Bulawayo — The removal of sanctions imposed on President Robert Mugabe's inner cabal and top Zanu PF officials and parastatals is a process that is bound to take time, the Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has said.

He also said the government was in the process of polishing up a strategy to engage the EU, Britain, America and other bodies to lobby for the lifting of the sanctions.

The Prime Minister was however quick to point out that the imposition of sanctions and the blame of their imposition should not be placed squarely on the shoulders of his party, the MDC-T, saying some of the problems that gave birth to the sanctions during the Zanu PF era were still to be attended to.

"The isolation of Zimbabwe from the rest of the world is pre-determined by the manner in which we as the principal political parties have implemented the Global Political Agreement (GPA).

"The MDC-T cannot accept liability of the sanctions. As leaders of the parties to the agreement, we cannot wish away the sanctions. . . . All we need to do is to implement the GPA in full and then sing with one voice for the removal of the sanctions," Tsvangirai said.

He pointed that at the moment, the three political parties were not singing from the same hymn book as there were still issues that were outstanding in the implementation of the agreement.

"We have to look at the GPA benchmarks and ask ourselves whether we have implemented the agreement in full. We cannot claim to have implemented it in full when there are still issues of the provincial governors, the issue of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) governor, Gideon Gono, that of the Attorney General, Johannes Tomana, as well as that of the deputy minister of Agriculture (Roy Bennett) who is still waiting to be sworn in," Tsvangirai aid.

The prime minister said claims by Zanu PF in the state media that his party was responsible for the removal of sanctions were hollow as Zanu PF was still to meet its own side of the bargain.

"The people of Zimbabwe know why the sanctions were imposed. The problem is that some people are now trying to discuss their impact without wanting to address the cause of the sanctions," Tsvangirai said.

The statements come ahead of a European Union (EU) meeting on February 20 where the issue of whether the EU should renew or review sanctions in Zimbabwe will be tabled.

The prime minister said what further compounded Zimbabwe's crisis has been the failure by the country's administration to clear its debt with international borrowers such as the IMF and the World Bank.