Zimbabwe recount 'rigged', says international observer 21/04/2008 - 14:04:47
The votes recount in Zimbabwe's parliamentary elections is a rigged sham, an international observer said today.
The recount in 23 seats was ordered after president Robert Mugabe's party lost its majority in the ballot last month.
Fears that he was simply using the opportunity to manipulate the figures in his favour were backed up when south African politician Dianne Kohler-Barnard dismissed the process as "futile".
"From what I have seen and experienced in Zimbabwe over the last three days, it is clear that the process of recounting the contested wards from the recent elections is fatally flawed," she said.
"Of particular concern was the evidence of ballot box tampering that I witnessed personally, which points to a concerted effort to rig the election results in order to bring about a Mugabe 'victory'," she said.
Results of the presidential election, held at the same time, still have not been announced. Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai claims he won an outright victory, but independent observers say it is more likely that he would face a run-off election against 84-year-old Mugabe.
MDC Secretary-General Tendai Biti said yesterday that there were clear signs of irregularities in the recount.
The opposition also claimed mounting violence and intimidation against people who voted for their candidates, especially in rural areas that once were Mugabe strongholds.
Violence had displaced 3,000 people, injured 500 and left 10 dead, Mr Biti said.
He said key members of the opposition's administration had been arrested, along with more than 400 supporters. Mr Biti and Mr Tsvangirai - who has been accused of treason - say they cannot return to Zimbabwe because they would face immediate arrest.
Elections officials said the recount was going smoothly.
However, "there are signs that the counting might take longer than the three days we had projected," the state Herald newspaper quoted an elections officer as saying.
The Herald said in some constituencies, counting was proceeding at a "snail's pace" and was likely to take about one week to complete.
Ms Kohler-Barnard said the process was marred by delays and administrative problems.
"The repeated miscommunication of venue addresses meant that party agents and electoral observers were frequently posted to the incorrect venue, thus undermining the observation process and contributing to further delays in the recount," she said.
She went on to list specific instances of ballot box irregularities. Meanwhile international pressure on Mugabe to release the presidential election results continued to mount.
The government of neighbouring Malawi called for Zimbabwe's government to resume talks with Britain, white farmers and the opposition party - all of whom Mugabe considers his enemies.
The statement indicated growing differences among southern African leaders on how to help resolve Zimbabwe's crisis.
"The Government of Malawi believes that the people of Zimbabwe should not live in the past. They must move on. Therefore, we believe that a new set of negotiations could be initiated at different levels ... so that Zimbabwe can begin to develop and transform its economy," the statement said.
Zimbabwe's economy, with official inflation raging beyond 100,500%, began unravelling when Mugabe ordered takeovers in the late 1990s of large, fertile farms owned by a few thousand minority whites.
Britain initially had paid to buy some of the farms but stopped, saying Mugabe was giving the land to cronies and relatives instead of landless black Zimbabweans.
New negotiations for British support for land reform ended in 1997 when the newly-elected Labour government said it had no responsibility for whites who own farms in Zimbabwe.
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The votes recount in Zimbabwe's parliamentary elections is a rigged sham, an international observer said today.
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