The opposition Movement for Democratic Change announced on Thursday it will take part in parliamentary elections scheduled for March 31, despite widespread fears of vote rigging and political violence.
”We participate under protest,” said MDC spokesperson Paul Themba Nyathi. ”We participate to keep the flames of hope for change alive.”
The decision was taken at a meeting in Harare of the executive committee, headed by opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
Given the widespread fears that polling will be violent and unfair, Themba Nyathi said his party had agreed to take part ”with a heavy heart”.
”More than ever the election playing field remains uneven and unequal,” he told reporters.
Last year, the opposition suspended participation in all elections to protest biased electoral laws and to demand an end to intimidation and to media and security laws that prevent fair campaigning.
It demanded electoral reforms to meet regional standards of the 14-nation Southern African Development Community, and though some reforms have been announced by the government opposition leaders have repeatedly insisted they do not go far enough.
President Robert Mugabe last month confirmed the appointment of what the government called an independent Electoral Commission but the opposition said its head, Judge George Chiweshe, was not impartial.
The opposition has also protested electoral laws that allow government employees, police and troops to run 12 000 polling stations across the country and monitor voting for 120 elected seats in the Harare Parliament.
Mugabe has vowed bar Western observers from the election, saying only ”friendly” African countries will be permitted to send observers.
The opposition won 57 seats in the last parliamentary elections in 2000 that were marred by violence blamed on Mugabe’s party and were pronounced neither free nor fair by independent observers.
Tsvangirai narrowly lost presidential polls in 2002 that were also condemned by observers as deeply flawed by political intimidation and vote rigging.
Under public order and security laws, police banned 45 opposition meetings and rallies last year and disrupted several opposition gatherings in January.
The opposition has been denied coverage by the dominant state newspapers and the sole radio and television broadcaster owned by the government.
The opposition blames Mugabe for plunging the country into economic and political crisis with his autocratic rule.
Zimbabwe has the highest inflation rate in the world and as many as five million of its 12,5-million people have received food aid over the past four years.
”This decision [to contest the elections] is based on the demands of the working people of Zimbabwe who wish to exercise their hard fought and inalienable rights of voting and still make a statement against the tyranny of this criminal state,” Themba Nyathi said. – Sapa-AFP