Zimbabwe’s justice minister has dismissed as ”utter rubbish” claims by the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) that the political playing field is uneven ahead of national polls. Zimbabweans are preparing to elect a new president, Parliament and local councillors on March 29, but the MDC has expressed fears of vote rigging.
South Africa has steadfastly refused to join in the chorus of criticism of Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe despite paying an ever higher price for the crisis across its northern border. As Zimbabwe goes to the polls this weekend, analysts believe South African President Thabo Mbeki may feel little enthusiasm towards Mugabe but will never embarrass his fellow leader.
Zimbabwe police on Tuesday arrested opposition officials and a pilot delivering campaign material for Saturday’s general election at a small airport just outside Harare. An opposition parliamentary candidate representing Morgan Tsvangirai’s faction of the Movement for Democratic Change was among those arrested.
President Robert Mugabe says an opposition win in Saturday’s tightly contested polls would be ”the greatest curse” for Zimbabwe. Mugabe, who is battling for his political survival, called on opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) supporters to ”come home” to his ruling Zanu-PF, the government-mouthpiece Herald reported on Tuesday.
Zimbabweans go to the polls on Saturday hoping for an end to a chronic economic crisis that has condemned millions to grinding poverty and prompted the exodus of up to a third of the population. The joint presidential, legislative and local council polls come at a time when the country’s inflation rate has breached the 100Â 000% mark.
President Robert Mugabe on Sunday vowed that his main political rival would never rule Zimbabwe, as the opposition raised concerns that the governing party would rig the March 29 ballot. Meanwhile, opposition Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai drew the biggest crowd so far in the election campaign.
President Robert Mugabe made a defiant campaign speech on Saturday a week ahead of perhaps his toughest election battle, saying Zimbabwe’s main opposition party will never rule during his lifetime. Mugabe also threatened to expel companies from former colonial ruler Britain after the March 29 polls.
A rights group on Friday urged Zimbabwe’s security forces to defy commanders who have vowed they would support only President Robert Mugabe to rule the country after next week’s poll. ”Go against the orders of your commanders, lay down your arms and rally behind the people of Zimbabwe to foster reconstruction and development,” said the National Constitutional Assembly.
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe warned the opposition on Friday against Kenyan-style violence if they lose next week’s election, saying security forces stood ready to crush such protests. The 84-year-old leader faces a stiff challenge from former ally Simba Makoni and long time rival Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the main faction of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.
Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe has used massive bribery, grossly-biased state media and inflammatory language to ensure he wins next week’s polls and the regional Southern African Development Community (SADC) grouping has not been able to stop him, a local rights body said on Thursday.
Zimbabwe’s main opposition leader and presidential candidate in the March 29 general elections said on Thursday that the voters’ register is filled with tens of thousands of ghost voters. Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), also said that the voters’ roll was in a shambles and threatened to pull out of the elections.
South Africa will send a delegation of 55 observers to Zimbabwe’s general elections, the government said in Cape Town on Thursday. ”The South African contingent will comprise representatives from civil society, business, religious leaders, members of Parliament and government officials,” spokesperson Themba Maseko told journalists.
President Robert Mugabe is urging Zimbabweans to ”vote for the fist”. His campaign posters — portraits of Mugabe wearing an olive green military-type shirt and holding a clenched fist aloft — reflect his hard-line politics, and remind voters of the crack troops who have helped keep him in power for 28 years.
President Robert Mugabe’s supporters have used violence to intimidate opponents in the run-up to next week’s Zimbabwe election, undermining chances of a fair poll, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday. Mugabe faces the strongest challenge to his 28-year rule in presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections on March 29.
Millions who fled Zimbabwe amid its economic collapse blame President Robert Mugabe, but their inability to vote in elections this month may boost his chances to stay in power. Opposition figures, who pose Mugabe’s biggest electoral challenge yet, have urged them to return to be entitled to vote in the March 29 polls, but few are likely to.
Zimbabwe’s election body has no legal powers to stop security chiefs from threatening to reject an opposition victory in this month’s poll, a senior official said on Tuesday. Analysts say President Robert Mugabe faces the strongest challenge to his 28-year rule in presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections on March 29.
