Zimbabwe?s main opposition said on Sunday it would decide in early January whether to contest general parliamentary elections set for March, which it had previously threatened to boycott. In August, the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) announced it was suspending participation in all elections until President Robert Mugabe?s government implemented ?real? electoral reforms in line with those agreed by the 14-nation Southern African Development Community (SADC). The MDC says reforms recently passed by the government will not guarantee free and fair parliamentary elections in March and has called on regional leaders to reject them.

On Sunday, the MDC?s national executive said it had reviewed Zimbabwe?s political situation, and decided to continue consultations until early next year. ?The MDC national executive resolved to convene a meeting of the national council soon thereafter in January 2005 so that a final decision on the question ... is made by the council,? it said in a statement.

In early December Mugabe?s ruling ZANU-PF party used its majority in parliament to pass a set of electoral reforms, including setting up an independent election commission, a single day of voting instead of two, and counting of votes at polling centres. But the MDC said the reforms were not enough to guarantee a fair vote in a country where critics say an independent media has been under relentless attack and where the courts are seen as being in the pocket of the ruling party.

Foreign critics ranging from Western governments to African churches have said Zimbabwe?s ruling party rigged the last parliamentary elections in 2000 and the 2002 presidential poll and accuse the government of widespread human rights abuses. Mugabe, in power since independence from Britain in 1980, accuses Zimbabwe?s former colonial ruler of leading a Western campaign to oust him over his government?s seizure of white-owned farms for redistribution to landless blacks.

Cris CHINAKA