THE South African Foreign Minister, Mr Alfred Nzo, said yesterday that he expected "dramatic progress" shortly in international efforts to broker peace in Zaire.
"We are in constant touch with all the role players in Zaire (and) in the region, and international efforts will see some dramatic progress within the next few days," Mr Nzo told members of parliament. He did not elaborate.
Earlier, South African government sources confirmed that the Zairean rebel leader, Mr Laurent Kabila, is expected in South Africa soon but they would not say who he would meet.
South African officials who took part in preliminary peace talks in Pretoria between representatives of the rebels and of President Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire arrived yesterday in Cape Town.
One of them, the Deputy Foreign Minister, Mr Aziz Pahad, said recent rebel statements indicated that "Mr Kabila, at the appropriate time, will visit South Africa to get our assessment of how the process was unfolding in South Africa and what is the way forward."
The office of the Deputy President, Mr Thabo Mbeki, said there was a possibility that Mr Kabila would visit the country this week. But his spokesman, Mr Thami Tenteni, stressed there was no official confirmation.
"At this stage I can only say that such a visit is possible," Mr Tenteni said. "It depends on Mr Kabila."
President Nelson Mandela told parliament yesterday he was "glad to have been able to make some small contribution to the resolution of the conflict in the Great Lakes region of Africa, and in Zaire in particular".
Mr Kabila's Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire now controls more than half the provinces in Zaire and all the major towns and cities except Kinshasa.
The governor of Zaire's southeast Shaba province has been put under house arrest by rebels who captured Lubumbashi six days ago, rebel radio reported yesterday. The radio said Mr Kyungu ku Mwanza, who was appointed by President Mobutu, had been "deprived of all his political rights".
Mr Kabila's forces captured Lubumbashi, Zaire's second city and capital of mineral-rich Shaba, last Wednesday. They have already named an interim governor.
Zaire's capital, Kinshasa, was calm yesterday as an opposition demonstration calling on President Mobutu to quit failed to materialise. Civil guards and gendarmes blocked off the two access roads to the campus housing three university-level schools, which seemed enough to stop students rallying.
Elsewhere in Kinshasa, there was a timid resumption of activity as shops re-opened, but traffic was limited after a stay-at-home strike on Monday had brought the capital to a standstill.
In Washington the State Department spokesman, Mr Nicholas Burns, said the talks in South Africa were the best way of avoiding further bloodshed.
President Mobutu's son, Mr Mobutu Nzanga, in a newspaper interview published in Brussels yesterday, said his father would not flee into exile and would stay in Kinshasa to stop the capital falling into rebel hands. He said Zaire was committed to holding elections on July 9th.
In Kinshasa there was the normal bustle of people on the streets, especially in the open-air markets. The opposition loyal to the former prime minister, Mr Etienne Tshisekedi, had called for students to demonstrate, using cars as much as possible and taking them from their owners if necessary.