Messages From Zimbabwe

In the first sign of a political denouement to the Zimbabwe crisis, southern African leaders were early this morning putting together proposals for a unity government. But it remained unclear whether President Robert Mugabe had been consulted. Fifteen days after the Zimbabwean elections - amid rising tension as the results of the presidential poll remained unpublished - the leaders of the 14-nation Southern African Development Community began talks early this morning with former Zimbabwean finance minister Simba Makoni. The regional leaders are known to favour Makoni, 51, as a successor to 84-year-old Mugabe because he too comes from

Mugabe’s ruling Zanu PF party, which has been in power since the end of white rule in 1980.

Moments before the leaders began talks with Makoni - who ran as an independent in the presidential elections and is believed to have finished third - the leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), Morgan Tsvangirai, left the talks abruptly with his delegation. “As far as we are concerned, the talks are finished for us. Everything regarding Morgan has been discussed,” said MDC spokesman Nqobizitha Mlilo as the delegation sped away. The MDC said it would explain its position at a later press conference. In the early hours of this morning, the heads-of-state meeting appeared deadlocked in its attempts to draft a final communiqué. Presidents and their delegations were tight-lipped as they walked between meeting rooms in the Mulungushi conference centre. Only Tsvangirai’s abrupt departure provided a clue that the MDC leader - who claims to have won the presidential poll outright, with 50.3 per cent of the vote - had been sidelined by the regional leaders.

Earlier yesterday, South African president Thabo Mbeki called on Mugabe in Harare after the Zimbabwean president refused to attend the Lusaka talks. It is unclear to what extent he was consulted by Mbeki about the prospect of a unity government, nor whether he was telephoned during yesterday’s talks. Observers said a unity government could take many forms in Zimbabwe and that the positions of Deputy President and Prime Minister could be reinstated as part of such a structure. ‘SADC leaders have always favoured Makoni because he provides a way of salvaging Zanu PF,’ said one Western diplomat. The developments in Lusaka came as Zimbabwean state media announced a recount of presidential ballots. Diplomats in Lusaka said the delay in releasing election results had - from the start - simply been a ploy for buying time to negotiate a transition.

Earlier yesterday, Western diplomats had been shocked by Mbeki’s statement, at the end of his visit to Harare, that ‘there is no crisis in Zimbabwe‘. He was filmed holding hands with Mugabe on the tarmac of Harare airport, where the Zimbabwean leader proclaimed that SADC had been ‘hijacked’ by Britain in its bid to destroy the country. The proposal to put in place a form of unity government to oversee the end of Mugabe’s 28-year reign marks a diplomatic breakthrough for SADC. Seven months ago, at another summit on Zimbabwe in Lusaka, the region’s leaders gave Mugabe a standing ovation. But the regional impact of the economic decline in Zimbabwe has now become untenable for SADC, many of whose governments now come from a grassroots democratic base, rather than being products of former liberation movements.

(Source)

Comment: You have got to be kidding! Morgan Tsvangirai has being sidelined - having won the Presidential election? And to have the person that came third in that election take over as Mugabe’s preferred successor?

So the votes of the Zimbabwean people mean nothing?

The Presidential election would effectively have been stolen from Tsvangirai, whilst the recount by the ZEC will ensure that the majority won by the MDC in Parliament is reworked…

In other country’s in the world would be imprisonned for such theft!

‘debvhu

Lawyers for Zimbabwe’s electoral commission urged the high court on Wednesday to dismiss a demand for the release of last month’s election results, saying the verification process was still underway.

“The collation has to be finished, the verification has to be finished,” the commission’s lawyer George Chikumbirike told the hearing in Harare.

“The order they sought is so unreasonable. This application must be dismissed, it ought never to have been made.”

Chikumbirike was speaking on the second day of the hearing into the application by Zimbabwe’s opposition for the court to order the commission to end its 11-day silence over the result of the March 29 presidential election.

The Movement for Democratic Change’s legal team had argued on Tuesday that there could be no justification for delaying the results any longer, saying they were effectively already known the day after the polls when returns were posted outside polling stations.

The delay had led to widespread opposition accusations that it was part of a ploy to buy President Robert Mugabe - who had ruled Zimbabwe non-stop since independence from Britain in 1980 - more time to cook up a victory.

