Mugabe says ready to hand power to a party faithful

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe was quoted on Sunday as saying he would be willing to hand power to a ruling party ally when he was sure the country was safe from "sellouts" and from British interference.

But the state-run Sunday Mail newspaper said he gave no time-frame and again vowed to stop the opposition from ending his rule, which foreign secretary David Miliband described as sadism.

Mugabe, 84, is fighting for re-election in a June 27 run-off against Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). The opposition leader won the first round in March but not with enough votes to take the presidency.

The veteran Zimbabwean leader, who has ruled Zimbabwe since independence from Britain in 1980, has threatened to go to war to stop a Tsvangirai victory.

The Mail said Mugabe told a rally on Saturday that his "leadership was prepared to relinquish power to those (ZANU-PF officials) that uphold the country's (independence) legacy".

"This country cannot be sold at the stroke of a pen," he added, repeating a vow not to let the MDC, whom he has branded as British puppets, rule the country.

The Mail said Mugabe urged supporters to concentrate on defending his government's land nationalisation and black economic empowerment policies, and not on complaints by what he called "sellouts" that ZANU-PF has been in power for too long.

Zimbabwe's agricultural sector, once one of Africa's most prosperous, has collapsed, and shortages of bread, milk and meat are common. Inflation is 165,000 percent and unemployment 80 percent.

"We are the custodians of Zimbabwe's legacy. We will pass this on to those we know are fully aware of the party's ideology, those who value the country's legacy," the newspaper quoted Mugabe as saying.

"I WILL NOT GROW OLD"

Mugabe has previously said he did not want to name an heir over fears he or she would become a target of other officials nursing ambitions to succeed him as ZANU-PF leader.

The president gave no timetable for his possible retirement and added: "But as long as the British still want to come here, I will not grow old; until we know we no longer have sellouts among us."

Mugabe this week threatened that he and his independence war veterans will take up arms again to stop the MDC taking power.

The MDC and rights groups say ZANU-PF have launched a brutal campaign of violence which has killed at least 66 MDC activists, wounded hundreds others and displaced tens of thousands since the March 29 election.

Britain's Miliband said South Africa had a responsibility to do more to bring pressure on its neighbour, and condemned the violence that has marred the run-up to the election.

"The first thing is to be clear about the sadism, and I use that word advisedly, that's going on ... in Zimbabwe," he told BBC television.

"People being killed, people being tortured, people being beaten. Election observers being stripped out, election officials being stripped out."

The African Union expressed concern over reported violence and said it planned to send "a sizable" team of observers to monitor the run-off poll.

Tsvangirai says he is confident of victory despite the intimidation campaign in which he has been detained several times this month.