President Mugabe has delivered an ultimatum to his rival, Morgan Tsvangirai, to sign up for a power-sharing agreement with his ruling Zanu (PF) party or face being frozen out of the new Cabinet to be announced tomorrow.

“If after tomorrow [Thursday], Tsvangirai does not want to sign, we will certainly put together a Cabinet,” Mr Mugabe told the state-controlled Herald newspaper.

The move would violate the founding conditions of the talks and signal Mr Mugabe's repudiation of the process doggedly pursued by South Africa’s President Mbeki for 18 months.

It would mean the end of a few weeks of heady optimism for change. It could also plunge the country back into the turmoil witnessed after bloody elections in June. By virtue of a violent, fraudulent election, Mr Mugabe made clear that he was determined to tighten his grip on power while the economy crashed into accelerating catastrophe and mass human misery.

The ultimatum was being ignored by Mr Tsvangirai's party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). “Mr Mugabe is trying to negotiate with us with a gun in his pocket,” said its spokesman, Nelson Chamisa. “We are not going to be stampeded into any kind of deal.”

The draft agreement has been all but unanimously approved by both the MDC and ZANU (PF), except for roles to be played by Mr Tsvangirai and Mr Mugabe in a new “inclusive” government. Mr Tsvangirai has dismissed the proposal that would make him almost a ceremonial prime minister, with Mr Mugabe as executive president retaining the core of the authority he has wielded since he came to power at independence in 1980.

Mr Tsvangirai said when the talks last adjourned three weeks ago that he needed “time to reflect and consult”. Since then he has given details of the proposals he refused to accept — chiefly, his junior position in a Cabinet chaired by Mr Mugabe, and his continued power over the security forces. “He refused to share power,” Mr Tsvangirai said at the weekend.

Last week the negotiating teams met Mr Mbeki in South Africa separately, and there has been no sign of any follow-up. Mr Mbeki is reported to have met the two antagonists yesterday at the funeral of Zambia’s President Mwanawasa in Lusaka, but nothing appears to have come of that either.

Mr Mugabe has shown little sign of willingness to accommodate the MDC. While the draft was still on the table, he appointed ten provincial governors to parliament, all of them from ZANU (PF), and five of his most trusted aides — who had lost their seats in the March elections — to fill seats reserved for appointment by him.

At the same time, ZANU (PF) has been arresting MDC MPs and mobilising violent militias for a handful of parliamentary by-elections to wrest the MDC’s slender majority of two

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