Despite the lack of an official result, Mugabe’s party had already demanded a recount of the whole election, saying it had uncovered a series of anomalies.

The commission announced the results of a simultaneous parliamentary election nearly a week ago in which Mugabe’s ZANU PF party lost its majority to the MDC.

Justice Tendai Uchena was not expected to give his judgement until later in the week.

(Source)

Zimbabwe’s former finance minister Simba Makoni may have come a distant third in the presidential election, but he could emerge as the kingmaker in the aftermath of the bitterly-contested poll.

Makoni, 58, quit the ruling ZANU-PF party to mount his challenge against President Robert Mugabe and main opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, but unofficial results put him a distant third in the March 29 vote.

“Obviously he will be a kingmaker. Either of the two will need Makoni,” said Professor Eldred Masunungure, a political expert at the University of Zimbabwe.

Makoni is thought to have played a “spoiling” role in the presidential battle so far, winning enough votes to prevent his rivals from passing the 50 percent mark needed for outright victory.

But this could change if indeed the duel for the presidency goes to a run-off: analysts believe his supporters will hold the balance of power.

“In the second round, he is becoming the ultimate winner, playing the role of an influential factor on who wins,” said Joseph Kurebga, a political scientist expert and colleague of Masunungure.

In an apparent bid to spruce up his electoral machinery, Makoni’s camp announced plans Saturday to form a political party, after he stood as an independent in the presidential elections.

“We will be formalising our movement into a fully-fledged political party,” his spokesman Denford Magora told AFP.

For the parliamentary polls, Makoni entered a loose alliance with a splinter faction of Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and a host of independent candidates.

The MDC faction garnered just 10 of the 210 parliamentary seats, while Tsvangirai’s main bloc took 99 and Mugabe’s ZANU-PF 97.

Makoni’s movement is widely expected to back Tsvangirai in the event of a run-off with President Mugabe, but his spokesman said nothing had yet been finalised.

“No decision has been made as to who we will back as we are still awaiting results of the presidential elections.”

However, if Zimbabwe’s elections have proved anything so far it is that nothing is for certain. One-time Mugabe information minister Jonathan Moyo believes Makoni’s candidacy is actually a ruling party ploy.

“He denied Tsvangirai an outright victory and gave Mugabe a new lease of life. It was a ZANU-PF project aimed at preventing Tsvangirai from the leadership,” said Moyo.

If unofficial results are to be believed, Mugabe will clearly find it very difficult to win a sixth term without Makoni’s support.

But in the run-up to the polls, Mugabe labelled his former protege a political “prostitute” and described him as “a frog trying to inflate itself to the size of an ox,” warning he would “burst in the attempt.”

But if anybody needs Makoni more, it is Mugabe, according to Masunungure.

“Unless he mobilises the support base which did not vote in the first round, there is no doubt that Robert Mugabe will need Makoni in order to make it back to State House (the presidential palace),” he said.

Less than half of Zimbabwe’s 5.9 million eligible voters voted last week and both Mugabe and Tsvangirai will look to tap into the huge reserve of untapped voters if the presidency goes to a run-off.

(Source)

vindicate - 1. to clear of accusation, blame suspicion, or doubt with supporting arguments or proof. 2. to justify or support. 3. to justify or prove the worth of, especially in the light of later developments.

Since 1999, the official opposition party within Zimbabwean politics has been on the receiving end of endless events in that country. Them - and many accidental observers and members of other bodies. We all watched as Mugabe’s ZANU PF rigged the elections in 2002 and 2005, and the Movement for Democratic Change took much of the blame for those losses.

Incorrectly, as it proved, since various court wrangles not only cleared the party, but in 2005 it is believed that Morgan Tsvangirai, the party’s leader, actually won the Presidential race, but was denied a re-run as the courts decided that because Mugabe had already taken office, they lacked the power to reverse it.

Then came the acrimonious split within the opposition party, which quickly turned very nasty. This was caused by a difference in opinion over whether the party should participate in the Senate election.

The breakaway faction, soon to be led by the parachuted in Arthur Mutambara, a former student firebrand and NASA rocket scientist, spent much of their initial few months arguing with the larger faction.

There was also talk about them commandeering the party name and logo, but in time much of this calmed down as the real aim of the party was thrust once again into the spotlight.