With her hand on her cheek, the 68-year-old woman gazes patiently at the cars racing past her, hoping someone will stop and buy the firewood at her feet so that she can feed her three grandchildren. MaNcube, as she is called in her village in Shangani, a dry arid land 360km west of Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare, has one plea.
When police collect obviously bruised and bloodied individuals from ruling-party headquarters and lay criminal charges not against the perpetrators of the bloodshed but their victims, there can no longer be even the pretence that the police are anything other than the ruling party’s agents.
A former finance minister challenging Robert Mugabe for the presidency denied on Sunday he was a Western puppet and said such accusations were to divert attention from Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown. Simba Makoni is running as an independent candidate after being expelled from the ruling Zanu-PF party.
Zimbabwe’s main labour union on Sunday called on millions of Zimbabweans living and working in South Africa to go home to vote in the country’s March 29 elections, South Africa’s Talk Radio 702 reported. Zimbabweans will vote in presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections in two weeks.
Britain is preparing to expel hundreds of failed asylum-seekers back to Zimbabwe because the government believes they are at no ”general risk” in their home country. The mass programme of deportations could affect more than 1Â 000 Zimbabweans who have enjoyed protection under a moratorium on deportations.
Thousands of teachers in Zimbabwe’s state schools have ended a three-week strike after being awarded a 754% salary increase by the government, their union said on Friday. ”We urge teachers to return to work,” said Raymond Majongwe, secretary general of the Progressive Teachers’ Union of Zimbabwe.
State media in Zimbabwe on Friday accused prominent South Africa-based Mail & Guardian publisher Trevor Ncube of donating R300Â 000 to President Robert Mugabe’s rival Simba Makoni two weeks ahead of scheduled parliamentary polls.
Zimbabwe’s crackdown on political dissent may need to be discussed by the United Nations Security Council, a prominent Southern African human rights activist declared this week. Opponents of President Robert Mugabe have reported large-scale harassment and intimidation in the tense period leading to elections due later this month.
President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe has awarded large pay hikes to civil servants, including teachers, ahead of March 29 polls, local news reports said on Wednesday. Addressing a rally on Tuesday at a school in Inyathi, in the country’s Matabeleland North province, Mugabe said he had signed the new salary schedule earlier in the week.
Wearing handcuffs and leg-irons in an African prison, the former SAS soldier who tried to overthrow the government of Equatorial Guinea in a coup d’état on Tuesday claimed the main instigator of the plot was the London-based Lebanese millionaire Ely Calil.
Zimbabwe’s Electoral Commission has put too few polling stations in the cities, where the opposition has strongest support, an independent election monitoring group said on Tuesday. The group said Harare had 379 polling stations for about 760 000 registered voters — or 22 seconds for each vote if there was maximum turnout.
Zimbabwe’s government on Tuesday sought to allay fears over a new equity law to give locals a controlling share in business ownership, saying it would not lead to expropriation of foreign-owned firms. "This is not going to be expropriation," Indigenisation and Empowerment Minister Paul Mangwana told a news conference.
A new equity law passed by President Robert Mugabe to ensure the population gets a majority stake in public-owned firms will plunge Zimbabwe into deeper economic woes, analysts predicted on Monday. "It will entail the destruction of the economy," Harare-based economist Godfrey Kanyenze said.
A ”virulent and vicious” smear campaign is being waged against Zimbabwe over the list of observers invited to witness the country’s elections on March 29, the country’s ambassador to South Africa, Simon Moyo, said on Monday. The campaign is being driven by the West and certain sections of the South African media, he said in a statement.
Tony Leon, the former leader of the Democratic Alliance (DA), is writing to the chair of the foreign affairs portfolio committee in Parliament, asking him to summon Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to explain what the government is doing to protect South Africa businesses from being nationalised by Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe.
Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe has handed out millions of United States dollars worth of imported brand new agricultural equipment, vehicles, generators and cattle in what critics said was a massive vote-buying exercise ahead of elections this month.