Widespread intimidation seen in Zimbabwe vote
By ANGUS SHAW, Associated Press Writer3 minutes ago
Roaming bands of government supporters heckled, harassed or threatened people
into voting in a runoff election Friday in which President Robert Mugabe was
the only candidate, ensuring he will remain in power despite international
condemnation of the balloting as a sham.
Residents said they were forced to vote by threats of violence or arson from
the Mugabe supporters, who searched for anyone without an ink-stained finger —
the telltale sign that they had cast a ballot.
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, who withdrew from the runoff after an
onslaught of state-sponsored violence against his Democratic Movement for
Change, said the results would "reflect only the fear of the people."
"What is happening today is not an election. It is an exercise in mass
intimidation," he said at a news conference.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called the vote a "sham," and said the
United States would use its position as president of the U.N. Security Council
until July 1 to drive international condemnation of Mugabe's regime.
"Those operating in Zimbabwe should know that there are those ... who believe
that the Security Council should consider sanctions," she said at a meeting in
Japan. "We intend to bring up the issue of Zimbabwe in the council. We will see
what the council decides to do."
The presidents of Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda, in a rare
comment about the affairs of another African country, said Zimbabwe's
one-candidate runoff, "cannot be a solution," to the country's political
crisis. The presidents, at a regular summit of the East African Community held
in Kigali, Rwanda, urged Mugabe's and Tsvangirai's parties "to come together
and work out an amicable solution through dialogue in the interest of all
Zimbabweans."
Jacob Zuma, the head of South Africa's African National Congress, said the
situation in Zimbabwe was "extremely difficult and distressing."
"We reiterate that the situation is now out of control," he said in
Johannesburg, South Africa, in one of the few times a senior South African
politician has openly criticized Mugabe. "Nothing short of a negotiated
political arrangement will get Zimbabwe out of the conflict it has been plunged
into."
European Union spokeswoman Krisztina Nagy said the election result will be
"hollow and meaningless."
Reporters and independent observers in Harare saw low turnout. As polls closed
at 7 p.m., officials at one Harare station said they hadn't seen a voter for
several hours.
Paramilitary police in riot gear deployed in a central Harare park, then began
patrolling the city. Marshals led some voters to polls, and militant Mugabe
supporters roamed the streets, singing revolutionary songs, heckling people and
asking why they were not voting.
Human rights activist Dusani Ncube estimated that fewer than 2,000 people voted
in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second-largest city. But he said people in surrounding
rural areas were told that if they did not vote their homes would be burned
down.
Human rights groups have said tens of thousands of rural Zimbabweans had been
displaced by campaign violence and would not be able to vote.
"I've got no option but to go and vote so that I can be safe," said a young
woman selling tomatoes in Harare.
A gunman in civilian clothes was seen attacking a TV news cameraman and the
voter he was interviewing on a Harare street, then forcing them into a police
vehicle. In addition, two Zimbabwean freelance journalists were detained by
police Friday as they waited to watch Mugabe vote at a Harare polling station.
Hundreds of journalists, mainly from Western media organizations, have been
banned from covering Zimbabwe's elections.
Tsvangirai, whose name remained on the ballot because his withdrawal on Sunday
came too late, said he still wanted negotiations about a transitional authority
for Zimbabwe but was not sure whether he could talk with Mugabe, 84.
The two leaders have been under pressure to sit down and find a solution to the
crisis in Zimbabwe.
Mugabe, who has been president since independence in 1980, offered an olive
branch to the opposition Thursday, saying he was "open to discussion" with
them.
He appeared jovial as he voted, telling a reporter in Harare he was feeling
"very fit, very optimistic, upbeat and hungry."
Shortly after voting, Mugabe told Southern African Development Community
observers he was confident he would be victorious, a spokesman for the key
regional bloc said on Angolan state radio.
Marwick Khumalo, head of the Pan-African Parliament observer mission, told the
BBC the mood in Harare was somber and that the turnout was low.
He said while walking in one high density suburb, observers mistook a long line
of people for voters waiting at a polling station, only to find that the people
were queuing for bread.
"It was quite a very long queue," he said.
Khumalo said he had not seen signs of intimidation and that the organization
would make an announcement on the election on Sunday.
However, he said he had not seen "the ingredients that make this election free
and fair."
Tsvangirai was first in a field of four in the March vote, an embarrassment to
Mugabe. The official tally said he did not gain the votes necessary to avoid a
runoff against Mugabe. Tsvangirai's party and its allies also won control of
parliament in March, dislodging Mugabe's party for the first time since
independence in 1980.
Mugabe was once hailed as a post-independence leader committed to development
and reconciliation, but in recent years has been denounced as a dictator intent
only on holding onto power through intimidation and election fraud.
Zimbabwe was the topic of long, closed-door discussions Friday in Egypt among
foreign ministers gathered ahead of an African Union summit that begins Monday
— and that Mugabe has said he will attend.
Some AU members say the runoff shouldn't have been held, while others, such as
regional powerhouse South Africa, refuse to publicly criticize Mugabe even on
that point.
"Our position is that the parties in Zimbabwe should work together for the
future of Zimbabwe," South African Foreign Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told
AP Television News.