Who can forget the beating that the MDC-Tsvangirai faction took at the hands of the ZANU PF sponsored ZRP, army, war veterans and youth militia last March? Who can forget the heartbreaking photographs of Morgan Tsvangirai, Sekai Holland and Grace Kwinje lying in hospital nursing their wounds?

And they were joined within days by their faction spokesman, Nelson Chamisa, who was set upon, in broad daylight, by ZANU PF thugs at Harare International Airport.

During the majority of 2007, the two factions of the MDC were tied up in ‘mediated’ talks with Mugabe’s ZANU PF, overseen by South Africa’s President, Thabo Mbeki.

Ten months of sustained negotiation - sustained? - ZANU PF refused to attend most of the sessions, and dug their heels in on any compromises to their rule - and the small victories by the MDC factions were very quickly negated by Mugabe who just used Presidential decrees to cancel the advances out.

The South African President, given the mandate to mediate the talks by the South African Development Community (SADC), spent most of the year delegating his responsibility to his underlings and reporting to SADC that the talks were ‘on course’, ‘in progress’ and that a breakthrough was imminent.

Obviously Mugabe’s influence over the South African President was in play then.

And his influence throughout the immediate region has also been noted, with many of the area’s leaders lauding the praise of Mugabe. Indeed, at a SADC meeting in Lusaka, Mugabe was applauded onto the stage by the regional leaders.

But if leadership within the region is one thing, then leadership within a country is another.

For 28 years the people of Zimbabwe have had no choice but to watch Mugabe begin to dismantle and destroy the economy which he inherited from Ian Smith’s Rhodesian government.

Few people had ever dreamed that the opposition party, just 9 years old, and battle-scarred and bruised, would ever displace and dethrone Mugabe.

But dogged determination, which epitomises everything that their leadership has been through since the party’s inception, has been what has carried them through.

Whilst many of their original supporters may have jumped ship or returned to the loving arms of Mugabe’s ZANU PF, more people were beginning the realise that Mugabe’s remaining in control was just going to guarantee a long and lingering death.

And the watching world did precisely that - they watched… Afraid to say a word of criticism against Mugabe or his government, for fear that he may say something scathing back.

The people of Zimbabwe were made to pay the price for that silence.

Three main assaults on the population spring to mind, and I believe that it is these, together with disjointed, impersonal government, that has precipitated the fall of Mugabe. As Roy Bennett stated on his recent interview with SW Radio Africa’s Violet Gonda, the Presidency is for the incumbent to lose, not for an outsider to win.

And Mugabe lost the Presidency as long ago as the 1980’s - he has just been able to hang onto power through all manner and means at his disposal - and has added insult to injury by perpetrating agony after agony on ‘his’ people - people which he lost touch with in the first few years of his reign.

First was the Gukurahundi - the massacre of between 20 to 30 thousand Ndebele people in Matabeleland and the Midlands. Mugabe made the excuse that it was to put the Ndebele people in their place, but in reality it was his way of smashing the hold that Joshua Nkomo had over the Matabele tribe. The atrocities ended in 1987 after Mugabe and Nkomo signed an Accord to work together. Nkomo’s ZAPU was swallowed up by Mugabe’s ZANU.

The families that were affected by these heinous acts have never received any compensation for those atrocities, whilst the closest they have ever had by way of an apology was Mugabe admitting that the Gukurahundi was a ‘moment of madness’.

The second atrocity visited upon the population that springs to mind is the land grab. In 2000, Mugabe presented the population with a Constitution for acceptance or rejection. In a referendum, the new Constitution was soundly rejected.

In anger, Mugabe set the war veterans - the aging battle force that he had used to fight against the Rhodesian security forces in the 1970’s bush war - sometimes referred to as the chimurenga - on the commercial farms in the country, owned primarily by experienced and very productive white commercial farmers.

This was the beginning of the land redistribution programme which saw some white commercial farmers murdered and even more farm workers killed, injured and losing their jobs.

The land redistribution exercise was, to all intents and purposes, to return the land to the ‘landless’ blacks. Eight years later, only a handful of farms remain in the hands of the original commercial farmers, whilst the overwhelming majority of the land is in the hands of Mugabe and his loyalists in his regime - and officers in the army and the police… The land remains unworked and fallow, but Mugabe’s government uses the land as an excuse to spend money on farm equipment for the new ‘owners’ (which is not used for agriculture) and a system where the ‘farmers’ received discounted fuel, and the banks offer loans against the land whilst they continue to run the country into destitution.

