HARARE - Zimbabwe's opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, has said it’s not safe for him to return home as he faces the prospect of arrest.

 

"It is no use going back to Zimbabwe and become captive," the MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai told Canada's The Globe and Mail in an interview yesterday. "Then you are not effective. What can you do? Do you want a dead hero?"

 

 

Tsvangirai, who went into exile on April 8, said he is using the time he is out of the country to launch a massive diplomatic offensive aimed at pressuring Mugabe to hand over power peacefully.

For the first time since Independence in 1980, Zanu (PF) has lost its parliamentary majority and is seeking to overturn that defeat through a vote recount that started Saturday.

The results of the presidential election remain unknown, but the MDC says Tsvangirai has won that poll with an outright majority.

Tsvangirai is said to have been offered asylum by Botswana president Seretse Ian Khama and has been shuttling in the sub region from his base in Gaborone where he is a special guest of Khama.

Tsvangirai, who is presently in SA, has met several African leaders. “I'm mobilising international support, I'm being effective in making sure that the issue of Zimbabwe remains on the international radar," Tsvangirai said.

During the time he has been out of the country, pressure has been mounting on him to return and challenge Mugabe inside the country. Currently, 50 activists have been bludgeoned in custody in connection with a stay away his party has called to protest the hold-up in election results.

But he said: "It's like a father, when the father is away, children always ask, 'Where is the father,' but father may make an assessment that it is not opportune at that particular time to do certain things."

Mugabe on Friday vowed that he would never allow Tsvangirai to rule “my Zimbabwe.”