Zimbabwe opposition leader meets SAfrica's Zuma

By Stella Mapenzauswa

HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai met South African ruling party leader Jacob Zuma on Monday after appealing for help from outside powers to end the 28-year rule of President Robert Mugabe.

A spokeswoman for the ruling African National Congress said Tsvangirai had met Zuma in Johannesburg but gave no details.

Tsvangirai, who says he defeated Mugabe in the March 29 presidential election, wrote in a newspaper article earlier that Zimbabwe was on a "razor's edge" because of the veteran 84-year-old leader's attempts to cling to power.

Although Zuma has no formal position in the South African government, he is the frontrunner to succeed President Thabo Mbeki and his role as ANC leader gives him influence in the development of the party's domestic and foreign policies.

Some analysts expected the new ANC leader to take a tougher stand on Zimbabwe after defeating President Thabo Mbeki for the leadership late last year. Zuma won with strong support of trade unions that have been sharply critical of Mugabe's government.

But in an interview with the Wall Street Journal carried out before the Zimbabwe election, Zuma said South Africa should continue Mbeki's controversial policy of quiet engagement with Mugabe to find a solution to his northern neighbor's crisis.

"We can't change that stance," the newspaper quoted Zuma as saying in an article published on Monday. But Zuma also told the Journal he thought political leaders should not stay in power for more than a decade.

COURT CHALLENGE

While Tsvangirai engaged in shuttle diplomacy, his Movement for Democratic Change continued legal efforts to force election officials to finally make public presidential poll results.

Earlier on Monday the High Court in Harare again postponed a decision on whether to take up the case on an urgent basis, while rejecting a Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) argument that it had no jurisdiction over the release of results.

The court will reconsider the issue on Tuesday.

Tsvangirai accuses Mugabe of planning violence to overturn results of the presidential and parliamentary votes. Official results show Mugabe's party, ZANU-PF, lost control of the lower house of parliament for the first time.

ZANU-PF has said it will challenge the parliamentary results in court, arguing election officials made mistakes and committed fraud. It also wants the release of the presidential results delayed pending a recount of the votes.

The situation became murkier late on Monday when Zimbabwean police announced they had arrested seven election officials for undercounting votes cast for Mugabe in four provinces.

"We're still investigating, but we have established that there was deflation of figures in respect of one candidate ... the ZANU-PF presidential candidate (Mugabe)," police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena said.