The land grabs continue as I type.

The third example of the atrocities that Mugabe perpetrates against his people, is commonly called Operation Murambatsvina. Remove the rubbish. Take out the dirt.

Something in the region of 700000 people were effected by this demolition.

Mugabe decided that the opposition party was becoming too strong in the urban enclaves in the various cities and towns, and ordered the demolitions of all properties and dwellings that his government considered illegal.

Some unfortunate people died in the ’slum clearance’ and Mugabe refused to acknowledge his people’s heavy handedness, and chose to remain silent.

The economy began to deteriorate and today inflation is gauged at 100000% - the highest in the world outside a war zone.

The problem was that the world-at-large did not realise that within the borders of Zimbabwe is very similar to a war zone. The Mugabe government fought may a battle with many organisations and many institutions and these battles were waged with a ‘no prisoners’ policy.

Today, Mugabe finally lost the majority in parliament and we await the announcement that he has been dethroned from the top office of the land. And replaced by Morgan Tsvangirai.

Morgan Tsvangirai and his party, the Movement for Democratic Change, are on the rise - but we must be sure to emphasise to any protractor, that the fall of Mugabe’s government was enabled by DEMOCRATIC means. That was the MDC’s original intention, and they have not only risen to the challenge, but the party has achieved their target.

Let no one ever hoodwink the good people of Zimbabwe again.

We must be aware that power in Zimbabwe is ours to give - not to be taken from us - and that we must allow no government to ever build up the resources for personal use as Mugabe did.

Freedom in Zimbabwe is a paramount necessity. We owe it to our children, and to our children’s children. No one must be allowed to dictate to us again. No one.

Tsvangirai needs all of us to assist and help where we can - even if that help is only passing on information. Many of us will decide to go home, and again, we need to be aware that the country is in a poor state of repair and that rebuilding is the first priority. And that life will not magically improve overnight. And that the rebuilding will continue for many years - if not decades. It may take as many years to rebuild as it took to destroy.

Some of us may elect (forgive the pun) to remain in our adoptive lands - but we still remain - by default at least - Zimbabwean.

Zimbabweans: a truly democratic, well-meaning - often misunderstood people - people who love life, love people and are able to weather any storm.

My hearty congratulations to Morgan Tsvangirai and his party. And to the people of Zimbabwe who had the belief in their hearts and the hope of democracy to guide them in their vote. I am proud to be led by a man and a party that ‘does what it says on the tin’…

This afternoon I sit in front of my machine typing this, and the reality of the moment has not yet hit me. But it will and I may even break my aversion to alcohol (brought on by my necessary use of pain killing drugs) to celebrate. I will probably wait until victory is complete, and then I will happily drink to the best health of our President, his party and all God-fearing, like-minded Zimbabweans the world over.

The real struggle starts now…

Democracy loving Zimbabweans the world over must feel entirely vindicated.

Take care.

‘debvhu

President Robert Mugabe’s party has lost its majority in parliament, the Zimbabwe Election Commission says.

It says Mr Mugabe’s ZANU PF party has taken 94 of the 207 contested seats, while opposition parties have won 105. One seat has gone to an independent.

Although seven seats have yet to be declared, this means ZANU PF cannot win an overall majority.

The opposition MDC says its leader won the presidential election but official results have not yet been released.

(Source)

The results of the election in Zimbabwe shocked dictator Robert Mugabe so badly that he opted not to declare outright victory for fear of a rebellion. Instead, his aides have convinced Mugabe to slowly roll out rigged numbers that appear at first to favour the opposition MDC but that later put Mugabe’s ZANU PF in control. However, the MDC has already collected evidence for that event:

A crisis meeting of Robert Mugabe’s security cabinet decided to block the opposition from taking power after what appears to have been a comprehensive victory in Zimbabwe’s elections but was divided between using a military takeover to annul the vote and falsifying the results.

Diplomatic and Zimbabwean sources who heard first-hand accounts of the Joint Operations Command meeting of senior military and intelligence officers and top party officials on Sunday night said Mugabe favoured immediately declaring himself president again but was persuaded to use the country’s electoral commission to keep the opposition from power. ….

