- Title: ZIMBABWE: Zimbabwe's opposition claims win on early results, fears rigging
- Date: 30th March 2008
- Summary: VARIOUS OF PEOPLE QUEUING FOR BREAD PEOPLE WALKING OUT OF THE SHOP CARRYING BREAD
- Embargoed: 14th April 2008 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Zimbabwe
- Country: Zimbabwe
- Topics: Domestic Politics
- Reuters ID: LVACYLABD3VZVPAXKDQ6L9GNR3L3
- Story Text: Zimbabwe's opposition claims victory based on early results but fears rigging and delays in the announcement of final results.
Zimbabwe's opposition claimed victory on Sunday (March 30) based on early results from an election in which it is trying to unseat President Robert Mugabe after 28 years of power and end an economic collapse.
Tendai Biti, secretary general of the main opposition Movemement for Democratic Change (MDC), told reporters, diplomats and observers at a briefing in Harare that the election was a historic moment for the whole nation but added that there was a concern about the delayed announcement of the final results.
"We are concerned about the delay in announcing the results, and we think that is potential of a constitutional subversion of a constitutional process," Biti said.
The opposition, headed by former trade unionist Morgan Tsvangirai, has accused 84-year-old Mugabe of employing election-rigging tactics in an attempt to stay in power and African observers say they detected fraud in Saturday's ballot.
Mugabe, who accuses the West of sabotaging Zimbabwe's economy, expressed confidence on Saturday he would be returned to office. "We will succeed. We will conquer," he said.
Observers from the Pan-African parliament said in a letter to the commission they had found more than 8,000 non-existent voters registered on empty land in a Harare constituency.
Most international observers were banned, but a team from the regional grouping, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), said later on Sunday it found the election to be "peaceful and credible". Critics say the SADC, which has tried to mediate over Zimbabwe, is too soft on Mugabe.
The former guerrilla leader, in power since independence from Britain in 1980, rejected the vote-rigging allegations.
Biti said the MDC's election agents had reported that early results posted at polling stations showed Tsvangirai was projected to win 66 percent of the vote in the capital Harare, an opposition stronghold.
He said Tsvangirai had made significant inroads in Mugabe's rural strongholds by leading in the southern province of Masvingo and Mashonaland Central Province, north of Harare, where the MDC has not won a parliamentary seat since 2000.
Tsvangirai's winning trend had also extended to Mugabe's home province of Mashonaland West, where the MDC had taken a rural parliamentary seat, said Biti.
He said that in Zimbabwe's second city of Bulawayo, another opposition power base, Tsvangirai had a slight edge over former Finance Minister and ruling ZANU-PF official Simba Makoni -- also standing against Mugabe.
But Makoni, whose decision to run was seen by many analysts as a sign of increasing unease in ZANU-PF ranks, was leading in Zimbabwe's southwestern Matabeleland South Province.
The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission initially said it would start to announce official results on Sunday but the Chairman of Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) George Chiweshe said the process may take longer.
"I don't know. These are four elections, we have never held four elections before, so we don't know how long it's gonna take us this time," Chiweshe said.
Final results are not expected for several days from the presidential, parliamentary and local polls. If no candidate wins more than 51 percent of the vote, the election will go into a second round.
Once-prosperous Zimbabwe is suffering from the world's highest inflation rate of more than 100,000 percent, chronic shortages of food and fuel and a rampant HIV/AIDS epidemic that has contributed to a steep decline in life expectancy.
"There is no food in the shops, no mealie meal. We have to eat bread instead of sadza. Here we live on sadza but we end up eating bread. No sugar, no cooking oil, no fuel. School fees are too high, sky rocketing.
People are suffering, we have nothing to do, no jobs," Bulawayo resident, Sithandiwe Musi said.
"So we think there is going to be a change. We hope there is not going to be rigging because we want to win . This time we are winning. This time Tsavangirai is going to rule, that's what we want. We want a change. We want good living," Musi said.
If no candidate wins more than 51 percent of the vote, the election will go into a second round. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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