JOHANNESBURG, 15 Feb 2006 (IRIN) - Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), already wracked by internal division, is finding itself more isolated in the region and at home.

The party's disputed leader Morgan Tsvangirai (MDC)has lost yet another round in his battle to overturn the results of the 2002 presidential election, which President Robert Mugabe maintains he won fairly.

At the time of the 2002 poll the MDC was in its ascendancy, but when the votes were finally tallied, Mugabe had scored 56.2 percent to Tsvangirai's 41.9, with his strongest showing predictably in the rural areas, a traditional support base. Western and local election observers condemned the ballot as neither free nor fair.

On Tuesday the Supreme Court dismissed an application by Tsvangirai that it hear his appeal for nullification of the 2002 results. This followed a High Court ruling in 2005 against Tsvangirai's bid to overturn the poll verdict, for which the presiding judge gave no reasons until months after his ruling.

This effectively hamstrung Tsvangirai from filing an appeal, as appeals have to be filed within 15 days of a judgement being handed down, his spokesman William Bango told IRIN. A second part of Tsvangirai's challenge to the election results was yet to be concluded, Bango added.

The court ruling was yet another blow for the beleaguered Tsvangirai, currently fighting a leadership battle with a 'rebel' MDC faction, led by vice-president Gibson Sibanda. The labour-backed MDC's bitter wrangle over participation in last year's senate election split the party in two, with each faction trying to expel or suspend its opponents.

They will hold two separate congresses this year, which analysts say is likely to lead to a finalisation of the split. Meanwhile, smaller parties have emerged, further confusing the opposition political landscape, say analysts.

Zimbabwe Electoral Support Network chairman Reginald Machaba-Hove told IRIN that 'the people of Zimbabwe deserve to have viable political parties, including strong opposition parties, to help solve the dire problems in the country, and not a plethora of smaller opposition parties'.

'We don't think that that is providing real choice to the people of Zimbabwe, it tends to weaken the opposition and confuse the electorate,' he added.

Analyst Brian Raftopoulos noted that many of the new political parties were formed by 'ex [ruling party] ZANU-PF dissenters, people like [former information minister] Jonathan Moyo, who have no place to go within the MDC and still have links with the ruling party - many are an extension of ZANU-PF'.

'They have little credibility, they are splinter groups that are likely to remain marginal,' he concluded.

The MDC, meanwhile, appears to have divided along geographical and ethnic lines. 'Although the reasons for the split were not fundamentally about ethnic tensions, the reconfiguration of the factions definitely has an ethnic dimension,' Raftopoulos noted.

The split would 'debilitate both factions of the MDC, as the strength of the party was in its unity, at present neither faction has a strategy to confront Mugabe and on their own they lack a national reach in terms of support, as one is based mainly in Matabeleland [in the south] and the other has support in other parts of the country'.

To add to Tsvangirai's woes, the MDC appears to be increasingly isolated within the region.

Recent comments by South African President Thabo Mbeki indicated that he had grown increasingly weary of trying to resolve Zimbabwe's political crisis. He told the South African Broadcast Corporation last week that in 2004 his 'quiet diplomacy' policy towards Zimbabwe had almost resulted in a deal between ZANU-PF and the MDC on a new constitution.

'They were actually involved in negotiating a new constitution for Zimbabwe, and they did and they completed it ... they gave me a copy initialled by everybody, done. So we thought the next step then must be to say where do we take this process. But then ... new problems arose among themselves. So we watch the situation and to the extent that we can help in future, we will,' Mbeki said.

'They asked us to assist, to mend relations among themselves. It didn't work. We tried to intervene but I think the rupture had gone too far,' he added.

To this, Tsvangirai's spokesman Bango replied that outside assistance was secondary to internal Zimbabwean initiatives to end the crisis. 'Whatever African countries may try to do should be complimentary to efforts here at home,' he said.

Raftopoulos, however, said Mbeki's comments indicated 'a sense of growing frustration that his quiet diplomacy policy has produced no fruits, the new wait and see approach [adopted by South Africa] is a result of the failure of his [quiet diplomacy] efforts'.

Last week Tsvangirai and several MDC leaders were deported from Zambia when they met in Livingstone, a tourist town on the border with Zimbabwe.

Raftopoulos said the deportation was 'confirmation of the fact that since the crisis began in 2000, the region has been behind Mugabe'.

The travails of the MDC - the current leadership battle and split in the party, coupled with the emergence of smaller opposition parties, a lack of democratic space in Zimbabwe and eroding regional support for efforts to find a solution to the country's political crisis - could see a changed political landscape, Raftopoulos said.

'I think opposition politics is going into a hiatus now, it will be a very dark and slow period in terms of opposition politics. I think civic movements are also in the process of reorganising right now, they are very much pushed on the defensive. On the whole, even though Mugabe has problems internationally, at home the opposition presents him with few difficulties,' Raftopoulos concluded.