If the government does attempt to fix the result it will not go unchallenged. The election commission will have to substantially alter a large number of polling booth returns in order to overturn Tsvangirai’s significant lead. But the MDC has photographed results declarations pinned to the doors of more than 8,000 polling stations. If the numbers announced by the election commission are different, the party says it will have indisputable evidence of fraud.

“Unlike previous elections no one can privatise the result as it is posted outside the stations,” said the MDC’s secretary general, Tendai Biti. “This country stands on a precipice. We still express our great misgivings about [the election commission’s] failure to announce the results. It raises tension among the people that is fertilising an atmosphere of suspicion.”

The MDC saw one election disappear into the corruption of the Mugabe government in 2005. This time, they took no chances with his election commission. The photographs of the ballot-station declarations will provide plenty of embarrassment for Mugabe when his numbers bear no relation to the local counts, and the anger over vote rigging will erupt in demonstrations - and probably worse.

Will the military remain with Mugabe? The MDC has tried reaching out to senior commanders, including a well-respected former army chief who is currently out of favour with Mugabe’s clique. They hope that Solomon Mujuru can convince current military leadership to either back the actual results of the election, or at least not interfere on Mugabe’s behalf with an MDC seizure of power.

The international community needs to increase its pressure on the situation as well. The West has no influence with Mugabe, but it does on his African associates. South Africa’s Thabo Mbeki has been one of Mugabes’ closest allies, to the shame of Mbeki’s own nation. Britain and the US should make clear to Mbeki his responsibility in convincing Mugabe to abide by the actual will of his people and depart forthwith.

Comments

He is a horrible man. I hope for the sake of his people that they are able to finally get rid of him.

USBB on April 1, 2008 at 7:38 AM

I wonder how the people of Zimbabwe would feel about our 2nd Amendment about now?

orlandocajun on April 1, 2008 at 7:47 AM

Mugabe’s a parasite and won’t let go until he kills Zimbabwe. If he’s smart he’ll go into retirement overseas and live off the billions he stole from the country.

Don Carne on April 1, 2008 at 7:53 AM

One comment from “Energizer Bunny” says it all…

Oh well. Hopefully by the next round of elections the average life expectancy hasn’t dropped below the legal voting age in Zimbabwe. That way we can all go through the merry charade again.

Thanks, Ed for staying on the Zim story.

BacaDog on April 1, 2008 at 8:13 AM

I think they should award this murdering b**tard the highest office in the land. That would be at the end of a noose 30 feet in the air.

leanright on April 1, 2008 at 8:24 AM

Here’s hope Mugabe meets the same justice as his peers, Ceaucescu and Saddam.

irishspy on April 1, 2008 at 8:46 AM

Mugabe’s a parasite and won’t let go until he kills Zimbabwe.

He’s already killed it and many people in it. He is as bad as Idi Amin. Shows how totally worthless are the UN, African coalition forces, Jimmah Cotta, and liberals in general. Remember, they wanted the “oppressive” Rhodesian government driven out and supported the open slaughter of many whites. A lot of blood on many left hands.

wepeople on April 1, 2008 at 9:03 AM

Mugabe’s legacy is carved in stone. The party’s over. The place has been trashed. He’ll be lucky to leave with his noggin attached.

perroviejo on April 1, 2008 at 9:29 AM

Robert Mugabe will remain in power until he dies. After that, a bloodbath of mythic proportions will encompass the country as one Warlord after another will seize power in the various states.

The sad thing is no one will step in to fix the problem.

SeniorD on April 1, 2008 at 9:30 AM

Mugabe’s regime needs to join the ash heap of history. And then he should be shot.

CP on April 1, 2008 at 9:34 AM

Then he should be stood up and shot again…

GeneSmith on April 1, 2008 at 9:50 AM

I’m sure someone will find a way to blame it all on George W Bush. Maybe Rev Wright will call him a CIA plant, designed to kill Africans.

How does he stay in power? Maybe his inner clique is still rich, but doesn’t the average soldier see what’s happening to the country?

rbj on April 1, 2008 at 9:52 AM

The only hope is for some military leader to ‘escort’ Mugabe from power (preferably at room temperature as a warning to others), then work with the new leadership, letting them know they’re next if they start acting the same way.

michaelo on April 1, 2008 at 9:55 AM

I love the title of this write-up, where Mugabe’s party is ‘considering defeat’. I’m sure General Custer did likewise when the first arrow perforated his pompous hide.

