According to Mbeki, the xenophobic attacks of 2008 were part of a planned operation

JOHANNESBURG: Former President Thabo Mbeki has suggested that the deadly xenophobic attacks in Alexandra in 2008 were part of a planned operation to drive Zimbabweans back to their homeland and pressure them to vote out Robert Mugabe.

Mbeki made these surprising revelations on Wednesday during a conversation with students at the University of South Africa in Pretoria.

He said there was an intelligence report, to which he had been privy as president at the time, that listed the people and motives behind the attacks.

Parliamentary elections took place in Zimbabwe in March 2008.

After Morgan Tsvangirai and Mugabe failed to achieve a 50 percent majority, a runoff election was announced for June.

Meanwhile, on May 12 of the same year, a wave of xenophobic attacks broke out in Alexandra, which later spread to other parts of the country.

According to Mbeki, the president at the time, the motive for the attacks was to drive Zimbabweans back to their homeland to participate in the run-off elections.

“An intelligence report with names, dates and places where people met and planned this and so on… It is portrayed as a xenophobic attack by the people of Alexandra – it was wrong… it was organised, systematic, for a political purpose. I see the mistake we made, we should have released this intelligence report.”

Mbeki said South Africa's economic crisis was not due to foreign nationals, but the country needed to strengthen its border security measures.