Jason Moyo

The state-owned Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation does not show the violence or cover the MDC in its news bulletins.

As Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe rolls out his strategy to hang on to power, attacks on his opponents are getting bloodier by the day.

Mugabe has invited 2 000 supporters and campaign leaders to a launch rally at his party's headquarters in Harare. The event will cap nearly a month of strategic work by his top advisers to reverse his first-round loss to Tsvangirai, leader of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.

Howard's mother is just happy her problem child has a job. But she has asked him to spare her the details of what he actually does for a living. He is a ''Green Bomber'', a member of Zimbabwe's National Youth Service (NYC). Zanu-PF says he and others like him are learning patriotism, morality and service to the nation, as well as skills that will stem the ''unpatriotic'' brain drain.

The Zimbabwean government announced this week that the run-off presidential election between opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai and President Robert Mugabe will take place before the end of July. In a special edition of the Government Gazette, published on Wednesday, it announced that the election will take place in 90 days.

Residents wishing to leave restricted rural areas have to seek 'authorisation' letters. In an indication of how blatant election-related violence has become in Zimbabwe, witnesses have described how a 24-year-old man was chased into a police station in Muzarabani, north of Harare, last Sunday and beaten to death.

A picture is emerging of a Zimbabwe Electoral Commission crippled by what one official described as ''a flat purse'' and difficulties in attracting fresh staff to run the elections. Tomasz Salomao, SADC executive secretary, said officials had assured a ministerial committee that a date for the presidential run-off would be announced once all the logistical requirements were met.

Sudden leaks of election results by the government shortly before the verification of the results were an attempt to prepare Zimbabweans for a run-off between the two leading presidential candidates, according to the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Two reports on Wednesday quoted government and election commission sources saying that President Robert Mugabe had indeed lost the presidential election.

For a massive ship that carries tons of ammunition and has its own cranes on board, the controversial Chinese ship carrying arms for Zimbabwe is about as easy to pin down as a cockroach in a dark, damp cellar. The An Yue Jiang is carrying three million rounds of ammunition for AK-47s, 1 500 rocket-propelled grenades and several thousand mortar rounds.

In their front room, 200m from Gwanzura stadium, the Matizas could just hear President Robert Mugabe vow that he would never allow the opposition to take power. For the eight members of the family, Mugabe's threats during his Independence Day speech last Friday had special meaning.

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has warned Zimbabwe that it will accept no more excuses from the Zimbabwean Electoral Commission (ZEC) if it fails to release the results of the Zimbabwean presidential elections by Saturday.

With the arms freighter An Yue Jiang reportedly returning to China, the Zimbabwean military is being forced to review how it ships arms to the country. The South African Press Association reported that the ship had set off home. It had run up against a High Court interdict in South Africa and the threat of trade union ''blacking'' action at ports throughout the region.