It does suggest how Mugabe’s thugs are planning to get out of this; by declaring a runoff is needed, one they’ll be sure does not have the same unfortunate honesty of this election. For one thing, they’ll make sure the local results are not posted on the doors.

michaelo on April 1, 2008 at 10:25 AM

These soft diplomatic measures being suggested are for fools. He should be assassinated immediately, and all who support or tolerate him in neighbouring countries, like the corrupt nitwit Mbeki, should be put on notice.

Jaibones on April 1, 2008 at 10:27 AM

This is the kind of vicious, murdering tyrannical, tin-pot dictator, commie scum that the United Nations loves. The UN’s Commission on Sustainable Development gave Mugabe a STANDING OVATION not too long ago. Democrats, lefties of all sorts and the UN just love this guy. Have a look for yourself.

I first saw Robert Mugabe in the flesh at a UN Earth Summit in Johannesburg in 2002.

His arrival on the podium was preceded by US defence secretary Colin Powell, who was booed and jeered, and by Tony Blair, who met with similar indignities. Mugabe, on the other hand, was greeted by a tumultuous standing ovation. I wrote it off as a passing fad. At the time, black power fanatics were still pumped up over Mugabe’s ethnic cleansing of white farmers, and one assumed their enthusiasm would wear off once the consequences of Mugabe’s folly manifested themselves.

Maxx on April 1, 2008 at 10:32 AM

President Obama would do the same thing to the US if given free rein. Wipe out the winners and prop up the loosers. Kind of like the cultural revolution in China.

It sure worked well for them.

saiga on April 1, 2008 at 10:41 AM

His arrival on the podium was preceded by US defence secretary Colin Powell,

Colin Powell was Sec of State, not Defense

bernzright777 on April 1, 2008 at 11:24 AM

Colin Powell was Sec of State, not Defense

bernzright777 on April 1, 2008 at 11:24 AM

Good catch… I didn’t notice that. But the article was written by a Brit, probably got confused because Powell was in the Joint Chiefs of Staff for so long. You will also notice “defence” is spelled the British way.

Maxx on April 1, 2008 at 11:58 AM

(Source)

The delay had become a major talking point here, propelling the rumour mill in Harare into overdrive amid intense speculation. Of the six results announced so far, MDC has won in Chegutu West, Mutasa South and Mutare Central while ZANU (PF) has won Chegutu West, Goromonzi West and Chipinge central.

The MDC says it has won the election based on results that have been collated from MDC polling agents stationed at the various constituencies.

But our sources in the ZEC says there has been tinkering with the results, with House of Assembly results leaked to ZimDaily revealing that ZANU (PF) has been given 108 seats, MDC Tsvangirai 94, and MDC Mutambara with eight seats. It was not immediately possible to access the tally for senatorial results.

ZimDaily was told that there was now likely to be a run off after strategy meetings held last night between ZEC officials and military commanders resolved that declaring Mugabe an outright winner with the earlier planned  52 percent would torch protests, hence the new plan. ZEC will now announce results giving Morgan Tsvangirai 48 percent, Robert Mugabe 37 percent and Simba Makoni 15 percent, according to usually reliable sources in the National Command Centre.

The run-off, to be held in 21 days, would give the Mugabe regime ample time to re-strategize new sophisticated ways of stealing the vote in Mugabe’s favour.

According to the results collated by the MDC, however, the party says Tsvangirai won 67 percent of the votes.

MDC secretary general Tendai Biti maintained Tuesday: “Like we have stated, we have won this election.” Information minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu said the MDC is “lying and speculating” and is bent on a campaign of anarchy if the result doesn’t go in their favour.

ZEC chairman George Chiweshe said in a televised address last night the delay has been caused by verification of the results.

“It’s an absolute necessity that all results be meticulously analysed at this stage,” Chiweshe said. “The commission is aware that these results are eagerly awaited both within and outside our borders. However, it should be born in mind that it is a mammoth national exercise.

It’s a process to ensure the transparency, credibility and efficiency in the counting and collation of votes, starting from polling stations up to the command centre.”

Chiweshe threatened the media for applying undue pressure on the ZEC to announce the results.

“If that kind behaviour continues don’t expect much co-operation from the commission.”

