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 HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) - Zimbabwe's ruling party leaders are to consider abandoning widely criticized proposals to extend President Robert Mugabe's term and delay presidential elections until 2010, the official Herald newspaper reported Saturday.
Mugabe, the country's only president since independence in 1980, is now under an intense international scrutiny because of a brutal clampdown on opposition activists. He had previously suggested delaying next year's presidential elections, effectively extending his term by two years unchallenged. Even ruling party members questioned the delay.
The Herald, a government mouthpiece, said Mugabe told a meeting of the ruling party's Women's League on Friday that there was growing consensus in the party to hold elections next year and the issue would be discussed at a meeting of the central committee next week.
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