Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai on Thursday accused President Robert Mugabe's party of obstructing reforms needed to guarantee the credibility of upcoming polls. "The major stumbling block to the implementation of already agreed reforms remains a palpable deficit of political will to implement agreed issues," Tsvangirai told reporters. "The ball lies squarely (sic) on President Mugabe and ZANU-PF," the prime minister said in Harare.

For 33 years Robert Mugabe has bestrode Zimbabwean politics, ruling as a virtual government of one. But as his final election nears there are signs the strongman's power is waning. In office since independence in 1980, Mugabe, now 89 years old, will ask Zimbabweans to re-elect him president at elections slated for later this year. He will face a battle on multiple fronts. He must defeat long-time political rival Morgan Tsvangirai, but if he is to keep his stranglehold on power he must also keep control over his party riven by factionalism.

Zimbabwe plans to seize majority stakes in foreign owned mines without paying compensation in a pre-election move that could heighten tension in the unity government and spook investors, a document showed on Tuesday. A notice issued by the Indigenisation Ministry headed by Saviour Kasukuwere, a member of President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party, said the "ministry and the government of Zimbabwe would like to revise materially, the policy and law on indigenisation and empowerment."

President Robert Mugabe marked Zimbabwe's 33 years of independence with a renewed call to shun violence ahead of elections later this year to choose a successor to the country's shaky power-sharing government. "The country is now due to hold harmonised elections, and I wish to urge the nation to uphold and promote peace," Mugabe told a rally in the capital to mark the 33rd anniversary of the former Rhodesia's independence from Britain.