Zimbabwe's unity government faces huge hurdles

HARARE, ZIMBABWE — Why are all those women carrying buckets of water on their heads?

That was the first riddle that David Coltart, Zimbabwe's new education minister, faced last month as he walked into his high-rise headquarters.

"The reason is that the whole of the Ministry of Education, 18 floors, has no water in it. So my first, immediate task was to get the pump repaired. If you walk down the stairwells you will gag, the stench is so bad on some floors," Coltart said in an interview in his new office. (Most of the bathrooms still weren't working.)

Until a few weeks ago, the Dickensian halls of the Education Ministry belonged to President Robert Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party. Now under the new "unity government," the ministry is run by his political opponents in the Movement for Democratic Change. The deal was forced on the MDC by African leaders to resolve a standoff over last year's disputed elections, in which ZANU-PF lost its parliamentary majority.

"It's like a dark hole of Calcutta," Coltart said.

Mugabe's legacy of busted plumbing and peeling paint is the least of the problems Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC party face in this shotgun marriage of a government: The country's finances are catastrophic; vital services such as health, education, power and water are paralyzed; and the man still calling the shots seems more fond of power plays than power sharing.

Tsvangirai promises reform and a better future, but he's trapped in a difficult situation. Without money from the West, his team has no hope of success. But he is unlikely to get that aid with Mugabe in power. And failure by Tsvangirai would suit Mugabe and his hard-line allies just fine.

The prime minister's effort to sell the unity government as a reform administration took a telling blow last week when President Obama ignored his call to end Western sanctions imposed against Mugabe and his cronies. Instead, the U.S. leader extended them another year.

A rare moment of real unity between the rivals has come as Tsvangirai faces his most difficult hour: the death of his wife of 31 years in a car accident. Mugabe visited Tsvangirai in the hospital the night of her death, staying for more than an hour.

At a memorial service Tuesday, Mugabe expressed grief and even referred to Tsvangirai by his first name -- a rare moment for a president who has shown open disdain for his prime minister.