mbeki, the de jure talks mediator, to drop these demands and at least take the first small steps to resolution of some kind. While there is new hope that the tragic and wasteful situation in Zimbabwe might be edging towards resolution, no-one is holding their breath. There have been too many false starts, and Mugabe has torpedoed too many prospective solutions.

"As South Africa's own painful transition demonstrated, there's many a slip twixt cup and lip and relationships of trust are not built overnight, especially when there is a history of false starts, leadership failure, bad faith, betrayal and outright duplicity emanating from both sides in the conflict," says Peter Bruce, editor of Johannesburg's Business Day newspaper.

It would be naive to believe that Mugabe has somehow mellowed overnight, that the hawks that dominate Zanu PF, Zimbabwe's governing party, have transformed into doves.

Doubtless, Mugabe was a reluctant signatory to the MOU that allowed chairs to be drawn up at the negotiating table. He finally found himself inescapably trapped between the hard place that was the souring of Africa's opinion of him, and the rock of unwavering international condemnation, backed by the threat of further sanctions that won't go away until Zimbabwe's leadership is in place to the satisfaction of the majority of the people.

And critically, Mugabe's crutch, Thabo Mbeki, developed a wobble when he found himself sandbagged by his own party hierarchy in the enforced company of co-mediators in the hours before the signing of the MOU.

It is unlikely that the MDC would have taken part in the MOU signing without AU and UN representatives joining the mediation team, if only as referees, supplying the credibility it lacked before.

In the sparest of terms, the MOU makes reference to constitutional change, the restoration of the rule of law and measures to halt the decline of the Zimbabwean economy.

Missing, for many disturbingly, is any reference to new free and fair elections. Perhaps it was omitted because of resistance to its inclusion by Mugabe, aware of his slim chances of winning a properly conducted and impartially supervised poll. The people of Zimbabwe did not vote on 29 March for a government of national unity, and it is unnatural and dishonest that one should be foisted upon them.

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South African business keen to help

Organised business in South Africa was quick to hail the breakthrough talks and said it was ready to help its counterparts in Zimbabwe get back on their feet.

"We are ready to work for economic stability in Zimbabwe," Business Unity SA (Busa) said in a statement. "As the voice of business in South Africa, with members holding business interests in Zimbabwe, Busa stands ready to work and support all Zimbabwean parties in the restoration of economic stability and growth," it said.

"After years of economic malaise and political instability, this watershed event presents the best opportunity for Zimbabwe to re-establish and redefine itself."

In particular Busa welcomed the time-scale of two weeks to finalise discussions around the establishment of an inclusive government and the commitment to a new constitution to protect civil liberties and democratic rights.

The signing of the Memorandum of Understanding set in motion the re-emergence of the Zimbabwean nation, it said, "it is a beginning, and we urge all the parties to redouble their efforts to ensure that the two weeks target is realised."