Noel Kututwa, chairman of the independent local observer mission, the Zimbabwe Election Support Network, said: “The delay in announcing these results is fuelling speculation that there could be something going on.”

The SADC observer team head Jose Marcos Barrica of Angola last night whitewashed the election as “peaceful and credible,” eliciting a shocked response from hundreds of journalists and diplomats at the press briefing at the Rainbow Towers.

“We saw that the basic conditions for a free and fair election were there,” Barrica said, speaking through an incoherent interpreter.

SADC’s endorsement was apparently aimed at legitimatising the flawed results that the ZEC plans to announce.

However, the SADC mission is deeply divided over the endorsement of the election, amid reports part of the team has staunchly refused to sign the report which glosses about the freeness of the election, which they have condemned as far from free and fair.

A Pan African Parliament observer mission report has condemned the election as far too shy of the SADC guidelines and says there were ghost polling stations discovered on the outskirts of Harare in the centre of the bush.

Mugabe has rejected charges that he was fixing the election. “We don’t rig elections,” Mugabe said after casting his ballot at primary school in Highfield Saturday. “I cannot sleep with my conscience if I have rigged.”

(Source)

As you may imagine, running three pages about the same subject is not that hard, but I am not going to duplicate the working table of result that I have put together for the election results.

The table, for simplicity’s sake, is here.

The table will remain the topmost posting on the blog until all results are in.

Take care.

‘debvhu

Tensions are running high in Zimbabwe with the first votes being counted in the embattled country’s general election ¿ and the accusations are flying of cheating and vote-rigging.

Opponents of President Robert Mugabe, as well as foreign observers, claimed the 84-year-old had stuffed the ballot with “phantom voters”.

Despite those fears, victory seems likely for the opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change. Official results, however, will not be known until later in the week.

The election will decide the fate of a country enduring the highest rate of inflation in the world - 100,580.2 per cent - and an unemployment level of more than 80 per cent.

Once seen as the region’s breadbasket, the country is now suffering from previously unheard of shortages of basic foodstuffs such as cooking oil and bread.

Mr Mugabe has ruled Zimbabwe since a black liberation movement won its war against Ian Smith’s white-led “rebel” Rhodesia government in 1980. The country previously was a British colony.

Mr Mugabe has blamed the economic chaos on the West, which imposed sanctions after he allegedly rigged the 2002 elections.

Yesterday, as votes were counted at 9000 booths, Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai said his party had uncovered evidence of widespread vote rigging.

He said one million “ghost” voters had been registered in a northern region. Zimbabwe’s official population is about 13 million.

“Victory is assured in spite of the regime’s attempt to subvert the will of the people,” he said.

Mr Tsvangirai last year was assaulted by members of Mr Mugabe’s security forces.

A pan-African team of monitors alleged 8450 voters had been registered as living on a patch of deserted land in northern Harare, the capital.

“Despite the fact that the area is empty, voters were registered using addresses of the empty stands (blocks of land),” the team stated.

Mr Mugabe shrugged off the claims, warning the Opposition to respect any announcement on the result.

“We don’t rig elections,” he said. “I cannot sleep with my conscience if I have rigged.”

Mr Mugabe’s opponents are former finance minister, Simba Makoni, and Mr Tsvangirai.

The election will also determine the composition of Zimbabwe’s 210-strong parliament.

Opposition secretary-general Tendai Biti said the swing to the MDC was “irreversible”.

“Thus far, short of a miracle, we have won this election beyond any reasonable doubt,” he said.

(Source)

Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai said he was confident of winning Saturday’s general elections while accusing President Robert Mugabe’s government of attempting to rig the outcome.

“Victory is assured in spite of the regime’s attempt to subvert the will of the people,” Tsvangirai, leader of the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), told reporters after voting in the Avondale suburb of Harare.

Tsvangirai, looking to end Mugabe’s 28-year rule in the former British colony, said his party had uncovered evidence of widespread vote-rigging.

“We have unearthed one million ghost voters in Uzumba-Maramba-Pfungwe (in northern Zimbabwe), and 33 ghost polling stations in (central) Mashonaland,” said Tsvangirai who was runner-up to Mugabe in the last elections in 2002.

“Even if the MDC wins, the election cannot be said to be free and fair,” he added.

(Source)