Zimbabwe Regime Claims Win Amid Charges

Ruling party officials claimed a crushing victory Friday in parliamentary elections, but opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai condemned what he called massive fraud and called on Zimbabweans to defend their rights.

The opposition Movement for Democratic Change appeared to have lost seats from the 57 it won in 2000. But criticism of the election here and in the West underscored the view that its losses were due to fraud by the regime of President Robert Mugabe.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who earlier this year included Zimbabwe on a list of “outposts of tyranny,” said Friday that the vote was neither free nor fair.

“The independent press was muzzled, freedom of assembly was constrained, food was used as a weapon to sway hungry voters, and millions of Zimbabweans who have been forced by the nation’s economic collapse to emigrate were disenfranchised,” Rice said in a statement.

Mugabe, 81, who has ruled since Zimbabwe gained independence from Britain in 1980, appoints 30 of the 150 members of the House of Assembly. Of the remaining 120 seats, the MDC failed to win the 51 it needed to block the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front, or ZANU-PF, from changing the constitution, strengthening its grip on power and preparing the way for a party member to succeed Mugabe.

Reginald Matchaba-Hove of the Zimbabwe Election Support Network, a nongovernmental group that deployed 6,000 observers, predicted that the opposition would get as many as 41 seats.

After the 2000 elections, which international observers also judged to be fraudulent, the MDC launched a series of unsuccessful legal challenges. This time, Tsvangirai bypassed legal action and appeared to call for some form of protest.

“We are deeply disturbed by the fraudulent activities we have unearthed,” Tsvangirai said during a packed news conference. “We do not accept that this represents the national sentiment.... This government has fraudulently once more betrayed the will of the people, led them through a garden path believing that they’re going through a process which is democratically transparent and at the end of the day would reveal the true will of the people.”

Tsvangirai added, “We believe the people of Zimbabwe must defend their votes, their right to a free and a fair election.” But he sidestepped a question on how MDC supporters should defend their vote.

Matchaba-Hove said about 10% of voters were turned away from the polls. Even though violence has declined, he expressed concern about an atmosphere of intimidation.

The opposition and human rights groups have criticized the election as unfair, saying ZANU-PF officials have denied food to opposition supporters, padded the rolls with the names of up to 2 million dead or bogus voters and provided uneven access to the media. Mugabe has rejected the allegations as ridiculous.

Throughout the day Friday, results trickled in from rural communities, traditional strongholds of the ruling party, which worried some Western diplomats. “The results are coming in very slowly, which in the past was an indicator that they were cooking the books,” a diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Police responded swiftly Thursday night when the organization Women of Zimbabwe Arise held a prayer vigil in a square in Harare, the capital. The 257 women who were arrested were released from Harare Central Police Station on Friday, and many of them said they had been beaten.

Like others, Emily Ngwenya, 74, had a swollen face and lacerated limbs. She said the women were praying for divine intervention on election day to bring change.

The group’s coordinator, Jenni Williams, who said she had been arrested 18 times, criticized Tsvangirai for not leading strong, peaceful protests.

“If Morgan really means that we must defend our vote, please can he set a good example and show us what to do and we will follow him,” she said. She said he must be willing to march and face arrest and the risk of violence alongside his supporters.